Tuesday 22 September 2009

Strictly Come Dancing Week 2 Preview

Strictly Come Dancing week 2 will feature the 8 couples who didn't dance in week 1 performing a ballroom dance and a latin dance each. We have been given an insight into each celebrity's ability with the group dance and there were some obvious ones to watch for the right and wrong reasons! The training footage shown on It Takes Two usually sheds some more light as to the level of dancing. Tonight's training footage showed some extra surprises to me in the form of Jo Wood performing far better than in the group dance, and Phil Tufnell showing some real ballroom promise! Hopefully we will get more of the training footage later in the week.

I am going to hazard a guess at some of the celebrities, as far as their dancing standard goes. However to guess who will go out would be crazy due to the public vote which doesn't always follow the dancing alone!

The Good
The one that really stands out in this section has to be Ricky Whittle. He has natural rhythm and movement as well as an understanding of shapes and lines. From the brief glimpses so far he can go a long way. He has many attributes of a great latin american dancer already, let's see what he can do in ballroom too!

The Not So Good
Having seen the group dance there were a couple of celebrities who you have to worry for, Richard Dunwoody and Jo Wood. I think the wood in their surnames may sum the problems up a bit! Richard didn't seem to know where he was or what he was doing in the group dance, and Jo was all out of sorts too. However in training footage, Jo Wood appeared to improve somewhat!

The Surprises
There could be a few in this section! Jo Wood's improvement in training footage was a surprise, whether it lasts or not will be the key! There were 2 who had a hint of style about them that I would never have expected. Phil "Tuffers" Tufnell showed some real promise in both the group dance, with his aerial heel taps, and in training he looked a rather refined dancer! Again Natalie Cassidy looked fantastic in training. It's hard to believe that it's only coming up to week 2. And does Anton finally have a good partner?? Let's hope she's as good as she looks because his latin american has come on a lot from last year.

Monday 21 September 2009

Strictly Come Dancing - Controversy in Week One?

In reality the controversy over Strictly Come Dancing started long before anyone saw a dance floor this year! Accusations of ageism in the BBC, scheduling wars with ITV and we'd not even started with bad public voting!


Week 1 set off with some surprises, not least that the celebrities are largely at week 3, 4 and beyond level and having to do 2 dances straight off. You may recall every other year they have put many weeks in before tackling 2 dances and been told how difficult it's going to be then!


This year has high lighted to me that no-one should now get voted out in week 1. They should all get chance to do 2 weeks before anyone goes. It is such a tight competition, and many people have been willing Joe to do well it seems, and he suffered with nerves the most. He did however show potential and I think the public saw that. However, if it was purely on this week's performance he probably should have been out.


Some forums have people complaining about Len's decision to save Rav Wilding this week, but I agreed with him that Rav really improved in the dance off, and Martina Hingis didn't. Len was spot on there. Yes I may have preferred looking at and watching Martina, but Rav was a better dancer. He had more control, and generally better technique, performing what is arguably the hardest latin dance for the male celebrities.

Wednesday 16 September 2009

Strictly Come Dancing News

I was very pleased to find out that Strictly Come Dancing will be filmed from Blackpool Tower on 7th November, for the 1st time in 5 years! As with many BBC shows, there is a draw via the website, with limitations on tickets. As you may have guess I have entered myself into this draw!

As the BBC website says, Blackpool Tower is the spiritual home of Strictly Come Dancing, as the original Come Dancing was filmed there too. It is also a fabulous location for dancing, boasting a huge floor, as well as a magical you will only ever understand if you dance there. Sitting in an audience is great but when you actually take to what many say is the World's best dancefloor, you can begin to realise what they mean.

I will keep you posted as to whether or not I manage to get tickets to this. There will apparently be 9 couples remaining at this stage. Maybe one day they will film another final there too, as they did in 2004. Having never danced on the BBC studio floor it will be hard to say, but the Tower Ballroom has a very unforgiving floor and it will be interesting to see if this will affect the celebrities, especially at a relatively early stage!

Tuesday 8 September 2009

Paso Doble Video from Evening of Dance

I have now posted the third and final video from an Evening of Dance, due to a couple of requests. The Paso Doble is the only other dance I filmed that James & Ola performed.

I am looking forward to see what they do in Strictly Come Dancing this year, as I don’t think we’ve ever seen the best of them! If you watch the Paso Doble video, you may agree!

Personally, I love the passion and the drama of the Paso Doble and it’s a shame so few couples perform it. Having said that it is one of the hardest dances to perfect in terms of the performance and look of it especially if you don’t feel the music. Yes I love Paso Doble! It still maintains a slight air of exclusivity about it when you dance at socials too as very few places seem to teach it. I do thinks that it’s a dance that formerly playing rugby really helps too! You have that bit of aggression, mixed with passion that is required to really carry the Paso Doble.