Mario Robau's Weekend Workshop At The Polish Home: A Dance Review

This weekend was a busy one!  Because of the Durham Fair, I had to choose when I would try out Mario Robau's weekend workshop.  Friday or Saturday?  I chose Friday so I could review the West Coast Swing Dance at the same time.

So, normally, the two classes before the dance are taught by Ken Mercik, and he teaches West Coast Swing.  Because of Robau's workshop, however, Robau taught intermediate and advanced hustle at 7 and 8 p.m..

Dave and I arrived as they were wrapping up the first lesson.  They apparently spent the hour working up to a certain type of spin.  The move was familiar, but different (as it always is when you learn from another teacher).  For intermediate students it wasn't too difficult; Dave picked it up in less than a minute and I would say he's an intermediate student verging on advanced.

The second class focused on variations of that particular spin.  I did the followers' part, Dave did the leaders' part.  Overall, the move was pretty easy to learn, with the variations being either easy or difficult, depending on your level.  Most of the leaders I danced with were able to figure it out, and the moves were useful and easy to incorporate into your own style.

Mario, in my opinion, is a good teacher.  He went smoothly from one variation to the next, making it gradually more complicated.  His instructions were pretty clear and simple, and he had a great sense of humor.  The class moved very swiftly, which was nice; I didn't realize how quickly time was passing until he said we only had 10 minutes left!

Dave enjoyed the class as well, although his main critique was that Mario moved on to the next variation a little too quickly, so he didn't have time to absorb the basics before moving on to the different modifications.  For Dave, it felt like that class was more about quantity than quality, like Mario was trying to fit in as much as possible into one hour.  He was right, Mario filled in the hour with quite a bit of stuff.  But in Mario's defense, from the point of view of a fellow teacher, it is pretty difficult to teach a workshop where there's students of various levels and you have to keep them all entertained.  As a teacher, you have to move slowly enough so the lower level students can keep up, but at the same time you have to move quickly enough so that your advanced students won't get bored.  I didn't get bored, but Dave felt a little rushed.  Ah well, it couldn't be perfect.

Aside from that critique, would I recommend you take Mario Robau's class?  Sure!  Particularly if you're an intermediate/advanced dancer.  I haven't taken his beginner classes yet, so I don't know if beginner students would like them, but I thought that for my and Dave's levels of expertise, he was pretty good!  I wish I could have done the workshops on Saturday, but I had to make a sacrifice somewhere.  No worries though!  Mario does have his own website where he says where he's teaching next, and he does have instructional DVDs!

Here's his website (click on the link if you want to visit):
www.Marioswingdaddy.com

Dance away everyone!  Dance away!