I’ve always known that dancing is good for you – it keeps you fit, gets you out of the house and socialising, keeps your brain active by having to remember steps, helps with flexibility, strength, posture, produces the happy hormones and burns loads of calories. What is not to love?!

And now it seems that people are catching on to this – Ian Waite & Natalie Lowe have started their new dance workout class called FitSteps (which we teach on a Tuesday morning at our dance studio by the way, little plug!) BUT you cannot beat the real thing of dancing with a partner  – and here are some articles proving what all my ballroom couples will tell you, Ballroom Dancing is fun AND good for you!

http://socialdance.stanford.edu/syllabi/smarter.htm

http://www.fitday.com/fitness-articles/fitness/exercises/4-exercise-benefits-of-ballroom-dancing-with-a-partner.html

It’s definitely wedding season – the number of enquiries and dance lessons booked in have significantly risen recently. But also on the rise are enquiries from parents of the bride and groom who want to dance at their children’s weddings. It stands to reason really – my parents don’t dance together and they are (sorry Mum & Dad!!) almost 70yrs old. They grew up in the 60s when partner dancing was still around, but on the decline. Any couples who courted in the 40s and 50s would have danced together a lot and they are now grandparents of the bride and groom. I think it’s great that parents want to learn to dance together – there’s no shame in not being able to dance. They just came from a generation when the music and culture didn’t support ‘going dancing’.

Everything goes through stages, I think it’s time to bring back partner dancing to Friday and Saturday nights out.