As part of Impact Arts’s new series of articles, our Arts Editors and contributors are putting their lives on the line by trying out a variety of different societies and artistic things, so you guys can read about it and laugh/want to get involved yourself!
This week, we Arts Editors ambitiously signed ourselves up for a jazz class with NUDance. NUDance are a student society here at UoN, who offer dance classes in a range of styles, ranging from tap and ballet to jazz, contemporary and commercial, all of which are taught by a trained professional. NUDance have also been awarded best society at the LSU Dance Competition for the past three years running. Pretty impressive, right?
“For maximum comic article writing, we decided to sign ourselves up for jazz”
NUDance offer beginners classes in ballet, tap and street. However, because we like making our lives difficult, and for maximum comic article writing, we decided to sign ourselves up for jazz, where it quickly became apparent that it was a lot harder than it sounded. Before beginning the session, we had visions of tapping a cane and waving our arms a bit *jazz hands*. How wrong we were. Forget the cane, this class was intense but incredibly fun, and more like ballet than any other dance form we’ve encountered.
“We both have self-confessed that we have the fitness levels of a potato”
We were worried before the session that the class would be too hard, as we both have self-confessed that we have the fitness levels of a potato. Indeed, at times we did feel like hippos amongst a sea of gazelles (especially when the leaping across the dance studio started), but the atmosphere, teacher, and other dancers were super encouraging and made us feel involved. If we continued with the classes, we truly feel that we’d improve.
The way the class worked was really fun, as we started with a warm-up to music, which was pretty strenuous before the dancing even started! The fact that throughout this warm-up, and the rest of the class, everyone was laughing, making jokes and having a good time, made this a lot easier. Then the dancing began…
“We both suffered muscle pain, which was to be expected as most of the time we’re sat in front of a computer editing Impact articles”
Beginning with fairly simple footwork steps, which still took us about half a year to master, the class then progressed onto high kicks, leaps and pirouettes. Considering that we both have limited dance experience (Lizzie belly-dancing, and Amy last doing ballet approximately seven years ago), we both felt we did pretty well considering. The next day, from all the leaping, we both suffered muscle pain, which was to be expected as most of the time we’re sat in front of a computer editing Impact articles.
“It’s great exercise, whilst also being fun and different every week”
To find out what the class was like on a regular basis, we also spoke to one of the class’s members, Katie Cash, who told us:
‘I’ve danced since the age of three and when coming to uni wanted to continue dance, and hopefully gain a new group of friends with similar interests. NUDance was so friendly and welcoming, and we are like one big family. It’s great exercise, whilst also being fun and different every week, due to the new choreography that our dance teachers show us. The competitions are really rewarding, and it was such a great feeling when the jazz team came first. NUDance helps with my ability to perform in front of a crowd, and in general just improves my confidence’.
We really enjoyed the whole experience overall, and would like to thank everyone at NUDance for being so welcoming!
Lizzie Robinson and Amy Wilcockson
Image credit: Andrea Nzeribe
For more information on getting involved with NUDance, check out their Facebook page here.
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