Every professional or amateur dance couple, in addition to attending a ballroom dance course, usually also attends seminars, workshops, trainings and master classes by well-known coaches. The AirDance team knows like no one else how important it is for dancers to have access to great teachers in order to reach great heights in competitions. Therefore, in pursuit of its mission to popularize dance worldwide, AirDance not only offers online dance lessons through its app, but also regularly organizes and sponsors various dance events.
The Italian Story Congress was held September 3-5, 2022 in Warsaw, Poland at our AirDance Space studio. We managed to invite legendary Italian dancers Maurizio Vescovo, Anna Melnikova, Stefano di Filippo, Annalisa Di Filippo and their incomparable coach Carolyn Smith, who has trained a huge number of champions in her career. Unfortunately, Stefano and Annaliza Di Filippo were unable to attend due to family reasons, but nevertheless the ballroom dance learning program was leaked and intense.
The goal of the masterclasses led by our star dancers and coaches was to share the story of success, the path to which was made possible through hard work and passionate love of dance. Both ballroom and utility dancing. The life of any professional dancer is almost always a story of ups and downs, as well as fraught encounters and decisions. It was great to witness an amazing meeting on the dance floor of well-known students and their regular and no less famous coach, while having a lot of theory, as well as practice in group and individual classes for adults and teenagers. Participants in the Italian Story congress spent the three days among like-minded people and professionals dedicated to their cause. The rest of the world simply ceased to exist for a while.
The motto of Carolyn Smith’s workshop was “From good to great, from great to champion.” They were a candid account of Carolyn’s experience in competitive ballroom dancing, coaching dancers from all over the world, the great importance of being curious and imaginative in the world of dance, and also being courageous in accepting key decisions about a dancer’s career. Carolyn shared with participants the secrets of the success of the ballroom dance champions she raised and helped some couples polish their skills in one-on-one classes.
Anna Melnikova, Stefano Di Filippo’s long-time partner, talked about the importance of knowing the success stories of dancers, shared the secret of who her personal idols are in ballroom dancing, and helped with her graceful example of perfecting the interaction skills of stable feet, hips, body and proper neck and head posture while performing certain figures during practice. Her practical classes were mainly based on polishing the basic steps, which will make any dance arrangement look masterful
You Tube Air Dance & Maurizio Vescovo
In his lectures and training, Maurizio Vescovo focused on the practice and concepts of freedom of movement between the rhythms of music and harmonic change of dynamics in dance. Maurizio always helps his students find their individuality and work on its interpretation in dance. He also revealed the issue of “Italianness” in ballroom dancing and why Italians in particular are doing so well.
We also thought of those who could not join us in person at our wonderful studio in Warsaw. The live broadcast of this congress took place on the AirDance app (https://airdance.live/), which has been loved by dancers from all over the world for more than two years, and which delights not only with online lessons from legendary trainers, but also with the broadcast of international ballroom dance tournaments organized by AirDance Events. It is simply unbelievable that more than a thousand people from 18 countries around the world participated in this online event.
We are convinced that such an intensive weekend was a great way to raise the skills of dance couples to a qualitatively new level. Concentration of training hours, mobilization of all forces and attention contribute to rapid growth, which is especially important after the vacations and before the start of a new tournament season in ballroom dancing. After spending time with professional and well-known dancers, motivation and self-esteem always increase, plus by watching their online dance lessons, the material is consolidated and absorbed as much as possible. Personal stories of legendary dancers, their theoretical explanations, and not just exercises and dance routines in hands-on classes, contribute to personal development, and consequently skills and performance in competitions also increase. The AirDance team is extremely happy to be of benefit to the dance community!
