May/June 2007

Volume 2, Issue 3



News and Activities at the Studio


The big news this time is the wonderfur success of our Spring Dance, as mew will see under "Spotlight" and "Dance Pictures" below! Wow, we got some great pictures!

We've had nice big classes again in Ballroom dancing, as all the memfurs brushed up their skills and practiced fancy new steps fur the dance. It's been a lot of fun, and we are always thinking of new dances to try out.

We've had great attendance in our Folk Dancing classes. Haffn't they been fun! This monff we will continue teaching mostly Russian and Mexican folk dancing in the two main studios, and watching fur festivals we can attend as a class. As fur the folk dancing in the third studio, mew are welcome to join that class, too, and we will let mew know as soon as we haff determined what we're ... how it .... the proper thing to call it.

And yes, that really is square dancing mew hear on Fridays. Sometimes. So come on in and join us, because a circle of kitties doesn't quite do it, and a rectangle is not really working.

Fur those of mew who asked, no, the Polka isn't a ballroom dance. I know, I know, but we honestly haffn't figured out what it is yet. Your teachers haff noticed that it helps if a kitty knows how to gallup. Uh .... we are still looking into that.

Our Basic Infurmation:

Any kitty can apply fur membership in the dance studio, it's easy! Just send us an email here to let us know, and we will enroll mew and send mew a memfurship card.

Check our schedule here to see when the classes and Dance Nights are, in case anything changes. Our memfurs take as many or as few classes as they want to, and can use the studio fur practice any time. They can also attend any of our dance nights and bring a guest if they'd like to. Tell your furriends about the studio, they might like to join, too. We always luff to see new memfurs.



We had a big Spring Dance in April, and it was furry well attended! The evening was balmy, the mewsic was good, all the girls looked beautiful and graceful in their lovely gowns and dresses, and all the boys looked elegant and actually behaved themsel... I mean .. had furry good manners. It was a lovely dance, and mew can see the pictures we took right here:

Spring Dance Pictures

We will let mew know when we plan another special event, but in the meantime our regular dance nights will continue efury other Friday night.



Don't furget to check out our Studio Shoppe fur your dancing outfits and workout clothes, dance shoes, dance bags, or anything else mew might need. We are always adding new items, and we can order anything (well, almost) that mew need fur dancing if mew don't see it in there. We also have a cobbler kitty who comes in the shoppe once a week to put new taps on your good comfy tap shoes, in case mew would rather do that. I'm not quite sure how so many boys manage to lose their taps, but it does happen, specially in baseball season, we noticed. Hmmmm.

Now fur our regular dance article by Phelicity.


We Got Rhythm, We Got ..........

What's the most impurrtant thing we need at the studio fur our dancing? We asked that in our classes. One boy said "Jelly donuts by da door". Well ........ not what we had in mind. One girl said "My brofur's socks to stuff in my toe shoes". Well........ yup, that's impurrtant in ballet class all right! But what do we need just as much fur all kinds of dancing? In our practice outfits or tutus, wiff just the right shoes on, wiff the jelly donut stickies washed off our paws, all happy and ready to dance.... what?

Yes, mewsic! Wiffout mewsic, we would just stand there and look at each offur. If we're gonna haff rhythm, we gots to haff mewsic. And the kind of mewsic tells us the kind of dancing to do, most of the time. Good mewsic can lead us.

The mewsics I like best are what's called oldies but goodies. (An I doesn't want to hear any cracks about why, mewhehe!) I think kitties can get confused at some of the more modern things that calls demselfs mewsic, that has so much loud bang-bang we can't hear any dum-de-dum-de-dum. That's why we dance better to old danceable songs, happy tunes wiff rhythm, country mewsic wiff nice chords, and bouncy melodies. We can hear the rhythm instead of the bang-bang.

Of course, there is special mewsic mostly fur singing. That's diffurnt sometimes but I think the purrty ones tend to be old, too. I'm not sure, and we won't be teaching any singing as long as one teacher - me - needs a bucket to carry the tune in. To us, mewsic is fur dancing! So we gots the rhythm and the mewsic .... let's dance!



It's finally here! We haff a new supply of the DVD of CATS in the shoppe. So that is the subject of our Video Review for this issue.

CATS
Video Review by Phelicity
It takes humans who are the furry best actors and dancers in the world to purrtend to be cats and get away wiff it. And only a few truly gifted ones come close to imitating us and our movements. Of course they need fantastic costumes and truly artistic makeup to efen begin to look like cats.

As all of us know by now, there are some humans who can actually do these things! They are the ones in the musical video of CATS! I nefur got to see a stage purrduction of CATS, but I luff the video fur being furry close to the action. Mew probly can't get that close to a stage. (Well, of course we kitties could, but we might get stepped on.)

I've watched videos wif my mom all my life, and when we couldn't connect our puter fur weeks after the ice storm where I liff, we watched piles of dem togeffur. My all-time fafurite is still CATS. The furst time I efur saw it I was only 7, and I'm 15 now so that's been awhile. But I rememfur I sat on the coffee table just mesmerized all thru the whole thing. And I still am.

I'm sure efury single kitty of us has seen it, and marveled at the cat-like costumes and the wonderfur dancing an songs. That's where the song "Memory" came from, a song that means a lot to many of us kitties. Which of us wouldn't like to be a Jellicle cat? All the characters are legendary now, there will nefur be any others like those. The sad and beautiful Grizabella, the fantastic, exciting Macavity, the sweet Gus, the wise old Deuteronomy.

If mew hafn't watched CATS again recently, do it the next time there's a rainy day and mew can't come to class or go ride your scooters. It's magical, it's intoxicating, it's fantastic! Mew will be mesmerized and inspired all ofur again to be the best dancers it's possible fur mew to be. I know I was.



If you haff any dance related news you would like us to announce, please email us at cat_mountain2003@yahoo.com.
We will also post any parties or performances we hear about.


Our good furriend and studio memfur Annie has recently opened:



Be sure to visit; she has some great dance outfits, costumes and warmup clothes!



Click here fur the big Spring Dance!

We haff added a lot to our Links page: all your dance class and dance night pictures from the furry beginning are there now. Mew will enjoy revisiting your class pictures, purrformances and dances; we sure did! What wonderfur times we haff all had!

See them all here!

Our previous monff's newsletters are here:
March/April 2007
January/February 2007
November/December 2006
September/October 2006
July/August 2006
May/June 2006
March/April 2006
February 2006
January 2006.
Nov-Dec. 2005.




Here is our business card, please link back to www.oocities.org/cat_mountain2003/studio Thank mew!