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| For the very first time ever Finland had a full team of four couples
in World Championships: Koivula & Kauppinen, Vastamäki & Relander,
Arstila & Kortelainen and Norkola & Huikari. Most of the team flew
to Zürich on Friday evening.
The competition was held in Neuhausen which is a nice little village just 50 minutes from the Zürich Airport by train. Although the competition place was a sports hall the "Rock´n´Roll Angeli" had decorated it rather nicely and it looked much better than I had expected. Because of the very rational international way of arranging things, we had mixed dressing rooms which reduced very much that running around asking "have you seen my partner?" from every passer-by. As the rehearsal room filled up the atmosphere got also warmer. One of the best things of competing abroad is meeting old friends again - our hugs were warm but a bit wet too because the room temperature was also pretty high. We noticed that norwegian and swedish competitors were taken care of by their coaches. It must be nice to have someone who keeps your spirits up and remembers everything for you and you can concentrate on dancing only. Well, I can´t complain because people were friendly and "good luck"- greetings came from everybody. It was a good thing that I had learned a thing or two about competing because the organizer didn´t have any r&b-music for the Boogie-Woogie dancers in the rehearsal room. This has been the case in almost all other competitions too, so I had brought my MiniDisc with me to Switzerland - just in case. The organizer actually brought a cassette maybe 3 hours later, but the other side of it was swing… 1. Round There were altogether 58 couples from 17 countries in the beginning. And this was really a World Championships because there were couples from Canada and Australia also. We danced always two couples on stage at the same time, so it took a couple of hours to complete the round. Actually the first round didn´t feel very good and I remember standing there a couple of times with my hand streched out to Timo kind of "here I am, take my hand already and lead me…" Because we danced in the beginning we had plenty of time to look at the others. From the finnish couples Vastamäki & Relander had improved very much since the finnish competition three weeks earlier. And from the foreign couples in my opinion Marcus Koch & Barbara Kaufer danced their best round on this first round. Especially Bärbl was very good and she performed more than ever before. 20 couples were selected from the first round to go straight to the
1/4 final. We were among those happy ones - and you can bet that we really
were happy!
Hope round Hope round is a very good system which allows you to dance at least
twice even if you aren´t among the best dancers. This way nobody
has to travel all the way to the competition just for a quick 1 min 30
seconds on the floor. And if you weren´t able to do your best first
time, now you have a second chance. Only six couples got to the 1/4 finals
from the hope round.
1/4 Final Before the 1/4 final there was the opening of the competition and all the couples got on stage according to the nation they represented. There were kids carrying the signs of the nations and the boy carrying Finland´s sign was so fast on his feet that we really had to run to keep up with him. Anyway we reached the stage right on his heels and found our place. Getting ready for the 1/4 final was kind of exciting because I had no idea when the round would start. The competition was about half an hour late and there was the Rock´n´Roll Swiss Masters going on. So, I was just hurrying with my dressing up and hoping that we wouldn´t be announced on the floor as the first couple. We were not the first but nineth couple to go on stage so there was plenty of time. That means also time to get a bit excited. I don´t remember the name of the song but the lyrics were about Charlie Brown.There was lots and lots to interpretate. This time I didn´t hold out my hand unnecessarily and we both thought that it felt really good - which doesn´t mean that it also looked good. We are kind of funny that way that we always wait for the video to see how it REALLY went and that is what we are doing this time too. Other couples gave us loads of compliments of our dancing and especially music interpretation. So, maybe it was good… Well, the judges didn´t think so, because we were on the divided
14th place and the first couple to drop out from the semifinals.
The placing was good, but to be so close to the semifinals was a bit annoying.
Semifinals So this was a 13 couple semifinal from which seven would get to the
finals. I found three couples that would most certainly be in the finals:
Grimm & Schiffer the reigning world champions, Di Jorios and Koch &
Kaufer but what about the others? There were three or so couples that certainly
wouldn´t get to the finals, but others seemed quite equal. Kenneth
Jacobsen & Monica Amundsen from Norway didn´t dance as well as
they can, so their placement could be better in the future.
Finals So finally the finals could start after an aerobics show. Actually it seemed to me that for the competitors the finals started too soon after the announcement of finalists - the couples didn´t make it to the beginning of the music selection for the slow round. After all you´ll have to change clothes and be ready to start dancing straight after the music selection. And the selection takes place in front of the audience. Anyway all the couples chose a tune and the slow round started. There were differences in styles of dancing and in the roles of man and woman. For example Christian & Karin Punk were quite equal compered to each other, both had the same amount of "shining time". The same was with Michael Grimm & Andrea Schiffer, both performed a lot. Instead in Marcus Koch & Bärbel Kaufer´s and Mario Di Jorio & Maria-Luisa Di Jorio´s dancing the man was "shining" more. Hasse Mattson & Marie Nahnfeldt showed another solution: the lady was shining more. Angelo Rensi & Barbara Alzani were really different from the other finalists because Barbara´s performing was actually acting. These differences in the roles may depend on how difficult figures the man leads and if they have a coreography of not. If it really is free leading and the figures are difficult, then the lady doesn´t have time to perform so much because she has to concentrate on following. Of course there also is the question of charisma and what the dancer´s nature is like. If you are by nature a shy person, you probably won´t feel at ease performing in a competition and probably won´t be as good a performer as some one who really enjoys being out there. And if you have self confidence then you can make all the movements as well as you can, that 100 % and your dancing in general looks better. Well anyway I really liked Hasse & Marie´s dancing. They had very good music interpretation and the altogether the performance was nice and tranquil, and there were nice places for the lady to shine. Michael & Andrea were outstanning: I have no idea about their figures or foot tehcnics but both of them were dancing, really dancing and not just making figures. And both of them have so much energy and charisma that I just sat there with my mouth open thinking: "I didn´t know that Boogie-Woogie could be something like this". It could be possible that they have heard that tune a couple of times before... but the music interpretation was really phenomenal. Fast round. Before the round started there was an announcement that Christian & Karin wouldn´t be taking part in the fast round. So there would be only six couples left. Again Hasse & Marie were a positive surprise: first time in the finals of World Championships and they looked like they had been there many times before. There was no hurry and they took time to play too. Mario & Maria-Luisa danced very well most of the tune. In the end there was some trouble like missing a couple of holds and it caused some uncertainity. Michael & Andrea were moving too fast to the tune for my taste. There is lots happening but all that speed causes an effect of almost "pulling" rather than leading. The judges had open presentation after slow and fast round. There was no doubt who would win the competition but the marks for the other couples varied quite a bit. I learned one thing about the rules too: the fast round is actually more important than the slow round. You don´t have the win both rounds in order to win the competition. Or even one of the rounds because in the end the fast round is more important. So you can win the competition even though you are not the best in either round... All in all it was a great competition and it would have been worth travelling to Neuhausen just to watch. It is great to see how Boogie-Woogie is developing and how the dancers get better and better. So let´s keep our feet moving!
1. Michael Grimm - Andrea Schiffer, Germany 2. Marcus Koch - Bärbel Kaufer, Germany 3. Mario Di Jorio - Maria-Luisa Di Jorio, Switzerland 4. Angelo Rensi - Barbara Alzani, San Marino 5. Oliver Fritsche - Patrizia Fritsche, Germany 6. Hasse Mattsson - Marie Nahnfeldt, Sweden 7. Christian Punk - Karin Punk, Germany In the semifinals
In the 1/4 final´s
In the hoperound
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