Books about Ballroom from Amazon.com

Ballroom dancing is back! And now anyone can move like a pro. DVD included!

In addition to the step-by-step photos, footwork illustrations, and instruction covering all the common ballroom dances, this new edition of the bestselling Complete Idiot’s Guide® to Ballroom Dancing includes a 90-minute instructional DVD featuring award-winning dancer and dance instructor Jeff Allen. It corresponds with the text seamlessly, giving readers the next best thing to one-on-one instruction, at a fraction of the cost.
• The #1 selling ballroom dancing book
• Includes a fantastic, new instructional DVD and hundreds of illustrations and instructions
• Allen is a renowned, award-winning ballroom-dance teacher
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Price: $13.96 [Notify me when price goes down.]

“I’ve been dancing steadily since that Valentine’s Day. I have taken countless lessons and classes, passed a professional certification exam, done several shows and a competition—yes, dressed in those outrageous gowns and false eyelashes—and then gone back home to the kids, the soccer, the housework, and to work the next day. It hasn’t been easy to make room in the schedule for my passion, but I have done it, because I’m certain now that it is necessary for life. This new period is rich—as rich in some ways as having my two children because it has been a kind of birth—but it has also been extraordinarily painful thanks to the self-examination that dancing has provoked in me. And so, because of dance, I can say, unequivocally and gratefully, that I am alive at last.”
– From Quick, Before the Music Stops

“There is no time for regret in dance. You have only now, this moment, for your performance, your glorious movement. Whatever you’re going to do, do it now, quick, before the music stops.” – Janet Carlson

In her twenties, Janet Carlson was a successful competitive ballroom dancer, but she abandoned dancing to raise a family and pursue a more conventional profession as an editor for a luxury lifestyle magazine. Twenty years later, she seemed to have it all: two beautiful daughters, a glamorous job, and a handsome, talented husband. Despite all of her successes, she felt a terrible void - her marriage was deeply troubled, and she was somehow withdrawn in the very midst of her own life and the lives of her children. Then, one Valentine’s Day, her husband gave her ballroom dancing lessons as a gift, and everything changed. She discovered the joy, passion, and confidence she hadn’t realized had gone missing for so long.

Over time, Janet discovers that ballroom dancing also contains the secrets to life and love: the give-and-take of dance, two bodies in rhythm and harmony, mirrors the reciprocity of human relationships. Total trust between partners is as vital on the dance floor as it is within a marriage. And yet, both partners - in dance and in life - must stand on their own two feet.The unadulterated joy Janet feels as she intuitively moves to the music speaks to the kind of absolute, whole-body happiness we were born to have. On the dance floor,she finds resolve in the waltz, self-confidence in the tango, and passion in nearly everything. Embracing dance once more allows her to let go of a marriage that was completely out of sync; put more heart and emotion into her work; find more time to truly be with her children; and ultimately rejoice in her intrinsic balance and poise.

Told with precision, grace, and painstaking honesty, Quick, Before the Music Stops is the tale of one woman’s midlife renewal through dance, and how her newfound empowerment transcends the dance floor and becomes immediate and relevant in every aspect of her life. It shows us how to recognize and celebrate both our strengths and our flaws, reignite passion for the everyday, and how to step from the periphery into the light and surrender to the music.

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Price: $9.29 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Gotta Tango is a superior instructional package for learning how to dance the authentic Argentine tango at a social level. Master teachers Alberto Paz and Valorie Hart take you on a journey through the rich culture, history, and music of Buenos Aires that inspired the romantic passion, alluring creativity, and natural elegance of the Argentine tango dance. You will learn the fundamentals and roles each partner plays in this exhilarating and intimate social dance.

The book describes, illustrates, and explains the fundamental concepts and techniques, while the DVD visually demonstrates the concepts and movements of the tango in real dance situations with a partner. This combination provides tango lessons that are infinitely more effective than a stand-alone book or video product--and will have you dancing with confidence in less time than you thought possible.

Each tango dancer has a unique way of expressing movements. Gotta Tango offers a logical, structured approach that will help you learn quickly how to move spontaneously with a partner and with the music. It provides the tools you will use every day as a tango dancer as you immerse yourself in the experience, pleasure, and addiction of dancing the Argentine tango..
Price: $17.40 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Feel confident on the dance floor—step by step! Social Dance: Steps to Success will teach you all the moves for eight popular dance styles:

· Swing
· Cha-cha
· Foxtrot
· Polka
· Waltz
· Rumba
· Tango
· Salsa/mambo

Each step you take is a smooth transition from the one before. Your first few steps provide a solid foundation of skills and concepts. As you progress, you learn not only the basic dance steps and styling but also how to adjust to a partner, how to make the transitions between positions, and how to create sequences from variations of those basic steps.

Each of the steps also explains why the concept or skill is important, identifies the keys to correct technique, helps you avoid common errors, and explains how to practice each skill. A compact disc featuring music for each style is included to help you practice.

Written by master teacher and dancer Judy Patterson Wright, this book is part of the Steps to Success Activity Series—the most extensively researched and carefully developed set of sport skill instruction books ever published..
Price: $13.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Tango. A multidimensional expression of Argentine identity, one that speaks to that nation’s sense of disorientation, loss, and terror. Yet the tango mesmerizes dancers and audiences alike throughout the world. In Paper Tangos, Julie Taylor—a classically trained dancer and anthropologist—examines the poetics of the tango while describing her own quest to dance this most dramatic of paired dances.
Taylor, born in the United States, has lived much of her adult life in Latin America. She has spent years studying the tango in Buenos Aires, dancing during and after the terror of military dictatorships. This book is at once an account of a life lived crossing the borders of two distinct and complex cultures and an exploration of the conflicting meanings of tango for women who love the poetry of its movement yet feel uneasy with the roles it bestows on the male and female dancers. Drawing parallels among the violences of the Argentine Junta, the play with power inherent in tango dancing, and her own experiences with violence both inside and outside the intriguing tango culture, Taylor weaves the line between engaging memoir and insightful cultural critique. Within the contexts of tango’s creative birth and contemporary presentations, this book welcomes us directly into the tango subculture and reveals the ways that personal, political, and historical violence operate in our lives.
The book’s experimental design includes photographs on every page, which form a flip-book sequence of a tango. Not simply a book for tango dancers and fans, Paper Tangos will reward students of Latin American studies, cultural studies, anthropology, feminist studies, dance studies, and the art of critical memoir.




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Price: $10.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Twice a week, millions of viewers tune in to watch the magical transformations undergone by their favorite entertainers through the beauty of dance—and now you can bring all that excitement, sparkle, and glamour into your own home.

Based on the hit ABC series, Dancing with the Stars has everything a fan of the show could want: never-before-seen pictures and stories from the stars describing their favorite moments on the show and how they trained for each week's competition; a behind-the-scenes tour of what goes into the all the hair, makeup, and costumes each week; a look at all the key dances performed on the show; and finally, a complete dance-based workout that helps you lose weight, get fit, and have fun. Filled with photographs and detailed instructions, this book will inspire you to take to the dance floor and get a dancer's body yourself. Anyone who has watched the show knows it doesn't matter if you're young or old, male or female, a talk-show host or a football player—this workout will get you in the best shape of your life.

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Price: $0.42 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Widely known as the creator of the air-step in Lindy Hop, a choreographer and Tony award winner, Frankie Manning recalls how his first tentative steps as a teenager at Harlem's Savoy Ballroom eventually led him to a career as chief choreographer and lead dancer for Whitey's Lindy Hoppers, who appeared on Broadway stages, Hollywood films, and stages around the world. He brings the Swing Era to life with recollections of the headliners as well as the dozens of uncelebrated dancers who helped to make the Lindy an international sensation.
With collaborator, Cynthia Millman, Manning traces the evolution of swing dancing from those early days in Harlem through the post-War War II period until it was eclipsed by rock and roll, then disco. Never one to sit on the sidelines, Manning ended his 35-year hiatus from dancing during the early years of the swing revival, and he has been performing and teaching ever since. This wonderful memoir will be a revelation to the new generations of Lindy Hoppers as well as dance historians..
Price: $18.42 [Notify me when price goes down.]

In the wake of the blockbuster television success of "Dancing with the Stars," competitive ballroom dance has become a subject of new fascination--and renewed scrutiny. Known by its practitioners as DanceSport, ballroom is a significant dance form and a fascinating cultural phenomenon. In this first in-depth study of the sport, dancer and dance historian Juliet McMains explores the "Glamour Machine" that drives the thriving industry, delving into both the pleasures and perils of its seductions. She further explores the broader social issues invoked in American DanceSport: representation of "Latin," economics that often foster inequality, and issues of identity, including gender, race, class, and sexuality.

Putting ballroom dance in the larger contexts of culture and history, Glamour Addiction makes an important contribution to dance studies, while giving new and veteran enthusiasts a unique and unprecedented glimpse behind the scenes..
Price: $15.95 [Notify me when price goes down.]

This book is written for the absolute beginner, not by a dance champion, but by someone who knows what a beginning dancer feels like and wants to know. The basics of ballroom dance are covered in a logical, easy to absorb manner that a beginner can feel comfortable with and see immediate progress. All the most popular ballroom dances are covered with enough steps to enable a complete novice to dance, without overwhelming the new student with technical jargon and ballroom snobbery..
Price: $19.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Born in the slums of Buenos Aires in the last decades of the nineteenth century, the tango--the most erotic, most passionate, most melancholy of dances--has remained spectacularly alive for more than a hundred years. Today it is the focus of a new cult, casting its spell throughout the Americas, Europe, the Pacific basin, and Japan. What is the secret of the tango's appeal? In Tango!, four experts from Europe, North America, and Latin America explore its fascinating history from the earliest beginnings to the present. Historian Simon Collier traces the tango's roots in Argentina and charts its rise from the brothels of Buenos Aires to become the quintessential expression of Argentine popular culture. The writer Artemis Cooper discusses the amazing tango craze of the 1910s in Europe and North America, while anthropologist Maria Susana Azzi looks at the tango's peak years in Argentina, the period from 1920 to 1950. Finally, Richard Martin, Curator at the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, charts the international boom in the tango's popularity in recent times. He looks, too, at the relationship of woman to man and man to woman in the tango. To match the spectacle of the tango, the book is illustrated with more than 250 photographs and drawings in color and black and white. Special features are built around the brilliant color photography of Ken Haas, recognized worldwide for his fidelity to the spirit of the dance. And as an evocative reminder of the rhythms of the dance, some of the most celebrated tango songs are discussed and quoted..
Price: $9.11 [Notify me when price goes down.]