West Coast / Kizomba Dance - WCKD - (509) 951-0521

This is a group of dancers in the Tri-Cities celebrating Kizomba and West Coast Swing the 1st and 3rd Thursday of every month at American Dance Academy!

Wondering what these dances are?

Kizomba is a beautiful partner dance developed in Angola and the former Portuguese colonies including Cape Verde, Mozambique, and Guinea Bissau. Derived from the Angolan dance of Semba, today it has evolved into a dance that looks like what some describe as a fusion of Argentine Tango and Blues. It's an intimate dance based on the connection between two people, dancing as one.

West Coast Swing (WCS) is a partner dance with roots in Lindy Hop. It is characterized by a distinctive smooth, elastic look that results from its compression-stretch technique of partner connection, and is danced primarily in a slotted area on the dance floor. The dance allows for both partners to improvise steps while dancing together, which means every dance is a different conversation!

Teaching you these dances are a group of people dedicated not only to dancing, but more importantly to the community. It's the people we share our love of dancing with that makes it awesome. Teaching you Kizomba will be the wonderful Shannon Urza and Kontien Chan and on the West Coast Swing side we have Amber and Nick Wilkenloh. We are so excited to share things we have learned with you! Find out more about us below!

Shannon began partner dancing in 2007, and was introduced to Kizomba early 2012. Since that time, her focus has been perfecting this beautiful dance and has traveled the world extensively in pursuit of the most esteemed instructors. Her dedication has opened many doors for her in the Kizomba world including work as an instructor, live television appearances, and an opportunity to participate in the AfricaDancar USA Kizomba Competition in New York. She and her partner, Chris Njunge from Los Angeles, won 1st place, and went on to represent the United States in the World AfricaDancar Championship in Milan, Italy. She has taught in the US as well as Mexico, in places such as Seattle, Washington DC, LA and Miami.

Kontien began her love of music at the age of 4, when she received her first birthday cake keyboard. Since then, she has enjoyed expression through the arts and received her minor in music from the University of Washington. She began partner dancing in 2010 and was introduced to Kizomba in early 2012. Kontien fell in love with the connection of the dance and began leading the partner dance in late 2012. She is now known within the U.S. kizomba community to be a fun and musical lead. Kontien has had the opportunity to travel and train around the world with master instructors and also enjoys growing in other dance forms, including afrobeats, ballet, hip hop, salsa, etc...

Amber started dancing in 2003 and quickly fell in love with connection based dances. Lindy Hop is her first love followed closely by West Coast Swing and many various Swing, Blues, Latin & Ballroom dances. She taught the Social Dance classes at WSU and for the Community Colleges of Spokane. In her classes she tries to bring out connection and conversation in the dance as she feels it will always be more satisfying than patterns. She is an avid learner and continually enhances her knowledge any way she can to bring the best version of herself to the dance floor.

Nick Wilkenloh starting dancing late 2009 for a woman (like most men) but he quickly fell in love with Balboa, for which he traveled as much as he can to learn, not only from well known instructors, but from some of the original Balboa Dancers. He has picked up other dances, such as West Coast Swing, along the way. He is very much about the community aspect of dancing and tries to make his events as fun and inviting as possible.

Our starter and sister dance is the Tri-Town Vintage Swing Dance every Sunday at the Shuffler Shanty in Kennewick. You can find more great classes and dances at our website (as well as keep track of WCKD) :
www.tritownswing.com

Tags: Dance Club,Dance Instruction,Social Club