Blaze II - aftermath

[Lory]

"blaze-ii-aftermath-cant-remeber-rachel.jpg"

Stop picking on me and help me remember

[Lory]

Dancing pics..

[Lory]

more dancing...

[Lory]

more..

[Lory]

dancing with the stars!..

[Lory]

more dancing with the stars!

[pmjd]

Roll on the next one Guys... Poor Craig is already sick of hearing about it I think. (PMJD - he says to hit harder the next time!! Bad Boy!)

What did I do(then again my memory is a bit fuzzy in places) all I can remember is you leading me astray

and the static electricity created by dancing on the extra flooring.

Didn't notice the static, maybe you were creating a little bit of electricity in your dances Though I did like have the choice of the faster main permanent floor and the slightly slower temporary flooring right next to each other.

* Some people in the M&J classes billed for experienced dancers who simply did not have a clue .... leads to people 'fixing' for classes which, IMO, doesn't help the overall development of a dance style.

I was a bit apprehensive about doing the experienced classes because your never sure if you're a suitably experienced dancer and fit into the teacher's idea of an experienced dancer. I did do several of the experienced level workshops: Trampy's dramatic drops, Lucky & Ruby's Flip, Flop and Fly and Lorna's spinnin jak flash workshops with a fixed partner (thanks very much to cms and Shea). This was because I wanted to have a partner who I felt was experienced and capable, mainly because of the moves involved. I also prefer to get feedback from the same person to see what worked and what needed to be improved as opposed to changing partners and feedback all the time.

I would agree that rotation is a good thing, especially when your starting out any new dance style, but as you progress I don't think it suits all classes.

...The relaxed feeling throughout the freestyle sessions in both rooms was undoubtedly excellent.

What I remember the most is the time spent behind the scenes, setting up the Blues room with those trees and all. That was one hell of a transformation.
...

There is a constant effort to constantly improve on what we do. What defines Blaze is the quality of the music, the excellent dancers (in both rooms) and the friendliness of the people. This alone is more than enough to persuade us to to come back next year for more of the same.

All the backstage efforts are greatly appreciated

It was the mix of people from all over, music and the high dancing standard that made it so memorable a weekend..and the reason I'm still grinning now

[robd]

Good photos Lory - when can we see the video for 'Shake That' feat. Franck Pauly?

[Lory]

more..

[Mezzosoprano]

What did I do(then again my memory is a bit fuzzy in places) all I can remember is you leading me astray

Eh?!? I thought it was you leading ME astray....

Anyway, there's no evidence to say that it was either of us.... so we're safe!!

ps - you skelped my bum in the middle of a song - I hate to think it was that forgettable?!

[Lory]

Good photos Lory - when can we see the video for 'Shake That' feat. Franck Pauly?

Don't worry... all in good time!

[robd]

And what a shame to cut Elaine off at shoulder height in those Saturday night pictures - she was stunning in that dress - clearly, the Ceroc Greenwich team have all the best partners

[pmjd]

ps - you skelped my bum in the middle of a song - I hate to think it was that forgettable?!

I thought I'd clocked you on the head or something by accident Oh yes that something blame it on Tramy's musicality class (officially passing the buck) the song lyrics at the time said "spank"...I just kinda went along with it

[Shea]

What a great weekend!!
Thanks Franck and Sheena and the team for doing a great job. All the behind the scenes work was well worth it!!


OK, the not so good stuff …..
Dancing finishing at 2am. The afterparties were a laugh though and it was a good chance to get to know & meet new people.

The Boudoir (sack the DJ) was hard to find especially on the Sunday when the internal access way was locked for some reason and we had to locate the outside rear door.


The good stuff….
Blaze may be a smaller weekend than others but the great thing about it is the friendliness and intimacy that comes with a smaller crowd. There was a great ambiance especially in the Cyclone room.

Workshops
I loved Lucky & Ruby’s workshops. Can we get them back again please Franck!!?
Flip, flop & fly was great (thanks pmjd) and as for Fishing...what a really chilled way to round off a weekend. Great atmosphere!!
Steve’s applied musicality – really enjoyed that. An innovative way to demonstrate musicality and it worked really well once people got into the idea.

Best discovery – micro blues! Mmmm..

Dances
I had so many wonderful dances over the weekend. Thanks first to pmjd for being my partner in the workshops. I enjoyed them, especially FF&F.
Franck – loved our dance! Think it’s the first time I got through a dance with you without messing up!
Jamie for our interesting but strangely fun one-legged dance on Sunday, Chesca for our bar-dance (I think we should do a workshop!)

I really enjoyed spending both afternoons in the Boudoir (when I found it!) It was a great opportunity to get experimental and try stuff in a relaxed environment and to catch up with friends. Thanks for all the great dances in there Passion Harem – loved the tango flavour, Gadget (didn’t mean to drop you!!), Noel – enjoyed our groovy dances as before, Killing Time, Ducasi, Morris, Pretzel Meister (fab lift!). Hope I haven’t forgotten anyone.

Special mention to Lucky who during my last dance of the weekend made me fly! The smile on my face when I landed said it all. So cool!

It was also great to meet the visiting forumites. Hi to Stoke Bloke, Twirly Bird, Sparkles, Robd, Barmpot. Hope to see you at a venue down south soon.

Finally thanks to all the Inverness crowd who were there in such numbers. I’m sure we were the largest group. It really helped make it a great weekend and it was fab to see you all dancing away and enjoying it so much - thanks for all the dances guys and gals!
See you Thurs.

[stairman]

Our first Blaze


Fantastic


Did 17 classes can remember about 2 new moves


Thanks to Franck & Sheena for organising the weekend
Thanks to all the teachers for great lessons
Thanks to all the support staff who gave up dance time to help it it run smoothly
Thanks for all for the fabulous dances I had all weekend


The Good
Everything apart from the BAD


The Bad
Wont have the Diner option again (had to miss classes & the food was lukewarm)
My sore feet (still feel them now 2 days later)

[Birlmeister]

What another absolutely brilliant Blaze weekender. Loads of great dances, great music and loads of great workshops. And as for the massage from Cheeks on saturday morning words could not describe it. (Thanks Cheeks for waking me up in time so I could do Trampy's dips and drops). Thanks must go to Mezzo and the ladies of Inverness for putting up with my dancing, especially on Sunday after my brain disappeared into a great void. Lory was the next recipient of the void but after just a few steps the dancing brain engaged again and I had a thoroughly enjoyable dance with her. Our newly crowned Forum Queen truly does have restorative powers. Other dancers of note were Jazzy Shuggy, Aleks and Von (will work on erasing those leads ).

Thanks Franck, Sheena and all the others for all your hard work in putting it all together.

All that remains to be said now is "Roll on next May for Blaze III."

[StokeBloke]

Short review, very long rambling overtired diary style review, take your pick...

Short Review - Great dancers, awesome host and hostess, excellent music, cool classes, new friends, old friends, millions of brilliant dances. More, more, more.......

Long Review -Lots has already been said about the event... so I will tell you what I got up to, if you wanna read it....
Thursday
The trip up to Ayr was a long and slow one. We caught a lift up with Mac, trailer attached with the lighting and video equipment for the weekend. We finally arrived at around 7pm on Thursday night and started to unload and set up the lighting for the main room. Finished at around 1am. During this time I also helped Frankc, Sheena and Dazzler who were setting up the blues room. At one point I came in and saw all three of them on their hands and knees with de-greaser and paint scrapers trying to get strips of glue off of the dirty, sticky floor

These are the sort of things that the majority of us never see, I cannot describe the level of commitment and dedication that was put into getting the venue ready and dance-able. Huge respect the crew, and it was brilliant to see Frankc leading the troops from the front

We stayed in a B&B Thursday night near the campsite and in the morning I had my first ever 'Full Scottish Breakfast' the only difference I could see from a full English was with a full Scottish you only get one sausage not two! Typical tight arsed Scots... hehhehee

Friday
Back to the venue early to finish setting up. Around lunchtime the floor buffing machine Frankc managed to borrow arrived. Respect to Mac and The BarmDude who finished setting up all the lighting and the video studio with one set of hands short so I could get to work cleaning the hideously filthy blues room floor. Before too long it was clean, smooth and totally devoid of any sticky glue. Marc had set up the sound and lighting, and Dazzler and me dragged (quite literally) five huge trees from backstage in the main room, into the blues room to realise Marc's vision of a jungle play room - boy those things were heavy! Thanks Dazzler for taking the heavier end

Then it was off to the caravan, which was a long trek from the venue. But clean, warm and tardis-tastically roomy. Time to dance

Although there were less people at Blaze than other weekenders I had attended, the level of dancer seemed to be extraordinarily high. Seeing the finished rooms full of dancers being washed with sweeping lights gave me a real sense of satisfaction.

Trampy and Rachel played awesome sets in the blues room, and Sheena kept me on my feet in the boing-boing room when the blues room was being used for a late night class. Brilliant music Sheena!

Jeepers! Is it 2am already! Frankc managed to sweet talk the security staff into letting us stay back a while longer so we could buff the floor in the main room. Left around 2:30ish and it was back to bed.... well... it was meant to be. En route I met Dazzler outside a caravan that was partying in full swing. His opening gambit was (imagine this is a Scottish accent) "Hey, Stoookie, d'ya wanna wee glass a champagne?" What sort of a question is that!! Are bears catholic?

Yes folks, it was the Official Unofficial Inverness Forum party. Complete with a micro-blues lesson from Gadget with Shea as a slightly excited demo. Boy those Scotchies know how to party. Huge respect to you all, I made so many friends that night. The party was closed down at 5:30am by the site security staff

Saturday
Went off up to the venue, but not a lot was happening. Twirlie Bird, Barmpot and Eve went back to watch Strictly Come Dancing (along with most of the other dancers) and I stopped in the main room to just hang around and watch. Wandered into the blues room and Yliander asked if I would partner her for Lucky and Ruby's Step Around class. Ummmm are bears catho.... sorry ... already done that joke! Seriously great class, and millions of thank yous Yli for putting up with me. Actually we did good enough to get dragged into the middle by Lucky to show where we were up to!!! I loved the circle type class set up. Teachers of smaller groups should take note.

The Forum Awards were real fun and the cabaret was totally superb! Ratatatatatattatatatattatatatatatataaa. The night finished drifting between the blues room and the main room, dancing to Rob Ambridge, Sheena and Marc Foster's sets! What a night... then in true Cinderella style it was 2am. The after party party was at Frankc's. Waffles straight out of the waffle iron and chilled champagne. Excellent! At around 4am Frankc's party was starting to wind down so I took Twirlie Bird, Jaimie and Caz and headed for Dazzler's after party, after party party with a bottle of bubbly kindly donated by Frankc

Dazzler mixed us Shambles cocktails (equal measures of champagne, vodka and red bull for those taking notes). They were killer! We had four couples dancing in that tiny front room! Lucky and Ruby think that group blues is a new concept Twirlie wandered home to bed at around 7ish.

We got bored cramped dancing to an iPod. So we (Dazzler, Jaimie, Caz, Pauline, Shiny Wee Star, Steve, pmjd and me) convinced Rob Ambridge to bring some CDs and we would try to get into the venue. Shhhh don't tell Frankc!! With a little sweet talk I managed to get the restaurant manager to pop a fire exit for us, and we hit the Boudoir. Dancing as the sun crept up, just the nine of us with Rob playing a sublime set was just the high point of the weekend!!! It's how friends for life get made! After telling the cheese & onion cornflakes story... ohh oh and Jesus Bananas whilst Jaimie tried to breath! I finally got home around 11:30am Twirlie made me some coffee.... what a beautiful understanding woman I have

Sunday
I got to do Lucky and Ruby's brilliant Flip, Flop & Fly class with Twirlie Bird, and even though we were the other side of the room we heard and felt the sickening thud of Freudian Hip's head thumping into the floor! So pleased that you were OK babe Then we did the Fishing class. I cannot recommend this highly enough, no matter how long you have been dancing, you'll love this class. Trampy's final set in the blues room was cut off in its prime unfortunately. But Sheena was playing in the main room so all wasn't lost. Damn! Is it 2am again! The venue emptied and we started to break down the lighting rigs ready for loading in the morning. Back to Frankc's for waffles, drinks and weird trans-Atlantic charades. Then to bed!

Monday
Loaded all the lighting gear into the trailer and headed off South at around 1pm. Finally got in at about 7pm complete with The BarmDude, and Dazzler! Forty minutes later the four of us were scrubbed, changed and heading out to a local venue that Marc was DJing at. Great end to an amazing weekender. Blaze III ... bring it on!!!!

What a weekend. Frankc and Sheena are wonderful people. Twirlie Bird and me both said how lovely is was getting to know them the way we did this weekend. And... Dazzler... what a top bloke!

[Minnie M]

Just love your spelling of Frankc Stokie

[Nessiemonster]

Best discovery – micro blues! Mmmm..

Discovered that about a year ago...

Huge thanks and to Franck, Sheena, Dazzler, StokeBloke, Gadget, Mac & however many others for all their hard work - it was Well Worth It!!! The blues room looked fab and was a huge improvement on last time. Great ambience, as has already been said.

I'm probably one of the few for whom the 2am finish was actually okay - it suited my body clock just fine.

Big thanks to all those I danced with - so many wonderful dances. I really enjoyed the Boudoir both days (and more accessible than last time!) and was able to experiment a lot more with improvisation. A good variety of music played. Maurice, I loved the version of Aicha you played. Sorry to Gadget and Pretzelmeister for my ungraceful descents to the floor whilst dancing - nothing personal! I have long wanted to dance to Evanescence - thanks to whoever was djing that, but I need to be fitter before attempting it again!

Thanks too to Passion Harem, Killingtime and Louisa for being great company and fab to share with. And they reckon us girls are chocoholics... And I really enjoyed that personal set we had in the main room on Friday afternoon! I love dancing with you all.

To all those I danced with, thank you, I enjoyed them all and spent more time dancing with a huge smile on my face than in a long time. The water-cooler sway (you know who you are, but I'm afraid I don't remember your name) and the fan dance with Killingtime stand out as two of the more unusual dances. Along with a swapsie dance that started with 3 of and grew to 6

Great to see so many others from Inverness there, and so good to see so many in the blues room - I look forward to being bluesed on a regular basis now...

After being injured for the first Blaze it was wonderful to be able to dance and make up for it this time. With so many first class dances it really did make up for it. Blaze really is about the intimacy of the event, the effort put in by the crew, and the folk who turn up and dance.

[frodo]

Our first Blaze
...
Did 17 classes can remember about 2 new moves
...
Thanks to all the teachers for great lessons
...
Wont have the Diner option again (had to miss classes & the food was lukewarm)

17 (longer than normal) classes and having involuntarily missed classes .

I wish more southerly weekenders would pick up the same volume of teaching time.