For the past year I have been saying that I want to learn balboa, but every week, when Wednesday night came around, I was always too tired and lazy after work, and then over the winter months it was too cold for me to brave the snow and minus degree temperatures, especially when my bed was so comfy...
Then I told myself that during my three month trip to San Francisco, I would have no excuses, and that I would take the opportunity to come back to London with a new dance under my belt...
FAIL.
Now I'm back in London, the weather is great, I'm currently unemployed and I have no excuses. So last night I finally made it to The Quick! Quick! Club for my second ever balboa lesson, and I loved it!
The Quick! Quick! Club takes place every Wednesday night at Peter Parker's Rock 'n' Roll Club, located on Denmark Street in Central London. A little trivia for you - this club was, in a previous life, the Regent Sound Studios, where The Rolling Stones recorded their first album and The Kinks recorded 'You Really Got Me'. Wicked.
There is both a basics and an improvers class with a dance freestyle afterwards that goes on until midnight. The classes are taught by the very stylish Paul Crook and Natasha Hall, who teach the moves in a clear and comfortable manner. The atmosphere is really relaxed, and the bar itself, although small, is spacious enough - in fact, a small club such as this demonstrates the effectiveness of a dance style with a close embrace. Additionally, there are old movies projected on to the walls, to entertain you if you're taking a break from the dancing.
I love how smooth and subtle this dance looks and I enjoy watching people alternating between swing or lindy and balboa in the course of a song. It looks so stylish, and helpfully, provides an opportunity for a little breather during the faster numbers...which I would love, given that I normally end up a sweaty mess when I'm out dancing!
Now that I have started up with the classes, I am determined to stick to it and master this dance! It can be a bit frustrating, because I always want to be good at things straight away, but this is going to take some practice. The added incentive is that my boyfriend can dance balboa already, so hopefully we will be able to dance it together soon...
I'll keep you updated on my progress, but until then, here's a clip of Paul and Natasha dancing at Southbank:
stick at it, it seems hard for a while then just sort of starts to click. we love to swing jive and do lindy but bal, for some reason gives that extra bit of pleasure, we love it to death!!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the encouragement, Tim! I am determined to stick to it - in fact, I just got back from The Quick! Quick! Club! Hopefully I will get comfortable with it soon - practise, practise, practise! :)
ReplyDeleteSounds fantastic! I've been wanting to try this for ages, but like you said always too tired, too cold. I'm going to make the effort this month! :-) x
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