Boston Tea Party - Swing-a-licious!

New England's premier swing dance event - Boston Tea Party - was  so amazingly, so outrageously, so stupendously, so tremendously, so breathtakingly FUN this year!   Just when you think that a dance convention can't get any better, this event tops it off with lots of social dancing in between spurts of competition and performances.  

 

If you want to see people dance, you can turn on "Dancing With The Stars."  Or - better yet - you could be watching great dancers, taking lessons with these unbelievably talented teachers and then getting to put your own spin on it all night long?  Yeah baby - who needs TV when you've got BTP?! 

Each night, I danced with people who kept saying "I'm so tired - but the music is soooo good!"  I watched people force themselves to leave so they could come back the next morning to take lessons from Tatiana Mollman & Jordan Frisbee, Kyle Redd & Sarah Van Drake, Ben Morris & Melina Ramirez, Andy Reid & Nina Gilkenson, Peter Strom & Naomi Uyama, Nick Williams & Carla Heiney.  Of course, plenty more people stayed all night long!

Besides the awesome teachers - there were some pretty unbelievable DJs - including Victor Loviera, Louie St. George, Andy Reid, and Kate Hedin.  And - a special shout out to the fantastic event organizer: 

THANX JOE MAHONEY!  For not making us wait until midnight to dance. Alternating an hour of social dance and competition throughout the night was perfect.  Watching is great fun for a while -  but not nonstop until midnight!   Having said that, the Cross-Over J&Js were phenomenal.  That was a great show.

Another good thing about Boston Tea Party 2010 was that there was a good mix of ages, a fairly even ratio of leaders and followers and everyone was very friendly.  The only thing wrong with BTP is that it has outgrown the hotel: Crowne Plaza Northshore.  Forget about parking - you could retire in the parking lot!  And, every workshop was way too crowded. 

At the end of the weekend, I hated to leave because  I had such a good time.  So many wonderful people to dance with - so much amazing dance information to assimilate - so much good feeling.   This is one event to put on your calendar for 2011. 

When it comes to swing, BTP is a sure thing! 


Boston Tea Party is held every year in Danvers, MA.  For more information:

http://www.teapartyswings.com/

Competition Results:

Strictly

1 Maxence Martin & Jill DeMarco

2 Scott Stuart & Katrina Ostrenski

3 Marc Levetin & Willow Colson-Wall

4 Max Pitruzzella & Natasha Ouimet

5 Eric Cudmore & Kim Filippo

Jack n’ Jills

Newcomer

1 Jun Ogata & Shoshi Kushnir

2 Gary Csandi & Elaine Trainor

3 Phouvanh Meckhasinh & Bonnie Tsung

4 Jack DeStefano & Melanie Zeltner

5 Mark Hennessy & Raya Ioffe

Novice

1 Doug Morgan & Isabelle Lafreniere

2 Martin Plante & Veronique Dupont

3 Morry El-Badry & Anna Lumsden

4 Christian Spengler & Cheryl Williams

5 Patrick Szmidt & Kathleen Armstrong

Intermediate

1 Scott Stuart & Tracey Melin

2 Brandon Rasmussen & Cami Lau

3 David Ward & Susan Flamminio

4 Richard Smith & Katrina Ostrenski

5 Dan Devan & Nina El-Badry

Advanced

1 Rob Glover & Kim Filippo

2 Jody Moscaritolo & Angelique Early

3 William Montgomery & Tammy Greene

4 Evan Schwartz & Catherine Cogut

5 Peter Fradley & Priscilla Brown