Round dancing is good exercise and provides a relatively inexpensive
evenings entertainment: the price for a typical club dance is about $7-$15
per couple for 1-1/2 to 3 hours. In addition, the social camaraderie should not be overlooked.
Round Dancers tend to be extremely friendly, sociable, and very helpful people.
Round Dance clubs & classes can be found in & around every major city in
the United States & Canada, as well as many cities in Europe & Asia
(especially Japan). There are also many weekend & week-long Round Dance
festivals & convention offered almost every week of the year, many of these
can be found in the
DIXIE Newsletter, on the
RoundDance.com,
URDC,
Roundalab,
websites & newsletters, and through the various local, national, and
international Round Dance organizations.
One of the easiest way to find a Round Dance club in your area is to go to the
URDC Carousel Club Directory or the
Roundalab Member Locations,
or contact your local Square Dance Shop or organization (check the yellow pages). They can
generally get you in touch with an instructor who can help you find the clubs or classes
that are right for you.
Please send any web site questions or comments to
webmaster You visitor #
Updated 5 January 2008 tac
Round Dancing is basically choreographed ballroom dancing with all couples
dancing the same figures around the floor at the same time, similar to a formation
dance team or to sequence dancing. Over the last 50+ years thousands of routines
have been choreographed to match specific music in almost every dance style
imaginable. A routine done to a specific piece of music in Colorado USA is almost
always the same routine you would do to that music in Tokyo Japan or any other place
worldwide.
This formation team type of dancing eliminates the traffic jam feeling that you
sometimes get while free form ballroom dancing. Dancers are able to concentrate
more on how they are executing figures and dancing as one coherent unit as
opposed to trying to think about which figure or pattern to do next.
Round Dancers learn from day 1 to associate each foot pattern with the figure
name. This makes it easier to teach future routines since the dancer has a
repertoire of figures at their fingertips (okay ‘foottips’). The average dancer
has a repitoire of hundreds of routines. Clubs and classes in addition to putting on
known routines will also typically teach part or all of a new routine or work on
figures each evening.
There are 6 levels of round dancing called phases. Phases 1 & 2 are "easy
level" and include 2-step (similar to basic country western dancing) and waltz
(bronze figures - enough to dance at your daughter's wedding & elsewhere, the basics).
Phase 3 & 4 are the intermediate levels (bronze & silver figures) and
include additional waltz figures in addition to introductions to other
rhythms in the International & American styles. Rhythms include: foxtrot,
quickstep (similar to Arthur Murray foxtrot), international tango, American tango,
Argentine tango, cha, rumba, bolero, mambo, jive, swing, west coast swing,
samba, paso doble, slow two step/nightclub two step, & others.
Phase 5 & 6 (gold, star, & above figures) take dancers into the upper levels of
dancing, including most of the figures you see at ballroom competitions. At the
upper levels many of the Round Dance instructors are trained by some of the
best International & American ballroom teachers/competitors in the world.
Several technique books & videotapes have been created by Round Dance
organizations and individuals around the world. For Example:
Round dancing is good exercise and provides a relatively inexpensive
evenings entertainment: the price for a typical club dance is about $7-$15
per couple for 1-1/2 to 3 hours. In addition, the social camaraderie should not be overlooked.
Round Dancers tend to be extremely friendly, sociable, and very helpful people.
Round Dance clubs & classes can be found in & around every major city in
the United States & Canada, as well as many cities in Europe & Asia
(especially Japan). There are also many weekend & week-long Round Dance
festivals & convention offered almost every week of the year, many of these
can be found in the
