What Should We Wear To Our Lessons?

Wear clothing you are comfortable in for your lessons. Ladies should wear something similar to the shoe you will be wearing for your wedding. Try to find a shoe with a similar heel height and style. Flip flops and mules are not a good choice for lessons. Men should wear a dress shoe with a leather sole rather than running shoes that tend to stick on the floor.

My Fiancé And I Have Never Danced Before. How Long Will It Take To Learn To Dance?

This varies with your goals, the number of lessons you take, and whether or not you like to practice! You will have fun during your very first lesson, but like all sports and art forms, there is no limit for improvement. Most of our social dancers feel they have a foundation in several dances within six months.

What's the difference between Ballroom Dance, Modern, Standard, International and Dancesport?

Ballroom is the most general and the oldest term that has been used sometimes to describe Waltz, Tango, Slow Foxtrot, Quickstep and Viennese Waltz and sometimes it was also used for Latin American dances, namely Cha cha, Samba, Rumba, Paso Doble and Jive. Sometimes it was also used to refer to Old Time and Sequence dances. So the term "Modern Ballroom" (in short "Modern") was introduced in Britain later to indicate clearly that the speaker was not referring to Old Time, Sequence or Latin-American dances. But in Europe the term "Modern" was already frequently used to describe a totally different type of dancing (eg. jazz or other form of solo dancing), so the Europeans called it "Standard" instead. But "Standard" had an unclear meaning in America, where there is an American version of it (called American Smooth). Therefore Americans introduced the term "International Standard" to make the difference clear.

Dancesport describes the competitive side of dancing Standard and Latin-American styles, where couples dancing is judges by judges and purpose of it is to achieve the highest possible placing. Dancesport is made of 3 branches: Standard, Latin-American and 10-dance. 10-dance is a combination of Standard and Latin, to take part in 10-dance competition you have to dance 5 Standard and 5 Latin dances.

On the other side of the scale we have Social dancing, where you dance for you own pleasure and to meet people. Here the divisions between style are not that important, so we still quite often say that we "Go Ballroom dancing"

Do I need to buy dance shoes for my beginning class?

Not at first. Just be sure you wear leather-soled shoes that fit well and stay on your feet. Sneakers or other rubber-soled shoes are not a good choice. They are very difficult to dance in and can put a lot of strain on your ankles and joints. Don’t wear clogs, wedges, slides, or any shoes with an open back – you’ll be thinking more about your shoes than your dancing!
For women, flexible heeled shoes that are not too high (what you would wear for a night on the town is best). Platform soles or stilettos come later! For men, flat-soled (dress) shoes are a good idea. This will allow you to spin without effort.
Bonus tip: when you go to get dance shoes someday, many of those stores have dance music, for whatever you’re learning!