hey, i'm from utah, kinda young. It seems like no one here really likes to dance, but i'd like to be be proved wrong. can you help?

What kind of dancing do you do? And how young are you? I'm asking because, as far as competitive ballroom dancing goes, there are a LOT of young people in Utah who do it. Brigham Young has a very large dancesport program, and consistently produces excellent formation teams. Utah Valley State College is also well-known for their formation teams.

As far as other styles of dancing go, I don't know as much. Hopefully someone else will see your post and respond!

Here's the link:

http://ce.byu.edu/cw/cwdance/2005/a_ballroom.cfm

Many people I know go every year.

My wife and I were going to go this year but now she has to work.

OB

I'd be happy to prove you wrong. I live in Utah, and BYU hosts Nationals every year. In Utah Valley, almost every High School has a Ballroom team, and there are several studios all over Utah. In fact, as far as Youth and Junior teams go, Pleasant Grove and BYU have the top teams in the Nation, as does Center Stage, which is hosted from Utah Valley.

If you live outside the Valley, then it might be hard to find a team or studio, but I'm not sure. I just know I've been dancing for four years, since I was twelve, with several different studios and directors. We have many, many top instructors in the valley, coaches who have produced national and international champions, and everyone around here loves ballroom. If you want to find a studio near you, I'm sure you can find something, and I'd be happy to help if you post here again. Good Luck!

Aaron,

We were disappointed this year as BYU and the other UTAH groups did not send a formation team to Snowball 2004 in Vancouver, BC.

They are a joy to watch and they were missed.

Our own Club:

http://www.vbds.org

entered a formation team for the first time but because of lack of entries ended up being a demonstration only.

OB

That is terribly dissapointing, I can imagine how it must be to travel all that way and not compete. One group from the east coast didn't get to compete last year at US Nationals because of some protocol infractions, and it was really dissapointing.

What groups attended before? Depending on the time and place of competitions, I know some groups decide to attend some competitions only in certain years. As a lot of our teams are High-School or Studio based, and knowing that Ballroom is already a very expensive sport, we often don't take many trips outside of the Mountain regions and California. We are very blessed to have the US nationals right here at BYU.

Aaron,

Last year it was a college group south of Provo I was told.

The two years before that BYU came with another group so there were two groups from Utah those years.

They were usually complimented by teams from Seattle, Richmond, BC and the University of British Columbia. They didn't compare with BYU's excellence though but that's not a put down as BYU obviously has an outstanding program.

This year, our group of middle-aged wannabees demoed a routine they'd practiced for two years. They entered as did a group from Seattle. Seattle then dropped out and we were told we would be a demonstration team only. Seattle found out later and asked to be readmitted as a demo team too. End result: no competition. Our people were disappointed but we were proud of them.

Seattle did a swing routine while our group was a cha cha paso combination.

OB

Most of our college groups are pretty good, since our Youth program is so active. It's really too bad that so few teams were able to make it, I'll try and put a plug in for Snowball 2005.

Still, I find it extreamly unique that you've put together a middle aged group for formation work. Very cool. I think we just barely created our first Adult formation team, so maybe you'll have some competition in that feild later on. It's just such a great hobby, I'm happy more "older" (never to imply that you are old, at all, just older than me =P ) people are getting involved.

P.S. ROB, we're still concerned about you, Utah has tons of oppertunities and it's a shame to waste any ambition or talent.

Aaron,

Viewing the tapes from BYU's dance camp for last year I'd say the avaerage age was older (but there were a lot of young people too).

Basically the evening performances were formation teams put together over the week.

OB