A few noteworthy comments about Ithaca Dance methods:

We believe that it is important for you to have TWO excellent instructors, a man and a lady. Students need to see the real dance, and they need to see a lot of it. Lady students need to see a good lady dancer and her movement styles, as well as experience dancing with a competant male leader, visa versa for a gentleman student. Students need to hear the perspectives of both sides of the dance partnership. Many solo instructors feel that, since they can show both the leader and follower part, that they can teach by themselves, using pickup students in the class - I hope you can see that a teaching team is much more effective.

My main co-teachers at Ithaca Dance - Heather Carlsen, Kelly Douglass, Ellie Foust - have each had at least 10 years of ballet and jazz. They were custom trained in partner dance by myself.

Students need to practice dancing to music both in class and at home. We use a lot of good music in class. We also provide lists of handpicked dance tunes for you to download from itunes, Napster, etc.

Many students attend as singles, without partners. We match them up, rotating partners frequently, a common practice in partner dance classes. We recognize that some couples do not wish to rotate partners, and we undertand that - it is fine. We do not put pressure on couples to switch partners.

A word about myself, Kurt Lichtmann - I taught dance for twelve years at Cornell University. At CU, I founded and developed the Swing Dance Program, created the Ballroom Intensive class, and created/maintainted the department website in the Physical Education Department. I am currently teaching ballroom, swing and latin dance for credit at my other alma mater, Ithaca College, where I earned my Masters Degree in Music Education (Voice/Piano) in 1982. I have been faculty advisor for two swing dance clubs at Cornell, and now one at Ithaca College. My music and pedagogy instructors at Ithaca College gave me much by personal example in their teaching styles, perspectives, and methods, but most of all by their personalities and charisma. I wish to pay particular honor to inspirational I.C. Professors Leslie Bennett, Mary Arlin, Edward Swensen, David Riley, Ronald Regal, Elizabeth Regal, Gary Brodhead, Margorie Porterfield, Roland Bentley, Steven Mauk, Lawrence Doebbler, and my student teaching supervisor at Horseheads High School, Joseph Crupi. The list of dance instructors I have studied with since 1993 is quite long, but here it is.

Born in Highland Park NJ, I graduated Cornell '70, B.A.. in Physics. I am founder/ producer/ DJ for 93.5 WVBR Saturday Swing radio show, now on temporary hiatus after 12 years on the air. I also founded the CSMA (Ithaca Community School Of Music & Art) Whiton Chorale, and directed it for four years. Let's not forget ten glorious years giving hundreds of songwriting workshops at virtually every school district in Central New York, and writing hundreds of songs. I also DJ weddings and events: Cayuga Pro DJ. I played in the regional rock 'n'roll band "The Corvettes" for 8 years, and then began to study dance in 1993.

Learning dance was not easy for me. As a result, my instruction is very sympathetic to the student, and to individual styles of learning. From what I have seen, it seems that many (not all!) partner dance instructors, including top pro performers and competitors who teach on the side, are unaware of the developments in effective music instruction that have occured in the last 1/2 century - Kodaly, Dalcroze, etc. For example, some students need to see a move demonstrated over and over again, some need counting, some need verbal descriptions, some need hands on, and so on. Instructors should not be afraid to touch students - this is the most direct and effective way to communicate movement ideas. Becoming knowledgeable and comfortable with socially acceptable forms of touch is indeed an important part of social dance. We work as much one-on-one as we can, and we encourage, not discourage, questions

I bring to dance instruction the perspective of a musician, composer, and improvisor. I feel that satisfying dance comes from allowing yourself to be as much part of the music as you can, as well as an extension of it - a co-creator of rhythm, melody, lyrics, phrasing, structure, dynamics. Relaxed natural rhythmic musical expression in the body is so pleasurable to watch, as well as to experience. Increasing students' music and body awareness is what I consider to be the thrust of my teaching research for the rest of my life. My continued work with the ancient Chinese tradition of Qigong movement (Sifu Maurice Haltom is my teacher) has helped in getting students to experience "abstruse" issues of centered movement, grounding, functional postures, body awareness and energy flow. Everything related to this issue interests me: Alexander Technique, Pilates, Martial Arts, etc.

I hope that you will consider allowing me and my co-teachers to become part of your dance learning experience.

Thank you - let's dance and have fun..