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Ballroom, Swing and Country dancers

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 New Years

 Dec 31, 2005

 Dec 31, 2006

 Dec 31, 2007

 Dec 31. 2008

 Dec 31, 2009

 Dec 31, 2010

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Dancers Comments

Thank you for the great dance on June 23  ..  simply marvelous ..  &  the music  ..  WOW  .. Keep up the good work  ..  V&B

MORE HERE!

 


2012 dates

 

All lessons Int/Adv

 

Jan 21

Cha Cha lesson

 

Feb 11 Valentines

NC 2 step lesson

 

Mar 17

Bachata Lesson

 

Apr 14

Street Hustle lesson

 

May 19

Salsa lesson

 

Jun 16

Jul 21

Aug 18

Sep 22

Oct 20

Nov 17

Dec 8 Christmas

Dec 31 New Years


Dance Info

 

All my dances

Ray's Dances OR

"I-Love-To-Dance"

are held at the

RMSS "Ballroom"

12150 - 224th St, MR

Map & driving directions HERE

 

Time

7-8 dance lesson

8-11:30 dance

 

Price

$20.00 per person

 

Includes FREE!

  • Int/Adv Lessons

  • Largest food layout

  • Tim Horton's Coffee

  • Starbucks Teas

  • Lemonade

  • Ice Tea

  • Filtered water

  • In season fruits

  • Veggies

  • Munchies

  • Assorted goodies

Reservations

Table Reservations available upon request, send me an email rayj@ilovetodance.ca

 

Alcohol

CASH bar available generally

available on the fourth

Saturday of the month

when my dances fall on

the fourth Saturday!

You can order and enjoy

your drink in the lounge

but cannot bring it

into the dance room.

 

Who Can come?

This is a dance for dancers of all ages, novice to professional.  We promote a fun, inclusive atmosphere.

Median age range is 45-65, but we have dancers from 20-85

 

Singles

At many dances we have

4 or more single ladies,

and 4-6 single guys

 

Music

The most important aspect of our dances is the music.  I play music from all time periods, for 20 different dance styles each night.  All music is chosen beforehand to assure fabulous and inspiring tunes to dance to.  We also play 2-4 line dances each night and one Two-Song mixer generally WCS/Cha Cha/Triple Step themed.

 

Floor

Large well maintained wooden floor 33' x 75' in size for most dances and when I rent the whole room 33' x 105' in size.

 

Chandelier

In Dec 2006 we purchased and mounted a beautiful chandelier for our dances

 

Dress Code

Most dancers dress Casual/Semi Formal, and special dances such as Valentines and New Years are Semi Formal to Formal.  Halloween dances you may choose to dress up, but it's not a requirement.

 

New Years

NY is a time for dancers to celebrate.  Our dances up till Dec 2010 have been themed events, but starting Dec 2011 there will be some decorating, probably no meal, however a much lower price.

 

Tickets & details are usually available first week in September

 

Ballroom Music

I play very little Ballroom music as you'd typically hear at the Ballrooms because I feel their music uninspiring.

Dance News

 

Note on the Cascade Casino dances.  I've been promoting these on my brochures lately because I provide the music and DJ services for these dances and Robyn Picard provides the dance lessons.    Robyn and I have an excellent working relationship with Cascades and they have arranged their dates as to not overlap with my dates.

 

Requests for DJ services - Every year I get requests to do DJ work for weddings and Christmas Parties and such.  Typical weddings want music I'm not interested in playing.   However I have done a number of weddings for Ballroom dancers, and I don't mind doing that.   I have a very large West Coast Swing selection, 50's & 60's ballroom music, and now a very good selection of fabulous regulation Ballroom music in addition to great Latin and Country dance music.  If you have a party that is largely ballroom dancers and don't want your typical wedding DJ, I can help you!  

 

Dance Pricing - I've noticed that several dance / lesson venues have increased pricing for 2012.  As I mentioned a couple of years ago, while you, the dancer, obviously don't want the prices to increase, dance hosts and teachers want a reasonable return for the services they're offering you!   We have nothing that can be made cheaper in China!   My price will remain at $20 for 2012 and I will continue to offer brand name refreshments, the lower mainland's best food layout, an intermediate level dance lesson each dance, unbeatable floor, and fabulous music for dancers of all stripes.

 

Jan 12 - A huge thanks to everyone who came to our New Years dance, thank you for your support.  We had way too much goodies, cheese and wine!   Thank you so much to Sandy Jurick who brought out not only the Coquitlam Arthur Murray, but some of the White Rock group also.   We also had 21 single ladies, so I tailored the music so they could have fun also.  Lastly thanks to dance teachers Robyn & Don Picard, Maggie Bretton, Carlos Loyola and Robert Ross for their support and joining us for a great night of fun.

 

This has been a whirlwind 11 days for Bertha and I because by the time we got everything packed up and back to my place it was 3:00am.   Eight hours later I got a call that my mom had probably 24 hours to live.  She’s had Alzheimer’s and strokes for the last 16 years and my dad has looked after her till the end.   We cleaned up the New Years stuff and headed up to Kamloops and she passed away Friday the day of her 59th anniversary.   We had a “Notebook” (remember the movie) moment Wednesday for over 2 hours, she couldn’t talk to us but she appeared wide awake.   My parents were dancers and I mentioned before that my dad believed that you could Foxtrot to anything!   Still, my parents never made it to any of my dances but on a visit to Kamloops in 1997 I managed to get in a 40 second Rumba with my mom – and she followed pretty good!  It was from her I got my musical talent.   She was an artist, photographer, musician (piano, guitar & accordion), her and her sister made 4 albums at age 19, and we grew up (I have four younger sisters) singing and playing a lot of tunes from the 40’s & 50’s.   Here a waltz she loved and that we got to sing to her one last time.

 

Thus the reason for no newsletters and not answering your emails was that I didn’t have access to my computer and I forgot the username and logon to my website to pick up my emails and at least respond in a timely manner.

 

Emilia (Silvio’s dance) has cancelled her monthly dances and is offering just the Thursday night practice dances.

 

Here’s a fabulous Rumba I heard at Bill McKinnon’s dance in December which I finally found and played at my New Years dance – “Song From A Secret Garden”.  No vocals an instrumental with a gorgeous melody and beautiful chord changes and 4:32 long.

 

My dance Calendar, for what I call “mixed Ballroom dancing” (up to 17 styles of dance music played) is now updated.  As noted in the bottom of this email, I will promote this type of dancing in my newsletters (these emails take a long time to make up as it is), and as long as your dances aren’t on my dance dates.  I ask that in return you promote and make available my promo materials at your dances.

 

New Years Pictures

 


 

Sept 5 - In the early 70’s I played keyboards in bands and did three years of karate until a free-fight injury blocking a kick shut me down.  I finished the fight, and got my points but two weeks later found I’d fractured my right wrist.  I quit karate to save my keyboard career and went to college.  That injury took 2 years to heal.  With no exercise regime I had serious restless leg syndrome - a term that wasn’t to be invented till decades later.   When my oldest son spent two years in Japan I was unwilling to spend 9 hours on a flight with RLS!  After a night of dancing I have RLS and I used to get severe leg cramps around 2-3am.   Watching that poor tennis player Rafael Nadal on TV during a post match interview I felt his pain as most of us have.   But today I seem to have a cure.  My doctor tested me for deficiencies, and vitamins, medicinals, water, and simple stretching didn’t work but this does.   Like most people my age I have sore knees which is helped immensely by exercise, but what I do is hold onto a chair and keeping my back straight do knee bends.  I do that 40 times which tires the muscles and gets rid of RLS, and then do a thigh stretch 30-40 seconds on each leg usually twice, followed for good measure, 40 toe rises - a real good exercise for dancers.

 

 


  Wanted:  

Cargo Van in good shape

Robyn Picard

Lessons

Dances

Ballroom & Swing

 

Donn Picard

Lessons

Ballroom & Swing

 

 

Maggie Bretton

Lessons

Dances

Ballroom & Swing

"Queen of WCS"

Dance For Fun

Lessons

Ballroom & Swing

Starr Dance Floors

Alberto Gonzalez

Lessons

Dances

Salsa

 

Carlos Loyola

Lessons

Argentine Tango

Master

 

Jason Warner

Lessons

Dancing

Lindy Hop, Balboa

East Coast Swing

Zelia

Lessons

Belly Dancing

Extraordinaire!

 

Arthur Murray

Lessons

Calendar

Ballroom & Swing

Brent & Barbara

N/A

Nestor

Lessons

Salsa, AT, Bachata Merengue...

Mr Dance

Lessons/Dances

Michael & Elsie

Ballroom & Swing

George Kao

Ballroom Beg & up

Abbotsford area

Website

LGDance@shaw.ca

Brian Udal

Lessons

Friday Dances

Ballroom & Swing

604-541-1313

brian@rocablancadance.ca

Bobbi & Patricia

Lessons

Dances

Argentine Tango

778-773-9904

dancetangonow@gmail.com

Dancing for Dessert

Lessons

Friday Dances

Ballroom / Latin

604-881-1234

Bill McKinnon

Lessons

Dances

Ballroom & Swing

 

N/A
 

 

 

 

Myles and Tessa West Coast Swing show dance

Myles and Tessa West Coast Swing show dance Reno Clip

 

 

 

Kim

 

 

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