Brandnew: Square Dance in Moscow

Gertraud Walz, Deutsch Russische Square Dance Freunde e.V.

People in Moscow are fond of dancing. Sure, everybody knows the famous Bolshoi Ballet! Lots of little children are learning to dance and like it to visit dance theatres when they are only 4 years old. There are many young people who have much fun, dancing on the banks of the river Moskwa in summer nights. And there’s a young lady in Moscow who is dreaming a dream: Square dance in Moscow

Some interested young people in Moscow are learning square dance figures step by step - on every Tuesday night. The Leader (not a caller) is Alsu Alyuscheva living in Moscow. When she had been in Munich for some years to study and to work there, she became acquainted with square dancing. Alsu was graduated in Pskov last year. She is a fan of square dancing. Eberhard was invited by her for a beginner crash course in Moscow recently. The dancers were eager to learn very fast and they had much fun together. Most of them speak German very well and so they had no problem to understand the instructions. Some of them knew about 15 figures already, some were new and had to catch on to the movements quickly. Eberhard’s experience brought a good result in a short time, like everywhere in Russia before. Usually he is working in contra lines, because the beginners repeat the figures up and down. It’s much easier to remember for example figures like “lady’s chain, right and left through, square through four”, and so on - all figures for two couples.

There were angels from the Russian clubs: Nicolai from Petrosavodsk, Tatiana and Natalia from Pskov, Sina from St. Petersburg and one dancer from Germany, Frank. Many thanks for your help!

A small plant will grow up soon. The German Russian House is very interested to support Alsu’s efforts. Probably square dance shall be shown in the program of a festival in fall.