For the workshop component of our 2015 event, students will be placed into tracks by application and audition. You will audition in the role of your choice (lead/follow) and be expected to take classes in that role.

Auditions are nothing to be nervous about. Show up, dance with an instructor or two, and you’re done. We’ll be looking for solid fundamentals much more than vocabulary, and flashy stuff is definitely totally unnecessary.

When filling out registration, select the track (A, B, C, D) you think is most suitable for you, based on the descriptions below. On Saturday morning you’ll audition with instructors and be assigned a track. No audition is required for Track A.

If you are applying for Track D, you may be preselected, in which case you won’t have to audition. To be considered for preselection you must submit a link to a video of your dancing on your registration form. You’ll receive an email before the event indicating whether our team of instructors approved you for Track D or whether you will need to audition.

Track A
You’re new to blues or taking beginning classes at your weekly venue and want to become an active social dancer. You’re working on pulse, turning down a line, walking and traveling, grounding, lagging behind the beat, some historical blues vernacular, and momentum and elasticity.

Track B
In addition to being an active social dancer, you’ve probably taken a workshop or two or have started traveling to events in other scenes. You’re comfortable with all the concepts outlined in Track A, and are learning concepts such as frame matching, shared and off-axis turns, dancing to subdivided and polyrhythms, and the ability the to create rhythm and pulse throughout the body. You are also starting to solo dance, add on to your blues vernacular, and explore musicality.

Track C
You have attended multiple workshops and events, worked on your dance regularly whether solo, in practice sessions, or performance groups, and are taking private lessons to advance your dancing. You dance solo on the social floor, have started riffing with other solo dancers, and are working on call-and-response interplay in your partner dancing. All the skills listed in Track B are second nature, you’ve got a wide and growing vocabulary of vernacular blues and jazz movement, and can comfortably dance to different styles of blues music with styles of blues dance such as Jookin’, Ballroomin’, and Drag.

Track D
Whether you regularly attend events in scenes outside your own or support your home scene, your focus on dance is in technique, quality of movement, and developing or refining your own style. Solo dancing is comfortable with a rich blues and jazz movement vocabulary, and you seek to make your social dance conversations flow by refining things like non-standard connection points and break-away improvisation. Self-critique is an important asset at this level, and you’re open to improving through watching your dance on video or learning other dances (perhaps you already have). You’ve done the work and are applying the skills from Track C. Track D is for those who have difficulty finding classes advanced enough to challenge them.