I am all over the Big Band Dances at Centennial Park every Saturday night. Yep. Every Saturday night. The danceteria is near the train and festooned with Japanese lanterns and twinkle lights for the summer. The music and dancing starts at 7:30 p.m., but do yourself a fun favor and arrive around 7:00 for the dance class taught by really great instructors from Dance World. Last Saturday was Salsa Night, and this past Saturday was polka night. At every session, the instructors lead wannabe dancers of all ages and ilk, step by step, through the featured dance. At the end of only 30 minutes, it’s amazing to see 200 students bobbing, weaving and gyrating rhythmically to the beat of the night. The music-and- dancing-in-earnest portion of the evening starts at 7:30, with a booster dance lesson about halfway through the night.
So what if you don’t dance? Grab your lawn chair, pack a picnic and go anyway. The music is darned fabulous, and it’s some of the best people watching in town.
There are good ol’ boys in jeans and ball caps and beautifully in-sync couples who clearly have been dance partners for years. There are a number of unaccompanied men who work their way through the crowd all evening dancing with ten or more partners. There’s a group of teens who apparently find this a nice cheap date night. Children dance with parents and each other. There are wheelchair dancers who roll and twirl gracefully to the music. There’s even a group of… eh-hem… mature women regulars who line dance. (Who knew you could line dance to a waltz?) This is the most gleefully unselfconscious group of people I’ve ever seen. Having two (or more) left feet does not keep ANYONE from getting out on the dance floor. I know.
In our peanut gallery, we’ve created three broad categories for the dancers: elegant gliders, bobbers and weavers and steam rollers. We make up stories about the couples. “First date.” “Just had a fight.” “Newlyweds.” We plant ourselves in “our” spot every week and have become friendly with the regulars… sort of like a Preds or Titans game, I reckon, but just a tad more sedate. We greet each other warmly, share our food, and last week, we even received prints of photographs taken of us the previous week. We’ve not yet organized to chant invectives at the assembly, but I guess it could happen.
And all this entertainment is absolutely FREE, thanks to WAMB Radio, Dance World, Metro Parks, the Tennessee Arts Commission and the Musicians Union Trust Fund.
There is no way not to have fun when you are with hundreds of people having such a great time.
One, two, cha-cha-cha! The featured dance August 28.