Our traditional Xmas Camp will take place in the Moscow Region, from January 3 through 8. This time the Camp lasts for 5 days! There will be workshops, bonus classes, parties, competitions and Christmas surprises!
Camp Programme
January, 3 – arrival on site, party + DJ Battle
January, 4 – workshops, bonus classes, party + christmas ball
January, 5 – workshops, bonus classes, party, blues night after 2:00 AM
January, 6 – workshops, bonus classes, teacher's show, party + Jack'n'Jill contest
January, 7 – workshops, bonus classes, cabaret, party
January, 8 – workshops, departure
Melanie Stocker-Bucher has a great number of awards in boogie-woogie: five times she won Championship of Switzerland, four times - European Championship and three times - World Championship (both main class and formation). She is one of the most famous European boogie teachers. She has taught in many dance camps through out the world including Herrang Dance Camp.
Among Melanie's students there are such famous dancers as Aina Nygaard and Jörgen B. Sandnes (World Champions 2004), Deborah Varisco and Vincenzo Fesi and many others. You can find Melanie's biography in "Publications" section at our site.
Melanie has trained at last year’s Christmas Dance Camp, everybody, who attended the camp, remember her classes very well.
Olivier Massart started dancing boogie-woogie when he was 9 (!!) years old at Melanie and Reto’s workshops. He has won several national Championships of Belgium, and won the world championship among junior boogie-woogie dancers. This year he started dancing lindy hop and west-coast swing, and won awards in US competitions.
Daniel & Sandra Dalman Lindy Hop
Daniel and Sandra are brother and sister and they hold together the title of two time World Lindy Hop Champions 2003 & 2004. Besides that, they are several times Swedish Champions in Lindy Hop and Boogie Woogie.
They started dancing together when Daniel was 8 and Sandra was 10 years old.
Both of them have been studying many different dance styles including jazz, ballet, street dance, modern dance, bugg, dubbelbugg, lindy hop, boogie woogie, tap and rock 'n roll.
Olivier & Natalia Harouard boogie-woogie, lindy hop, west coast swing
Natasha and Olivier met in Herrang in 2001, started teaching together from 2003. Natasha dances since she was 7, balroom dancing, contests, teaching...in 2001 she discovered swing dance, and simply fell in love with it. Later, she took part in all workshops on swing in Russia and other countries, and soon became one of the best Russian dancers and teachers.
Olivier discovered dancing when he was 20, and it became his big passion. He started taking part in contests, and was one of the 8 best dancers in France, and one of the 40 best world dancers. In 2003 he began dancing lindy hop and balboa.
After getting married, they start teaching in Toulouse in 2004, and then, in 2005 they move to Cote d'Azur and continued to develop swing culture.
They teach practically all kinds of swing dance: lindy hop, boogie-woogie, balboa and west coast swing.
The dancers in Russia, France and other countries appreciate the blend of 2 cultures, original style of dancing and teaching. They are often invited to give workshops in Finland, Spain, Russia, Italy and France.
Taras Melnik and Larisa Glikina – Kiev Swing Dance Club Lindy Hop
Here’s what Taras told about himself: “People say - God moves in a mysterious way! If somebody would tell me, when I was a student, that I will dance, take part in contests and teach – I would laugh in their face. But nevertheless… In my last university year, in 1993, friends brought me to dancing classes, they stopped coming in a month, and I stayed :-)
And it went on... I danced tap (6 years) under the guidance of a famous Ukrainian teacher Vladimir Shpudeiko, at the same time started dancing and later teaching rock’n’roll. In 1995 Dmitry Tarasov came to Ukraine with a seminar on boogie-woogie, a dance, which was not known in Ukraine. My partner Larisa Glikina and I attended the seminar. Since then we started dancing a lot and taking part in contests. We won prizes of Ukrainian Cups and Championships, won silver medal in the Championship of Russia, presented Ukraine at the international competitions. In our desire to improve dancing, we attended dance seminars in Finland, Sweden, France, Germany. At the same time I received second higher education – in choreography.
We started teaching boogie-woogie on request of our friends in 1999, and in 2002 we started teaching lindy hop. Now we develop social dance in Kiev – many of our students become swing dance fans and bring the light “the joy dance” to people, involving them in the wonderful world of dance.”
This summer Taras and Larisa gave classes at Herrang, the famous international dance camp (Sweden).
Olga Moiseeva Lindy Hop
Founder and head of Moscow Swing Dance Society, Olga started dancing back in 2000. She was doing boogie woogie and lindy hop for quite a long time, then concentrated on authentic group of dances – lindy, charleston, balboa.
She has founded her own club (MSDS) in 2002, enabling to realize her concepts and vision of swing dancing and social dance community. Nowadays she teaches lindy hop and charleston on a regular basis, organizes various dance events in Moscow.
Ksenia Semenikhina
Lindy Hop
When being a high school student Ksenia once saw on TV a competition in rock’n’roll. She liked the acrobatics and decided to try this kind of dancing some day. She managed to do this in a year when she came to Moscow dance studio “B17”. She was training there for several years and changed two dance partners. Also at this time she was much interested in hustle. And in 1994 she has won the title of “Miss Hustle” at the contest organized by dance school “Dance College”. That was the first but not the last of her victories.
First she started to dance boogie in dance studio “Tutti-Frutti”. In 1997 she came to “Tantsclass”. Next year Vladimir Ishimov became her dance partner.
Now Ksenia has a great number of students. Many of them are real fans of swing dancing who visit swing dance camps all over the world and take part in competitions. And some of them already teach boogie and lindy themselves.
Fyodor Nedotko - Casa Latina, St. Petersburg
Lindy Hop
That is what Fedor telling about himself: "I am Nedotko Fedor. I love social dancing (almost all styles of it). I think it is the only way of dancing that suits for using dance potential of a human being. I think that couple dancing is an illustration of relationships between man and woman and that is why it is the most natural and the most interesting way to dance. But certainly it does not exclude the need of individual training. For me jazz is not only abstract music but it is special "dancing mood" that takes me to the condition of slight emotional raise. Couple dancing + jazz = SWING DANCE.
I am not an adherent of any special style of swing dancing. For me the only important things in dancing are: music, comfort, freedom and partnership. I am sure that swing is the most actual style of social dancing.
In the words "Afro-American dance culture" the prefix "afro" also has a large meaning for me. 14-years experience of standard ballroom dancing as well as the classes of world famous teachers, gave me a good knowledge and understanding of dance mechanics. I teach myself since 1994, particularly lindy classes - since 2000. Now I started to run my own business in my own dance club in Saint Petersburg. I have many students and some of the make me feel proud.
Andrey teaches boogie-woogie in Saint Petersburg. Here is what he is telling about himself:
I've always loved dancing. I started to dance "seriously" in 1994. That was rock'n'roll. I was brought to it by my friend Natalya Bushmanova who had later become my dance partner. In a year we have become Saint Petersburg Champions and later – Russian Champions that allowed us to get the status of Sport Masters. Simultaneously with the beginning of my career in rock'n'roll I entered Saint Petersburg teacher-training university. I was graduated in 2000 as a professional coach. Also I've got education in choreography in Saint Petersburg College of Culture.
First time I have seen boogie during one of the competitions in rock'n'roll. It was performed by Dmitriy Tarasov. I was pretty impressed! For me it looked new, exciting and easy. I started to learn boogie from video. Then I went to Moscow to take seminars and individual lessons of Volodya Ishimov & Ksenia Semenikhina. The same year I went to Herrang Dance Camp. It was my first visit to the camp and to Sweden and it changed my attitude to dancing in general tremendously. Special atmosphere, mood, style, communication, music, improvisation and play – all of this are parts of swing dancing.
Now I am the president of dance club "Bravo" that is a part of Russian Rock'n'Roll Federation (RRRF). I have more then 10-years experience of teaching. Some off my students has become Russian Champions and finalists of different national competitions in rock'n'roll and boogie-woogie.
Every dancer has its own style and its own understanding of dancing. I like different dance styles like jazz, hip-hop, RnB, break dance and some others. Certainly in every style I have favorite dancers, in boogie these are Marcus & Barble, in lindy – Cavin & Carla. If you take impressive acrobatics of rock'n'roll, excite and dynamics of boogie, smoothness of lindy hop, and jazz plastics – perhaps there'll be another style! I would be glad to bring to you some pieces of my experience! See you!
Here’s Jenya’s story:
I learnt about swing dance in 2001 and started dancing lindy at Viktor Zinoviev’s classes, then I went to Lennart Westerlund’s seminars, The Rhythm Hot Shots, seminars by Terence, Mandy, workshops and dance event sin Sweden (2002, 2003, 2004), England (2003), Canada (2004). I danced with and took part in shows of Swing Dance Company.
At some point of time I discovered certain things in boogie, which were missing in lindy. A different, exciting energy, drive, simply a splash of happiness. I teach since 2002, when I started going to Andrey Prokopenko’s classes, first I gave classes at the University, improving my teaching skills, then I taught with Ivan Akhtysrky at Vintage Dance club and with Andrey Prokopenko at Bravo club. This year I gave workshops with Andrey at Moscow and Kiev Dance Camps.
Vladimir Ishimov– Tantsklass, Moscow
Boogie-Woogie
Vladimir was the finalist of the first competition in rock'n'roll in USSR. Since this time rock'n'roll has become his passion. He missed no competition. Several times he was winner or finalist in category "B" of such competitions as Moscow Championship, USSR Championship, different national cups and then - Russian Championship.
First time he has seen swing dancing in 1993 and started to learn how to dance boogie. He was one of the dancers who were first to perform boogie show in Russia. It was in 1994. Those people were: Tarasov - Kosmynina, Gavrikov - Sokolova and Ishimov - Shestopalova.
When his carier in rock acro was over he has become a trainer. And continued to compete in boogie woogie. He was one of the first of Russian dancers who took part in international competitions. Together with his partner Ryzhova Nadezhda he has won the 2nd place in a contest in Helsinki, Finland. Together with Ksenia Semenikhina he was the winner of many national cups and Russian Championship 2002. During all that he has been activly promoting swing dancing in Russia. Besides contetst and competitions he performed at different contests and TV-shows.
Vladimir Ishimov and Ksenia Semenikhina were first in Russia to teach improvisation in swing dancing. They have learned the methods of world famous teacher Marcus Koch and adopted it for Russian situation.
Vladimir Ishimov took part in many international dance camps and workshops. Among his teachers were Lennart Westerlund, Franky Manning, Peter Loggins, Janise Wilson, Marcus Koch & Barbl Kaufer, Michael Grimme & Andrea Shiffer, Melanie Bucher & others.
Besides boogie woogie Vladimir dances and teaches other swing dances like lindy hop, charlestone, balboa, shag, etc.
He will teach together with Ksenia Aposiants in turn with Sergey Kruchkov :).
Sergei Krjuchkov – Tantsklass, Moscow
Boogie-Woogie
He started with ballroom dancing in 1985. Later he switched to acrobatic rock’n’roll, and in 1998 got interested in boogie-woogie. During the last 5 years he took part in more than 40 contests, and won awards in most of them.
Finals: Sultans of Swing 2002, Tutti-Frutti 2002, Cup of Russia 2002, Championship of Russia 2002, “Crystal” Casino prize 2003, Pushkino Contest 2004.
Awards: Championship of St.Petersburg (3d place), Cup of Spartak 2002 (2d place), Sultans of Swing 2003 (1st place), Volga Grand Prix 2003 (3d place), Championship of Russia 2003 (3d place), Swing Boom 2003 (2nd place), Tutti-Frutti 2004 (2nd place), Championship of Russia 2004 (2nd place), Volga Grand Prix 2004 (3d place)..
In 2003 he took part in European Championship in Karlsruhe.
"I like boogie-woogie mostly because it’s based on improvisation. It’s more a dance than a sport, unlike acrobatic rock’n’roll. Besides, I like the 30-ies style, and dancing in authentic clothes is extra pleasure".
Accommodation
The camp will take place in one of the health resorts in the Moscow region. The cost of the food (three meals a day: breakfast, lunch and dinner) is included in the price of the participation.
Transportation
We will organize transportation to the Camp site. Please contact us for the details.
Organizers
Christmas Swing Dance Camp is organized by Moscow Swing Dance Federation and dance studio «Tantsklass» headed by Vladimir Ishimov. For additional information about the camp please contact us at camp@swingdance.ru.
