30 years of IDO World Tap dance Championships
To personalise this compilation further, I have added some annecdotes and special memories of the specific year or act. Since these are my personal memories, it might not be representable as the compiled data of finalists. But, I added them to flavour the dry statistics. Bill Fowler Already in 2010 I started to write a first “History” and asked my late dear friend and colleague, Mr. Bill Fowler from Boston, USA to rewrite my text in better English language and to add what he thought should be added. He re-wrote the whole text and we published it in the IDO- Website for a long time as “IDO - History” - though it was “only” about tap dance. Consequently and with the best memories and respect to Bill I used his text as a guideline until 2010 - always marking what is Bill’s text and mine. I appreciate his valuable text and professional inputs as truly important because this came “right form the horses mouth” als Bill used to say. Bill and I shared our love for all “our” tap danc ers from where they came in the world of tap dance. The text parts from Bill are formatted in Arial Narrow to distinguish what is Bill’s text and what is mine. This book is written for everybody who is interested in the IDO World Tap Dance Championships. It is for those who participated and helped to create such an impressive event. It is also a recording of unforgettable results for the dancers, choreographers, studios and national federations. These can be used in bios, CVs and websites. Libraries and official publishers in tap dance should include the content and names. It also showed the importance of tap dance. The music has changed from the early days and the glorious times of Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly and many wonderful others. Today tap dance is very lively and uses every kind of music, from classical, to hip hop, latin American or African music, from musicals - mainstream music, special music, swing and jazz, modern and/or ballet - everything which is in or out. Following this introduction, I have added messages from people who were or are important for the IDO Tap dance Championships in Riesa. This is just a selection aiming to represent the variety of supporters for this event. I have asked current and former participants and officials like Riesa’s Lord Mayor, Mr. Marco Müller , and the Message of the IDO-Tap Dance Committee Chairperson, our dear colleague and friend, Mrs. Nancy Chippendale. Additionally, there is a Who is Who collection of standout competitors and supporters. I came to Tap dance because I liked it. I was never a good dancer but I enjoyed organising exiting dance events. I had not trained to be a tap dancer, I have never been a choreograph or earned my money by teaching tap dance. So, I left judging to the judges. I felt it was important to not interfere with the judges decisions. I always aimed to run fair competitions and created the grounds for it. How it began Being a member of the German Dance Teacher Association and thus also a World Dance Council (WDC) member, I have organised WDC competitions for a number of years. These were Standard and Latin American dance competitions on a smaller scale than the Tap Dance Championships. When exploring new dance styles with new audiences, Mr. Gerry Bucher in Switzerland introduced me to the International Dance Organisation. So, I learned about a variety of new dance styles like Disco Dance, Show Dance and Boogie Woogie. Mr. Moreno Polidory, the Italian founder of the IDO, envisioned a new dance federation for the Mediterranean countries with a focus on trendy dance styles for young people. Meanwhile, I envisioned a world wide dance sport federation covering possibly any existing dance style. My aim was to give competitions a structure and ensure fairness.
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