Melanie Stocker-Bucher: dance biography

The story

Since I started to identify myself I wanted to dance. When the music was playing I jumped all around the house as probably many other children do. While my friends were playing outdoor I was sitting all day long beside the stereo player that belonged to our neighbors and listening to Elvis singing. After a while I've got a possibility to do my first dance steps in a dance school. This was a dance school for adults. I had a lot of motivation but no talent to say honestly.

Certainly, the majority of people who attended classes at the school have interest not so much about dancing but mostly about flirtation. So for me at my age of 13 it was not really a good place to learn to dance. The only choice for me that time was to train at home with one of my friends. I showed her the followers' steps and tried to lead her. That for me today is advantage that time was a great disadvantage. I was a very young girl and I had two left legs and I was almost unleadable. That was the description of a follower that young men from my group dreamed of :)

Five years have passed. I trained at home every day and started to concentrate at rock'n'roll. That was my stream and my music. Though my partner liked to dance he did not want to spent so much time and energy for dancing as I did. Sometimes I thought that was enough for me and I wanted to change the partner or just to give this all up. But my mother convinced me to go on.

At the end I have found a partner and together we came to Crazy Darts. A little bit later we broke away and for some time I had no a constant partner. Once in Crazy Darts one of the followers could not take part in a show. And so I was asked to replace Reto's partner. The show was successful and since that time we danced as a formation-couple. Later we started to train individually and to compete. He was my 13th partner and the number of our couple at the first competition we won was 13.

We danced rock'n'roll before we first came to BoogieBaren seminars in Munich. There we first time learned what is boogie woogie. I had many problems with the basic steps. By the end of the week I was sure I would not ever dance this. But next year we have come there already as teachers.

By that time European and World Championships in boogie woogie were already held regularly. It was decided that Swiss couples also should take part in these competitions. The qualification contest was organized to decide who will go to Germany. The first five coupes were permitted to go there. And we were the fifth!

The Championship in Freising was held in both categories: main class couples and formation. That is why we have not only to dance all day long but to change our costumes all the time. In the beginning - pink-and-black costumes for couple dance, later - white ones for formation. And certainly for every costume I should change underwear, petticoat, shoes, jewelries, lipstick and so on.

Organizers did not really follow the schedule strictly. That is why when we for example were ready with the formation costumes we heard that main class couples had to prepare to go on stage…

But by the end of that day we not only won the first place with our formation group but also reached the pedestal as a couple. We were right after the new European Champions. That was great excitement for us and the great success for Swiss boogie stage. I am frequently asked about that competition even now.

Soon Reto and I managed to repeat the success at the World Championship. There we took the third place.

The sequence of crazy years followed. With great pleasure and inspiration we dedicated a lot of time to dances. Due to our achievements at competitions we have been receiving more and more invitations to teach. We have passed through almost the whole Europe and got acquainted with many interesting people. That was great time. During all this years we continued to compete. From 1991 to 1995 we took part in more then 90 competitions and 61 times we have won the cup. Five times we were Swiss Champions, 4 times - European Champions and 3 times World Champions (both in formation category and as a couple in main class). In 1995 we took part in the World Championship for the last time. After my long stay in England and Reto's departure to the USA we decided that it was the right time to finish our career as competitors. But we continued to train as a couple until Reto's marriage and his son's birth when Reto decided to give up the dances.

As for me I was not ready to finfish to dance. And I started to teach alone. At the beginning it was rather difficult but soon I started to receive more and more invitations. Certainly, I was very glad that I had an opportunity to continue to teach but at large seminars I felt the lack of the partner. Firstly it brought less satisfaction to me and secondly I thought it would give better results to teach as a couple. That is why I invited Mario and asked him if he wanted to teach with me. After some time we have become a constant teaching couple. Now it is almost four years since we found our own style that suits us and is accepted by many dancing couples. We both like boogie and are eager to teach it. And that is the thing that connects us as teachers and as friends.

We work with different Swiss and foreign competing couples and it gives us great pleasure.

This year I have become totally independent and I earn my living. I do my best to continue self-development to be able to help dancers to reach "the dance heaven" on their way together with their partners and music. I wish to all of you to reach it.

References

Aina Nygaard & Jorgen B. Sandnes (Norway, World Champions 2004): We are very glad that we've got an opportunity to work with Melanie. She has given a huge help to us as to boogie-dancers. She knows the dance in details and her training and motivation skills are awesome. We would not ever have the success that we have now without her help.

Deborah Varisco & Vincenzo Fesi (Italy): Three lessons with Melanie and we have won the World Cup… No comments! Melanie is one of the best teachers in the world and a very good friend. Music and dance connect people. Even in spite of the distance of 1000 km between them.

Dora Landherr & Gabor Buzalka (Hungary): Thanks to Melanie and Reto I fell in love with boogie-woogie and gave up rock'n'roll. I admired them entertaining people with their light joyful dance. I would never thought that once I would have and opportunity to meet Melanie and to take her private lessons. Those lessons gave us more than all the lessons of all the teachers that we ever took before. This lady really understands something :)