Ballroom Dance Update

Well, the greatest ballroom event in Hawaii, the Hawaii Star Ball has come and gone. I know some people were waiting for a blog or Facebook postings. Unfortunately, Geoffrey didn’t allow private photographing of any of the events during the Hawaii Star Ball. So, I don’t have any pictures to share with you, other than a group shot of just a few fellow competitors taken in the Ballroom after the event was over. If you want to know the competition results, you can go on-line and see them for yourselves, so I don’t need to blog that.

You really can’t blame Geoffrey for such a rule. After all, the Star Ball is a commercial venture. Geoffrey’s not a charity. He’s got costs to cover. And, it would be nice if he made a little profit for his efforts. All I have to say is that he did a great job this year and the attendance was quite nice with more competitors from the mainland and Japan than last year. We hope this is an upward trend that we will see continue next year.

This weekend, there are two full-ballroom events at the Palladium. On Friday evening, USA Dance, Honolulu Chapter is having their “Harvest Ball” and Pan Pacific has a full-ballroom event on Saturday evening. Most of you already know that Debra & I are on the Board of USA Dance, Honolulu Chapter. So, I hope you don’t mind that we throw in a little pitch every now and then for our events. If anyone from any of the other clubs would like to post a blog, catch us at the Palladium and let us know. We'll give you our email address and we'll post it for you.

All the dance clubs have gotten their Palladium schedules for the rest of the year and into next summer. Most of the Clubs, including USA Dance, received ballroom time for every month. Here’s a tip. USA Dance, Honolulu Chapter, has decided that all ballroom events (with the exception of ticketed events - like our Holiday Ball and Anniversary Ball) will be FREE to all members. That’s right - no charge to members. That includes this Friday’s Harvest Ball which is a full ballroom event.

The annual membership fee for USA Dance - for social dancers - is only $25. That gets you a membership in the National organization, not just Hawaii. There are Chapters all over the U.S. But, most importantly it will get you into all our monthly dances (except for the ticketed ones) free. And, it will get you significant discounts at all our workshops and classes we have during the year, including the workshops put on by the visiting professionals. If you’re not already a member, you can join during any of our events.

The Harvest Ball on Friday will feature a short, entertaining Latin exhibition by a select group of our younger students, in the K-12 group. We also heard that the Club may be raffling off a couple of coupons for our upcoming workshops. Hope to see you there.

Here’s a little testimonial from a couple who enjoys our dances. You may have seen it previously posted on Frank’s blog. It’s such a positive comment that we wanted to post it too.

September 23’s USA Dance social at the palladium started off with a “bang” … and it never stopped! Really … the music was awesome, from the very first dance to the last … and we honestly did not want to go home. I remember Warwick telling us once that the music is your third partner … and boy, did we have a great third partner that night! It was definitely a night to remember. Thank you, DJ Gary Kawasaki … you “ROCK!”

It was also nice to see some of the contenders to the Hawaii Star Ball “strutting their stuff” that night, getting ready for the grueling week ahead. They all looked great!

And by the way, we just heard there’s another fun dance scheduled for this Friday, October 7 at the palladium. Please don’t miss out, okay? It’s guaranteed to please!

Carl and Gayle

I think that says it all. If you miss the Harvest Ball on Friday, but you can make Pan Pacific’s dance on Saturday, we’ll probably see you there too.

If you can’t make either event, we hope you have a great weekend, whatever you may be doing.

With Aloha,
Calvin & Debra

p.s. The top picture is from a previous Hawaii Star Ball - when Geoffrey allowed picture taking. :-) And, the keiki's in the lower picture are USA Dance competitors at a Regional Competition (No, they're not the kids performing on Friday. But, Friday's kids will be great too!)