How to make your Christmas season dance calendar happen

Yes, Christmas is a long time away (well a few months), but the time will whizz by in a blur of work dos, freestyles and various other fun activities you have to coordinate in your seasonal dance calendar. With some Christmas and new year events requiring tickets to be bought in advance, it requires some planning to work out your seasonal dance calendar.

You might want to attend everything, but remember that like any event, many Christmas dance events have a slight increase in price – either due to additional offers like a freestyle that goes on for longer, or being a more dressy event with food available. There also tend to be Christmas or New Year balls, so watch out for those too.

How to plan your Christmas dance calendar

Where to find out about events and classes

First stop – get on Facebook. I reckon a good 70% of dancers probably only started on Facebook in the first place so they could keep track of events. Join or follow any nearby franchise pages or groups. You can add them to a dance list so you can immediately see them rather than having all the notifications going mad.

As well as the dance organisations themselves, there are plenty of groups for modern jive events as well as wider dance groups so you can find out easily what’s going on at other venues and locations. Don’t forget to share any local events in them to say you’re going, because the more they get seen, the more people will attend and you’ll have more choice of dancers to dance with.

UK Jive website – this splits into regions and will show any class nights or freestyles on for the next couple of months. It’s dependent on dance organisations submitting dates, so won’t have everything, but you can then find the specific location websites to check for details.

Independent websites – search under google for modern jive and the location.
Ceroc website – while each franchise has a website, it seems all the events are now centralised via a search function.

What to look out for

If you go to classes, look up Christmas closures. Not all venues close – in our area, they usually continue 1 venue through the holiday season, while the others shut. If you want to dance more through the week and not just freestyles, look at other nearby venues.

Then look for freestyles. You should be able to find these on the above websites or groups. Quite often Christmas sees special events like longer freestyles, new year balls and themed Christmas freestyles.

Once you’ve got ideal events that you’d like to attend, it’s time to research and short list. Because unfortunately most of us can’t attend everything.

Cross check against prior engagements

Cross off anything that clashes with essential family events.

If you’re away from home for the holidays, why not think about finding a new venue while you’re away.

Make it happen

Think about location, ability to travel, potential weather issues. Book accommodation if travelling further away. Do you want to link up and travel with someone local to you?

If you need a babysitter, book someone in quickly given many people won’t be around for the holiday period, or won’t want to babysit on new year’s eve.

Buy tickets in advance. Some events are ticket only and gender balanced. Some have early bird discounts a few months out. It’s always worth booking in those you know you want to go to, to avoid missing out.

Team up with friends if you prefer going dancing with other people.

Plan any themed outfits as required – most are just either dressy or a colour theme so nothing too taxing.

Make sure they’re in your calendar.

Then enjoy your Christmas season of dancing.

What modern jive events and locations are on your must dance at list? Let me know your recommendations in the comments below.