The KL International Dance Festival, organised by The Dance Space and sponsored by many huge corporations including Astro, was held this whole week from 4th to 10th June. The weekdays saw a host of dance workshops for various dance styles including Jazz Funk, Capoeira, Argentine Tango and Shuffle to name a few, and the nights saw performances for said dances. Saturday was the international dance competition for four different divisions which are DanceSport (i.e. ballroom and latin), Middle Eastern (belly dancing), Hip Hop and Shuffle.

I didn’t go for any of the workshops although I had wanted to, and wanted to take advantage of the fact that they were held during the school holidays and I was free to attend. But I didn’t, because (1) I was sick (yet again) and (2) a friend said that they weren’t really worth going for. The dance floor was lovely, without a doubt the best we’ve ever seen; but the dance workshops were not really workshops; rather just classes for the general public who know how to dance as much as an ostrich might. OK, that was rather harsh. I mean they were catered for the public who knew nothing about dancing; and seasoned dancers, regardless of discipline, would find them rather beneath them.

I didn’t want to go all the way there just to be disappointed, so I stayed home catching up on work instead. Geez, how sad is that??

Anyway, I went to the mall today to watch the competition which was held at the concourse for the entire public to see. I was there from 11am (comp was scheduled to start at 10am). First thing I noticed was the unresponsive crowd. The crowds at a tickets-only dance competition are always far more appreciative than the general free-for-all public; I’m guessing it’s because they want to get their money’s worth. Haha!! Seriously, it’s usually because the people who are willing to pay for the tickets are generally dance enthusiasts themselves, or appreciate dancing enough to pay for it; and they can appreciate the hard work and effort the competitors put in on the floor.

It started with ballroom, and I’m not a big fan of ballroom to begin with, but I didn’t see anything worth watching. I’ve been to a few ballroom/latin comps before where there were some ballroom couples who really wowed me. Not this time. I stood there waiting until the next division (Middle Eastern) came on, where there were two levels: Intermediate and Advanced, both of which had three participants each. The participants were required to dance (freestyle) to three pre-selected music, and then on the floor on their own to one own selection. Two of the advanced dancers reused a pre-selected music. Frankly, the only thing interesting on the floor during the division was their costumes. The dancing was, as we would say, syiok sendiri. They danced for themselves.

Then Hip Hop came on. There were only teams for this competition, which including one kiddy team (all under 12) who were so cute, and honestly better than some of the teen teams who competed. This time around, the competition level felt a bit lower than what I’ve previously seen in other hiphop competitions. Quite disappointing. But it might be due to where I was watching, because I was standing on a higher level sort of behind the stage; the speakers were pointed towards the floor, so I was sort of behind the speakers. I wasn’t hearing the best sound that the competitiors were hearing, and so not quite able to get into the groove the competitors were trying to draw us in.

Then Shuffle came on, and honestly, I’ve no idea what shuffling is about. My friends tell me that it’s just a dance move, and it’s not a dance discipline so to speak. So all we saw were teams doing their own thing but the similarity they all share is their footwork. I only stayed to watch three and half teams before I dragged my friends (Andrea, who was supposed to meet me at 11 but only came at 1; and Kobee who came a little after Andrea) away for lunch. I had been standing at the same spot from 11 to 3! I didn’t even go on a washroom break!

Don’t get me wrong. I think it’s fantastic that dance festivals like these are organised, to cater to different dance styles, and giving opportunity to dancers everywhere to compete in. This is the first Malaysian belly dance competition, as well as the first Malaysian shuffle competition. It’s also great that dance workshops are conducted for free to the public. It’s just disappointing that the level of competition is not as high as befits a KL International Dance Festival.

Still, I applaud The Dance Space for successfully organising a dance festival on a monumental scale as this!

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 10th, 2007 at 12:45 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.