BlueMoonSwing

I’m delighted to be joining forces with John Lindo and other west coast swing dancers in Houston to form Swing713 (view our Facebook group and current DJ schedule).

Every first and third Tuesday of the month, starting in October 2019, we will have a dance from 8.00p-10.30pm, with rotating DJs each time, including John Quarto-vonTivadar, John Lindo, Mario Robau, Ruby Lair, and several others.

The theme of the group is friendly swing, with a healthy mix of contemporary and classic swing dancers having a great time, and relaxing over a shared fun hobby. All you need bring is your feet and a smile. Oh, and $5 (gracias, y’all).

Our venue is the old Esquire Ballroom, which is now a CW bar called Neon Boots. Great AC, free parking, cheap drinks, excellent dance floor (like SUPER excellent dance floor). I’m very happy to have found such an excellent home for swing in Houston and I’m sure you will enjoy it too.

Dance with Swing713 at Neon Boots: 11410 Hempstead Road, Houston.

We will offer a free beginner lesson at 7:30pm if you bring friends who you want to learn the basic-basics. But we won’t have progressive lessons; our purpose is social dance starting at 8:00pm. If you’re looking for regular lessons we suggest local pros for privates, or who have group lessons (Mario Robau, Michael Stephens, David Appel).

Trivia: This venue has been in almost continuous operation as a dance hall since the 1950s and plenty of well known CW singers have performed and worked there. Patsy Cline! Willy Nelson!  There is a separate spot in the hall where you can read up on the fascinating historical dance importance of the Esquire Ballroom.

I’m very happy to announce that Blue Moon Swing is now a weekly event, at the Neon Boots Saloon, in the historic Esquire Ballroom.

Every Thursday starting in April 2018. Dance is from 9.00p-11.45pm. And it’s free. Great AC, free parking, cheap drinks, excellent dance floor, I’m very happy to have found such an excellent venue and I’m sure you will enjoy it too.

Lessons will be at 8:15pm with occasional guest teachers of note (Apr 25: John Lindo).

This venue has been in almost continuous operation as a dance hall since the 1950s and plenty of well known CW singers have performed (and worked!) there.

An actual Blue Moon during Blue Moon Swing dance, Sat. 1/27/18 !

An aligning of the dance planets, folks!

Facebook Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/483501812007292

More details:

• a “Blue Moon” is the second full moon in a single calendar month. This happens about once every 2-3 years. This month’s Blue Moon is technically a “Red” Blue Moon, since it will also be a lunar eclipsed ! Happens only about every 150 years! Astronomically inclined? Here’s more info
• National Day of Dance occurs the last Saturday of January each year, across the whole nation. Studios everywhere offer free or discounted beginner lessons in many dance forms, a great day to drag in a friend who wants to learn WCS or you yourself pick up another dance form. See your local studio for details.
• Turns out Blue Moon Swing Saturday this month is happening the same weekend as Swing Easy Friday, so Austinites get a rare opportunity to get a full weekend of dancing in to a very broad range of music genres! Please consider attending both events so we can keep independent swing dances alive and varietal!

Doug Silton at “Boo Moon Swing” Halloween Dance, Saturday 10/28/17.

First time in Austin, Mr. Doug Silton!

Multi-Championship swing dancer, choreographer and instructor Doug Silton is the only competitor ever to be a finalist in WCS, Lindy, and Carolina Shag in the same year at the US Open. Ever! He will be at our Boo Moon Halloween dance in Austin TX, on Saturday, Oct 28, 2017.

Facebook Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/483501812007292

Doug will be teaching 3 workshops (details below) and he’ll be staying to dance the night away with us afterwards as we dance to the best of blues, soul, and classic swing.

Here’s a recent video of Doug Silton in action:

And another years ago, barely more than a swing-tot with legend Mary Ann Nunez:

Venue: Blue Moon Swing, my once-in-a-blue-moon swing event, this time to be held at the Uptown Dance Studio in Austin, Texas

Date: Saturday, October 28, 2017

Workshops & Dance: 3 one-hour Workshops, starting at 5pm / 6pm / 7pm, then a short dinner break, and a Dance from 9pm to 12:30am. A private group workshop for Juniors at 8pm by special arrangement.

“Boo Moon” Halloween workshops will be:

• “Terrifying Techniques”: learn some of Doug’s unique specialized WCS techniques culled from his dance intensives, including improvements to your hand grip,  and effective grounding and partnering
• “Check Candy For Needles”: intricate footwork for both Leaders and followers, and how to incorporate lead/follow technique to match that footwork
• “I Regret All That Sugar”: movement mechanisms to leverage new & efficient ways to think about lead/follow as a single role that requires two humans

Workshop Tickets:

$20/workshop or all three for $50, up until Friday Oct 27. Then $25/$60 at the door.

Social Dance $10, but if you pre-buy any workshop+dance the dance is only $5.

You can pre-pay for the workshops and dance at the discounted price right now thru Oct 27

Private Lessons: Doug will be available for a very limited number of private lessons, which you’ll need to arrange with Blue Moon directly, as these will not occur at the studio.  Please contact Johnny Q directly to book these: 347-WCS-WHIP. Privates are available Friday afternoon, and Saturday morning in WCS, Lindy, or Carolina Shag

John Lindo is coming to our next Blue Moon Swing dance in Austin TX, on Saturday, July 22, 2017

Lindo will be teaching 3 workshops and he’ll be staying to dance the night away with us afterwards as we dance to the best of blues, soul, and classic swing.

Private Lessons: Lindo is available for a very limited number of private lessons. These will not occur at the studio so please contact Johnny Q directly to book these: 347-WCS-WHIP .

Workshop Tickets:

Early Bird Package ($60): effective thru Thursday July 20: buy Early Bird Tickets

Full Price Package ($70): day-of, Saturday July 22: buy Full Price tickets

One John Lindo Workshop ($25): anytime: buy one workshop

Social Dance w/ DJ Johnny Q ($12): buy dance ticket

Venue: Blue Moon Swing, my once-in-a-blue-moon swing event, this time to be held at the Uptown Dance Studio in Austin, Texas

Workshops & Dance Details:

3 one-hour Workshops, starting at 5pm / 6pm / 7pm, then a short dinner break, and a Dance from 9pm to 1am

Workshops Topics:

• “Eyes on Me”: add more visual connection to your physical connection. These simple cues will help you communicate better with your partner.
• “Change your dance to match the music“: Learn how to adjust your patterns to the music that is playing. A pattern is worthless if it doesn’t fit what you’re dancing to. Special emphasis for how to dance to blues vs lyrical vs soul
• “Conversation thru Musicality”: Connection is really communicating to your partner — learn how to make subtle but effective adjustments that will change the way you communicate to your partner.

John Lindo. Saturday 7/22/17.

Exciting news! John Lindo is coming to our next Blue Moon Swing dance in Austin TX, on Saturday, July 22, 2017, to help Blue Moon inaugurate its return to Texas!

This will be John’s first workshop series in Austin in a very long while, in fact since he last joined Blue Moon, back in 2013.

UPDATE: Ticket prices & links to purchase below!

Facebook Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/448146912211733

John will be teaching 3 workshops and he’ll be staying to dance the night away with us afterwards as we dance to the best of blues, soul, and classic swing. If you attended his workshops in Dallas in May, this will be substantially different material specifically tailored for Blue Moon.

Here’s a video of Lindo in action:

You know you wanna do that yourself. Come learn how.

Venue: Blue Moon Swing, my once-in-a-blue-moon swing event, this time to be held at the Uptown Dance Studio in Austin, Texas

Date: Saturday, July 22, 2017

Workshops & Dance: 3 one-hour Workshops, starting at 5pm / 6pm / 7pm, then a short dinner break, and a Dance from 9pm to 1am

Workshops Topics:

All of these workshops have been customized with an emphasis on classic technique and social dancing, and a de-emphasis on competition.

• “Eyes on Me”: add more visual connection to your physical connection. These simple cues will help you communicate better with your partner.
• “Change your dance to match the music“: Learn how to adjust your patterns to the music that is playing. A pattern is worthless if it doesn’t fit what you’re dancing to. Special emphasis for how to dance to blues vs lyrical vs soul
• “Conversation thru Musicality”: Connection is really communicating to your partner — learn how to make subtle but effective adjustments that will change the way you communicate to your partner.

The workshops above will be presented not necessarily in the order listed above; we are ironing out timing this week.

Workshop Tickets:

Rather than time cut-offs such as early bird pricing, we will instead offer a limited number of tickets at a series of progressively higher prices. So the faster you buy your ticket, the less money you will pay. When the tickets at that price point are gone, that’s it.

Prices start at $50 for all three Workshops, a hell of a price for a non-local A-lister like Lindo.

I have a limited number (about 5!) of First Responders tickets left: $50/pp includes all three workshops. You’ll have to call Uptown Dance directly at 512-459-5678 .  I’ll cross this out as soon as the Studio tells me these tickets are gone.

Early Bird Package ($60): effective thru Thursday July 20: buy Early Bird Tickets

Full Price Package ($70): day-of, Saturday July 22: buy Full Price tickets

One John Lindo Workshop ($25): anytime: buy one workshop

Social Dance ($12): buy dance ticket

Private Lessons: John will be available for a very limited number of private lessons, which you’ll need to arrange with Blue Moon directly, as these will not occur at the studio. These will sell out early so if you have any interest, jump on it.  Please contact Johnny Q directly to book these: bluemoonq -at- johnquarto.com  . Privates are available Friday afternoon, and Saturday morning and early afternoon, and cost $100 for a 50-min private. Please include your full name, what you’d like to work on, and please try to include a link to Facebook (or etc) about you so Lindo can see who he’s working with!  He remembers faces, and he remembers names, but sometimes putting them together is hard to do!

Friday August 19th  is the Blue Moon Swing “Summer Blues” dance. August is hot weather time, and dancing to Blues is a perfect way to dance in hot weather. Enjoy the sultry sounds of Blues, Soul and R&B and dance the night away, all for $5

This month the musical theme Blues Music, and dancing to it.  The Intermediate Lesson at 8:30 will explore 12-bar Blues, slow blues, and changing your core WCS moves to match the music

Want to dance early? We have Two-Step lessons & then CW dancing from 7pm to 8.30pm. Then a quick WCS Intermediate lesson as mentioned above at 8:30, and full-on WCS from 9pm to midnight.

Friday June 17th will be Blue Moon’s “Dance n’ Stay” event.

A fun event in Bend, Oregon every year in June is Dance n Play. However, if you’ve decided to dance right here at home, Blue Moon Swing is Friday June 17

new addition! CW music from 7pm to 8.30pm. Then a quick WCS Intermediate lesson, and full-on WCS from 9pm to midnight. All for $5.

This time we’ll be joined by two veterans of swing from Texas, Richard & Roxanne Ware. They represent the epitome of great social dancers: they dance with everyone and they just don’t stop until the last song plays. You’ll really enjoy their take on having a great dance night.

They’ll also be in Seattle that entire weekend: Blue Moon on Friday, a  jaunt to Steel Creek in Tacoma on Saturday and then the Seattle Swing Club dance on Sunday June 19th. I’m happy to say I’ll be djaying at SSDC that Sunday as well.

A full weekend of dance, and all local.

Blue Moon’s next dance is this Friday, May 20th

Our first dance with warm weather since last September — any excuse to dance is a good excuse!

If you’ve decided you don’t want to do the 8-hour haul down to SOSwing in Oregon, you’ve got a great dance weekend ahead: Thursday at China Harbor, Friday at Blue Moon, Saturday at KDC or SteelCreek.

Also, happy news for CW lovers: I’m close to inking a deal on another space for a monthly ‘Swing meets Country’ dance where you can get in a few hours of Two Step and then segue directly into a few hours of West Coast Swing. Details forth-coming, but there’s free parking, a bar, food, A/C (!!), and a perfect dance floor for fun.

BlueMoonSwing and the Seattle Swing Dance Club are teaming up! I’m delighted to be teaching two workshops and djaying the night away at SSDC’s May Day Dance, Sunday May 1, 2016

It’ll be May. And a Sunday. And almost certainly nice weather. So here are three great reasons you really want to be there:

Workshop #1 (4:00pm): “Groovin’, On A Sunday Afternoon”
Aretha sang a song dedicated to swinging on a lazy Sunday. There’s a special sort of music made for just such days and you need a special way to swing to it! Learn the essentials of changing your dance to match the groove sound of blues, soul, jazz, & gospel swing. All levels.

Workshop #2 (5:00pm): “Tuck You!”
How to master this hardest of basic moves: open tucks…closed tucks…round, soft, hard, and sassy tucks. You’ve never seen it taught this way. All levels.

Then DANCING from 6pm-10pm!

OK, that’s two reasons. The third is:

It takes money to run a club, especially a club that puts on a national swing event. I invite you to come help the club replenish the coffers after Easter Swing. I myself will be donating my portion of the fees from the workshop back to the club. Coming to the workshops means you’re helping the SSDC!