My partner and I have just returned from the 24th Riviera Dance Festival in Torquay, England. For those who are not familiar with this festival it's 7 days of dance practice, private lessons, master class workshops and competitions for all levels. In short it's a joy from start to finish for anyone who's keen to take their dancing to the next level be that novice to intermediate or pre-championship to full championship.

The 7 days were crammed full of opportunities to practice, learn and try out new ideas on the competition floor and it certainly got me thinking about our dancing and how we move to the next stage. It might be a controversial point of view (for some teachers) but I now firmly believe to truly develop your dancing you need to take lessons and workshops from a range of teachers and coaches although I also believe there is a strong need for a base coach to help you week in and week out. The dance festival both facilitated this and for me cemented the need for it.

From a personal point of view the weeks activities changed forever the way I think about dancing. No longer do I view it as a fixed and absolute but rather a range of interpretations that should be adapted to suit ones own body shape, ability, personality and ambition. The master classes demonstrated how ideas I had previously considered to be immovable and incontrovertibly fixed were in fact up for debate and could be adapted.

This is not to suggest that many aspects of dance are not fixed and absolute and I wouldn't encourage the novice dancer to question the basic building blocks of a solid foundation and top line – it certainly seems to be assisting us in our endeavours. However other aspects of the modern dance technique are it would seem, following the festival and associated classes, very much up for debate. Following my week at the festival and the ideas and thoughts related to me by the very best teachers and dancers I'm looking forward to taking my dancing to the next stage with an enquiring mind and a keenness to take lessons from as many quality teachers as my bank balance will allow!

This article is copyright Vertical Expression