We offer a wide range of blues classes and are ever adding to our repertoire. Check out some of the classes we teach:

What Is Blues Dancing? 

This as a simple one-hour class to discuss the history of the dance. It is often included in our beginner series, covering all the major blues basic steps while incorporating historical context at every turn.

Intermediate Blues

We recommend starting this class after you’ve taken a wide range of beginner classes and feel comfortable with those blues idiom styles. In this series, we tackle different partner dancing concepts, more blues idioms, and add more layers to your blues dancing. Expect a faster pace in this class in covering content and more peer interactions to help you develop your critique ability.

Jookin’ (Jukin’)

Jookin’ is one of the oldest forms of historical blues dancing and gets it’s name from the place is grew,  Juke joints. Juke joints could hold the band, the bar and a small number of dancers; they danced the way the music moved them in the space they had. As opposed to a ballroom dance that may travel a lot, Jookin stays in place more times than not in relation to the space. Since Jookin’ is a umbrella term, we’ll spend time going over the blues basics that are commonly associated with this style, like funky butt, fishtails, etc.

Ballroomin’

With more space and building off the popular dancing in the bigger ballrooms, this style grew out of the slower songs that bands would play in the Savoy Club, Cotton Clubs, and various ballrooms in the north. Dancers would generally be more upright, pull off larger moves and travel the floor more with the increased space. We start with the Savoy Walk previous taught in the beginner classes, along with other styles that were popular.

Struttin’

Struttin’ was born in Memphis, TN and danced to the local blues joints. This variation steps on every beat, and is primarily done to faster blues tunes. Danced in close embrace, the partners create a distinctive “lean to” connection this dance emphasizes a solid pulse like all blues styles, but has a distinctive chug or “jogging” feel to the dance.

ABCs of Solo Movement 

ABCs of Solo Movement is geared toward building your dance vocabulary and musicality. Start moving to the music through standard moves and variations. Learning solo movement will not only make you more comfortable in your own dancing, but will also greatly enhance partner dancing.

Soul Moves

Every now and then, we change it up and dance to soul music and this class is aimed at showing you how this music differs from blues.

 

 

*Credit and shout out to the Virginia Blues group, Dirt Cheap Blues for these excellent blues style descriptions. Check out Dirt Cheap Blues for even more explanations and other blues variations.

http://www.dirtcheapblues.com/blues-dance-styles.html