How to go
What: Ohio Ballroom dance classes
Where: Franklin: Above Pisanello’s Pizza, 335 S. Main St. Hamilton: Grace United Methodist Church, 1200 Main St. Middletown: Towne Athletic Club, 4343 S. Dixie Highway Oxford: Oxford Community Arts Center, 10 S. College St. West Chester Twp.: The Court Yard Sports Plex, 7373 Kingsgate Way
When: Classes start Jan. 21, 25 and 29, depending on location
Cost: $110 per month per couple, for four lessons a month
Info: Call (513) 217-5551, e-mail ohioballroom@gmail.com or visit www.ohioballroom.com.
Not everybody who gives ballroom dancing a whirl aims to be a serious dancer.
Cissi and Scott Glickfield, a husband and wife from Middletown, started taking classes at Ohio Ballroom in May 2009 to dance at their daughter’s August wedding. Cissi said her husband was a “total nondancer” who “had to be dragged onto the floor.”
“Our daughter is a dancer, and I wanted to do the father-daughter dance,” Scott said. “I didn’t want to embarrass her too bad.”
As of last week, the couple was still cha-cha-cha-ing under the direction of Michael Scoggins, founder of Ohio Ballroom, which will offer a new series of classes this month in Middletown, Franklin, Hamilton, Oxford, West Chester Twp. and Miamisburg. The studio teaches various styles of dancing, including, swing, two-step, rhumba and tango.
The Glickfields were the lone couple to come to a session at the Towne Athletic Club in Middletown, just a day after last week’s snowstorm. They worked on perfecting some cha-cha moves like the full turn, and what’s called “the grapevine,” with its succession of five side-steps and a turn.
The Glickfields struggled with a few steps, dancing to songs like “Smooth” by Santana and “Black Horse and the Cherry Tree” by K.T. Tunstall, but on the whole they were getting the hang of it. When they executed one particular move well, Scoggins cheered them on, saying, “You got it! Good deal! That one was hot!”
Scoggins, who performed professionally for 20 years, according to his Web site, has been heading up these classes for eight years, estimating he’s taught more than 2,000 people. Students stay for an average of eight months, but some have been with Scoggins since Ohio Ballroom’s inception.
Asked what it takes to be a good ballroom dancer, Scoggins replied, “Practice, practice, practice, practice, practice.
“It depends on how far you want to go. Do you want to go competitive? If so, you’ll be practicing a bunch. Most people don’t want to go competitive, they just want to have fun.
“Students will start taking it, and countless times, after three or four months of classes, the next wedding they go to they’ll clear the floor,” Scoggins said.
Unlike other studios, Ohio Ballroom doesn’t require its students to stay for a set length of time. They can come and go as they please.
Scoggins also likes to have his students show their moves in monthly ballroom dances at Middletown’s Manchester Inn with the Bob Gray Orchestra. The next dance is at 7 p.m. Friday, Jan. 22.
The Glickfields are happy that they’ve gone even farther with ballroom dancing than they thought they would.
“It’s got us doing things together,” said Scott, citing the fact that they went to the New Year’s Eve dance at the Manchester when they would have normally stayed home.
“We’re laughing at ourselves, too,” Cissi said.
“Nobody was laughing at the wedding,” Scott replied.
Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2836 or erobinette@coxohio.com.
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