Product Description

Ballroom dancing is back! And now anyone can move like a pro. DVD included!

In addition to the step-by-step photos, footwork illustrations, and instruction covering all the common ballroom dances, this new edition of the bestselling Complete Idiot’s Guide® to Ballroom Dancing includes a 90-minute instructional DVD featuring award-winning dancer and dance instructor Jeff Allen. It corresponds with the text seamlessly, giving readers the next best thing to one-on-one instruction, at a fraction of the cost.
• The #1 selling ballroom dancing book
• Includes a fantastic, new instructional DVD and hundreds of illustrations and instructions
• Allen is a renowned, award-winning ballroom-dance teacher

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #42482 in Books
• Published on: 2006-09-05
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

About the Author
Jeff Allen is a columnist for Dancing USA magazine and the author of four books on social and ballroom dancing, and holds membership credentials with the North American Dance Teachers Association, Inc., and the Pan American Teachers Association. He has won more than 30 Top Teacher awards and is considered one of the top 25 dance instructors.

Customer Reviews

Lots of fat - not much meat...
This book uses a lot of words, but fails to make clear how to master a dance step. Disappointing. It makes a good coffee table book (one leg was shorter than the rest.)

Not entirely for dummies
I had high hopes when I bought this book. I have never danced before so perhaps that is why after reading it, I did not think this book was entirely for dummies who did not know how to dance. The book had much advice about dancing and the preparatory stages before dancing, but when it came down to the actual explanations of dancing it was difficult for me to follow the sequences especially looking at a book while trying to copy what it said. I felt it focused to much on the wedding day event, which is old news for someone who has been married for a while- perhaps including a section about how to animate a reluctant spouse to dance would have been more appropriate! The book wasn't the main disappointment. It was the DVD. I had hoped for more explicit instruction when viewing the DVD and there was none. He spoke some advice during the clips but did not explain what was going on. It was like watching a performance which although beautiful to behold was still mysterious. Not having had any prior dancing experience but lots of desire to want to teach myself, I suppose I expected too much from this book and it left me naturally let down. Those who have some dancing experience will find this book much more enjoyable and will benefit from it more fully.

Great for the absolute beginner
This book will take you through the basic patterns of popular social dances and does a fairly adept job of doing so. This is purely a footwork book, as there is little mention of styling, but for the absolute novice it will get you out on the dance floor.

I particularly enjoyed the section on rhythm and the emphasis that dancing is about doing the same motion, the exact same way every time, so you don't really have to have rhythm to dance, you just need to perform the same motion the same way consistently. I have a friend struggling with this same issue in his dancing and recommended this book to him, with the practice exercises included, to help him improve.

All in all, a well written book for the novice dancer and one I recommend.