Ah, the eternal competitor question… “What are the judges looking for?” Consider that judges are not necessarily “looking for” positive elements of your dance as much as they are “looking to eliminate” negative elements. We call these “red flags”: bad habits or errors that prevent judges from giving you a callback to the next round. […]
Are you curious about what it takes to do a Rising Star routine? Are you an event director interested in supporting and promoting the next generation of routine competitors? You probably have a lot of questions. This article is aimed at answering them: Who should compete? What is the purpose of the tour? Who’s […]
The West Coast Swing world is a strong supporter of social dancing: the improvisation side of the dance. The idea of speaking a language in order to carry on a conversation with anyone in the world without planning, is of the highest value. However, almost all dance forms have a facet to them that involves […]
April (Seattle’s Easter Swing) marks the 15-year anniversary of our dance partnership! As a rare breed of Champion couple who has been able to make a dance partnership AND romantic partnership work, I thought it might be nice to honour it by sharing the lessons we have learned along the way. Every couple has a […]
It’s US Open season! This means many competitors are hard at work preparing their choreography, and are turning their attention (if they haven’t already) to planning their costumes. There are dozens of factors to consider when choosing/creating a costume, it’s easy to miss some. But the reality is that little details make a BIG difference. […]
Last week I released Tough Love: Read at your own Risk (Part 1). You really should read that first, in order to put this article in perspective, and catch the points that are made about aspects of WCS outside of competition. This article is aimed specifically at Competitors. Here’s my disclaimer again: If you are […]
Dear Routine Competitors, The month leading up to the US Open is always fraught with emotions. The intense preparation causes us to reflect on why we are putting ourselves through this. It is almost impossible to explain to outsiders who genuinely just want to wish us well. How can they possibly understand? This can be […]
“Winning” is not only about the final placement. You don’t even have to be competitive to be “winning”. In our WCS competition scene, while many dancers ambitiously chase points, others are kicking their butts in other aspects – winning games that have no trophies or prize money, but are invaluable nonetheless. The word “winning” has […]
I’m a bit of an overachiever. This is no surprise. I don’t see much point in “just doing enough”. But overachievers tend to overachieve in both quality and quantity, which have different advantages and…not disadvantages, but consequences. (obsessive pursuit of quality has the potential of leading to paralysis by analysis). Experts in any field have […]
It seems kinda elite, at first glance. You see it on the schedule, but it only involves certain people, but there seems to be no rhyme or reason to who gets to do this mysterious contest. When I first started dancing I had all kinds of hypotheses about what “ProAm” was. Coming from the west […]
