ALBERTA INSPIRATION WEEKEND THREE!

February 18 – 20, 2011

Sunday February 20, 9:21pm

G’evening AIW Attendees!

As you’re all settling into bed (or into a car seat) after a most wonderful, inspirational weekend of dancing music and friends, I want to share with you a list of thank yous. This weekend was full of numerous inspiring instructors, volunteers, and attendees. First of all, thank you to all of you for coming to this weekend with an infectious excited enthusiasm and for bringing that onto the dance floor. The vibe all weekend was positive, and I always love seeing our community come together. It’s because of all of you that a weekend like this is successful! Here are my thank yous, in the order of how I think of people (and hopefully I haven’t forgotten anyone, but if I have please tell me so that I can apologize profusely)….

Thank you to all of the instructors! Your enthusiasm, expertise, and general inspiration was greatly enjoyed and I can’t wait to see all that you’ve taught us on the dance floor! Ashley, Birkley, Carolyn, Curtis, Dave H, Dave P, Eric M, Erik S, Gary, Glenn, Greg, Heather I, Heather R, Heidi, Julia, Julie, Kalina, Krystal, Luis, Matt, Nicole, Rob, Ryan, Sierra, Tasha, Tracy, Tyra

Thank you to all of the volunteers! Events like this couldn’t happen without your commitment and willingness to assist. Especially to Tim for being official volunteer coordinator! Kristen B, Kathy, Amber, Tyra, Laura, Liz, Sarah, Steph, Rob, Greg, Katie M, Tim, Nicole, Yuen-Ying, Matt, Tasha, Erik, Ryan.

For the most delicious food: Homemade cookies on Friday, thank you Tyra and Amber! Holy moly were those amazing! Lovingly prepared fruit, veg, cheese and meat dishes (& jell-o and cookies), thank you Sarah and Michael (and Sarah’s mom!).

For spinning some great tunes during the band breaks: Bobbie, Dave Hall and Dave Parry. Awesome!

Thank you to Leah for organizing a really fun and really funny Jack & Jill! I believe the participants and the observers equally enjoyed the combined sillyness and talent from this competition.

And, thank you to Toe Tappin’ Swing for organizing Saturday night’s “The Big Band Inspiration Ball”. It was great to dance to Johnny Summers’ Lil Big Band. Matthew, we appreciate your assistance over the weekend.

Thank you again to all of you for helping make the weekend amazing. See you all at PLEXi Gras, or sooner!

<3

Jo (& Curtis & Heather)

Are you excited?! We’re excited!!!

Alberta Inspiration Weekend Three is happening, and it’s happening soon!
February 18 – 20, 2011.

Check out our Workshops tab for more information.

See you there!

FRIDAY

7:30 – 8:30 COOKING SESSION

• Basic Aerials – Julia & Eric

This class is not included in the regular AIW workshop registration.  The cost is $5 at the door.  Intermediate dancers only, partners are recommended.

We will be teaching a frog jump, jump for joy, L-train (C-train) and if time the start of a fancier aerial. There won’t be any big dangers or lifting, flipping etc. Bring your jumpin’ shoes!

SATURDAY

10:00 – REGISTRATION

10:30 – 11:30  GREY CELL WAKE UP

• Lindy Basics – Krystal & Gary

Just like you start your day right with a nutritious breakfast, kick off this workshop with delicious Lindy fundamentals! Wake up to scrumptiousness with core moves & concepts, fun exercises, and food for thought.

• Mixin’ It Up – Heidi & Dave Hall

Dust off some of those fun old familiar 6 and 8 count moves, and learn some funky new ones.  Try some cool combos and learn how to
combine 6, 8 and other count patterns on the social dance floor.  You should have a vocabulary of: basic 6 count patterns including passes and turns, 8 count moves including turns, swing-out variations, and side-by-side Charleston.

11:45 – 12:45  LE PETIT PULSE

• Balboa Basics 101 – Julie & Krystal

Dust off those heels, shine your best cap-toes, and “Shuffle-step” your way down to Balboa Basics for some up-tempo, fun dancing! Julie and Krystal will guide you through the basic footwork patterns and body connection, with a few fun moves thrown in along the way! Beginners welcome!

• Balboa Advanced – Birkley & Nicole

Calgary joins Edmonton for an all-out Balboa exclusive event! Nicole (Calgary) and Birkley (Edmonton) will deliver an advanced Bal-Swing class that is intended to be both challenging and rewarding. Look forward to alternative endings of the bal send-out, rolls and catches, cross-overs, and other dynamic moves. Note: you must be quite comfortable leading/following the bal send-out.

1:00 – 2:00  FREE PIZZA LUNCH & LEARN

• More Than Just A Beat – Greg
  

Break out of auto-pilot and spice up your dancing by taking cues from the music. Learn to anticipate the music so you can dance every song as if you already knew it by heart. All skill levels welcome, but be prepared to improvise a bit and learn about song structure during this lunch-time lesson.  Pizza lunch will be provided free of charge for attendees of AIW.

2:15 – 3:15  RAWK YOUR BODY

• Basics of Blues – Curtis & Sierra

We’re taking blues back to the basics.  Come and get an introduction to blues dancing or review what you have learned in the past. We will be covering posture, frame, pulse and learning some blues movements.

• Fun times – Carolyn

How do we take what we already know and make it feel more like art and less like aerobics? By infusing a healthy dose of fun times! Come with an open mind and be ready to use both your mind and your body as we explore ideas of space, emotion and creativity. We will also definitely do some dancing.

3:30 – 4:30

• Jack & Jill Prelims – Hosted by Leah

Leah has provided me with a most amazing description for the J&J.  In order to read the full thing, please scroll to the bottom of this page.

SUNDAY

10:30 – HALL OPENS

11:00 – 12:00 – MAKE YOUR BODY SMILE

• How to look creative and fun on the dance floor – Kalina & Matthew

Matthew Isenor and Kalina Malowany will be teaching a class on how to enjoy yourselves while dancing and how to change things up so that you aren’t doing the same thing over and over. This will be a fun and innovative class that will make you think about how you dance and the infinite possibilities there are within Lindy Hop. Matthew has been dancing since he was 9 years old and has been teaching for the past 4 years. Kalina, even though she is new to Lindy Hop, has been dancing for over 18 years with a background in Ballet, Tap and Jazz. They both teach for Toe Tappin’ Swing in Calgary and really enjoy dancing up a storm!

• Show’n'em How It’s Fun – Eric & Julia

This class will be high energy and open to all levels.  We will be teaching crazy ways to have fun and make your partner want to pay attention.  All the moves have been collected from our travels and workshops we’ve enjoyed.

12:15 – 1:15  LE GROS PULSE

• Kickin’ it Old School – Julie & Ashley

Let’s boogie like it’s 1933! Dust off your Apron, Shine your Shoes, and Pimp Walk on down to our kickin’ solo jazz class! We’re gonna Mess Around with those Crazy Legs and Spank that Baby until you Fall Off the Log, Apple Jack. You’ll be Truckin’ like Shorty George and Suzy Q in no time!

• Learn how to fly – Dave & Tracy

Okay, no aerials in this class, but partnered Charleston is best when it feels like you’re flying. That’s what we want you to experience.

1:15 – 2:15  LUNCH

2:15 – 3:15  FANCY FEET

• The Tango Dancer Within You – Luis

Believe it or not, you were born a Tango dancer. Your body knows more about Tango than you could ever imagine. This class has been designed to save you hundreds of hours trying to figure out what this beautiful dance is about. The first thing you have to do is forgetting everything you think you know and the second is coming to this class.

• Happy Feet – Heather I

An opportunity for all levels of dancers to add some rhythm to their feet, be it with a shuffle ball change or a syncopated beat. This will be a two-tiered tap class, so all are welcome. Come learn a cramp roll or two to spice up your swing dancing!

3:30 – 4:30  STRUT YOUR STUFF

• Burlesque |bərˈlesk| – Heather R
  1. A derisive art form that mocks by imitation; a parody
  2. A variety adult entertainment show, usually including titillation such as striptease, most common from the 1880s to the 1930s. [as adj.] burlesque clubs.

Description:
Noun
burlesque (plural) burlesques

ORIGIN mid 17th cent.: from French, from Italian burlesco, from burla ‘mockery‘, of unknown origin

Burlesque history(s) certainly are confusing – but how it makes you feel sure isn’t. Come learn some burlesque basics, get a taste of a couple different styles and find out why so many girls (and boys) are embracing burlesque.
BYOH (bring your own heels* – and what ever else makes you feel good!)
*heels not required

• Al Minns Shim Sham – Rob & Glenn

A different take on the classic shake!

AIW – Jack and Jill

This fun contest is a traditional Jack and Jill event. The contest is free to enter for every dancer who is registered for the AIW weekend, if you aren’t able to attend the weekend classes but still want to participate in the Jack and Jill you can pay $5 and join the fun. This event is open to dancers of all skill levels – our one request is that if you have been swing dancing for more than 3 years, OR if you are an instructor, OR if you are on a performance team that you enter as the “opposite” role. This means that if you are traditionally a lead, you can enter as a follow (and vise versa)! Jack and Jill’s are fun to participate in and very inspiring to watch, so please join us for this wonderful event and show off all the wonderful things you learned this weekend.

Preliminaries will be held on Saturday afternoon at 3:30 pm at MidSun Community Centre – 50 Midpark Rise SE.

Dancers will dance to a maximum of four songs switching partners in between each song, it will be random pairing. Songs will vary in tempo. Although you dance with a partner for the preliminaries you will be judged on your skills as a follow or a lead.

Finals will be held Saturday night to live music by Johnny Summers. The dancers chosen for the finals will be partnered-up and will dance jam style.

Dancers will be judged by a panel of judges and they will be judged on how much fun they have with their partner, how well they connect and how musical they are when they dance together. One of the most inspiring things you can bring to the prelims and to the finals is your joy and love of this wonderful dance, and how much inspiration you get from dancing with your partner.

First prize will be awarded to the top couple from the finals. And the prize is………….free entrance to PLEX! A wonderful tradition held in the prairies, called the Prairie Lindy Exchange – it is a roving lindy exchange and this will be the 11th PLEX. This year’s theme is PLEXi Gras, and it will be held in Edmonton March 11th to 13th.

For a bit more background on Jack and Jill competition check out this link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_and_Jill_competition

ALBERTA INSPIRATION WEEKEND THREE!

February 18 – 20, 2011

Swing Dance Calgary has been working hard planning the 3rd installment of Alberta Inspiration and we have a great weekend planned! Two live bands, 16 workshop classes, performances, a Jack & Jill and more.  We believe that Alberta is full of amazing talent, and absolutely love how this workshop brings out the best of our scenes and lets us learn and grow together, from each other.  This workshop is open to dancers of all levels, and we will have two classes happening at once so that you may chose which class inspires you the most.

!!!CHANGE IN LOCATION!!!

Location: MidSun Community Centre  (50 Midpark Rise SE)
Even though this location is in the far south, it is surprisingly accessible by transit.  It is about 1.7km away from the Shawnessy Ctrain station.  While this is walkable, please let us know if you require assistance in finding a ride between the station and the hall.

Instructors: 30*ish people that you know and love from the Alberta (and Saskatchewan) scenes, teaching classes on the things that inspire them the most! Hopefully what inspires them, will also inspire you! (Ashley, Birkley, Carolyn, Curtis, Dave H, Dave P, Eric M, Eric S, Gary, Glenn, Greg, Heather I, Heather R, Heidi, Julia, Julie, Kalina, Krystal, Luis, Matt, Nicole, Rob, Sierra, Tasha, Tracy)

Schedule: You can now check out all the class descriptions at AIW – Class Descriptions.  They fit into the overarching themes of Grey Cell Wake-Up, Le Petit Pulse, Rawk Your Body, Feel It, Make Your Body Smile, Le Gros Pulse, Fancy Feet, and Strut Your Stuff.

• Saturday – Classes run from 10:30am to 3:15pm, with the Jack & Jill Prelims at 3:30
• Sunday – Classes run from 11:00am to 4:30pm
  

Friday Night: Friday Night with The Fedora Club at Mount Pleasant Community Hall w/ Fedora Club, & snacks!

Saturday Night: The Big Band Inspiration Ball at Hillhurst/Sunnyside Community Hall, w/ Johnny Summers, Jack & Jill Competition hosted by Leah, & snacks!

REGISTRATION

AIW – Full Weekend Registration – $75

This will cover the entire weekend.  Workshops, bands, learning and laughter galore!

Please select:

Follow Lead

Instructors – Click Here

SINGLE CLASSES

Single classes can be purchased for $10 each.  Here is the paypal button which allows you to do that.  (*note* not “singles” classes, but payment for a class if you’re only attending one, and not the whole weekend… just to clarify….).

Single Classes

1 Class $10.00 2 Classes $20.00 3 Classes $30.00

FRIDAY NIGHT with THE FEDORA CLUB

Come join us Friday Feb 18th for some swing dancing to the amazing Fedora Club.  Tickets are $15 and can be purchased here, at the Friday night dances, or at the door.  This dance is already included if you’ve purchased the weekend pass.

Beginner Drop In: 8:30 – 9:30 pm with UofC Swing’s Tasha Hansen and Erik Singendonk.
Band Starts: 9:30 pm
DJs: Dana Codding and Bobbie Beddoes

THE BIG BAND INSPIRATION BALL

On Saturday February 19th, Toe Tappin’ Swing would like to invite you to a night of amazing music and dancing! Don’t know how to dance? That is ok, come out and listen to the amazing band, Johnny Summers’ Little Big Band, or join us for the beginner lesson at 8:30pm! You don’t need a partner or any experience. Tickets are $17 in advance or $20 at the door. This dance is already included if you’ve purchased the weekend pass.

Beginner Drop In: 8:30 – 9:30 pm

Bands Starts: 9:30 pm

Tickets available: via Eventbrite http://tbbib-efbevent.eventbrite.com/

Location: Hillhurst/Sunnyside Community Hall (map)

OTHER INFORMATION

Volunteers: We will need many many volunteers to help with the door, the bar, set up and take down, etc. Please let Tim know if you’re interested in helping out. We promise to give you an extra hug or two in thank you. (info@swingdancecalgary.com)

Housing: Please try to organize your own housing, but if you require assistance email info@swingdancecalgary.com. If you have available space, please also email info@swingdancecalgary.com and let us know!

Facebook: Just in case you want to RSVP so that everyone can see :)

Questions? Talk with Heather, Curtis or Jo, or email info@swingdancecalgary.com. We’re really looking forward to this weekend, and I hope that you are too! Can’t wait to see you!

♥