The Dance Rules

Unlike most competitions we wanted to leave the rules of the dance very open to allow dancers to come up with new and novel variations. However we also wanted this to remain a dance competition, and for it not to turn into an acrobatic or gymnastic competition.

So aerials are allowed, but we have restricted the number.

Also many people have tried to put a label on what is 'Modern Jive' and it would be a very sad day when competitions were being judged in the strict nature that can be seen at today's Ballroom contests. In our opinion modern jive is a complex mish mash of various different dance styles from the romanticism of tango to the high energy of the Lindy hop. There are no right or wrong styles and elements of lots of dances are seen in what is taught at today's modern jive lessons. To this end any form of dancing is allowed, Jitterbug, West Coast, Rumba, Salsa ……. even Ceroc, and it is up to the judges (ie. You) to decide if they like what they see and if they think it suits the music that has been selected.

There are however a few rules:

• Each couple must be made up of one male & one female dancer
• Each couple will dance (by themselves) to two pieces of music (one slow 110 - 120 bpm / one fast 150 - 160 bpm)
• Each piece of music will last a maximum of 2 minutes only and will be faded out
• Music will be selected from a list of 10 pieces and will be draw by the competitors before their heat.
• There will be a gap of 10 - 15 seconds between each track
• Any form of dancing is allowed
• This is a dance competition and not a gymnastics display, however aerials are allowed but are restricted as below.
1. Aerials are judged as when both of the ladies feet are above the guys waist
2. Only 2 aerials are allowed per track (ie. 4 in total)
3. A sequence of moves (where the lady may touch the floor in between each part) are counted as one aerial.
• If more than two aerials are performed the adjudicators will deduct ½ a point for every aerial over the allotted two that are performed. (NB. this will be checked on the video so the audience need not worry about counting the number of aerials performed when deciding their scores.)

The audience judge the competition and are given score cards which will be totalled to define the winners
The score cards are split as follows

a) 5 marks Musical Interpretation
b) 5 marks Presentation & Performance
c) 5 marks Technique
d) 5 marks Variety & Complexity