Texas Championship Pow Wow
A different kind of dance contest
Age is experience - an advantage
How often we, dancesport enthusiasts, living in our own world of latin
and ballroom dancing, tend to forget the mass of other dance forms out there
that hold their own competitions. How often we forget where dancing itself
comes from in the glamour of the ballroom (or the vastness of a sports
arena)... Yes, sometimes we do take notice of the "related" dances, like Mambo,
Argentine Tango (which, incidently, is called by Argentinians by the name of
Tango - they call our Tango "Continental Tango"), Rock'n'Roll,
the different forms of Swings as competitions. We may go to watch the elevating
artisticity of a ballet (or even do some of it ourselves, as it is needed for
the correct foundations of every dancer). Yet I would bet that most of our
readers will be surprised, just as I was, about finding a dance competition
which in its system is quite similar to "our" dance competitions... in a
completely different setting.
Ladies Fancy Shawl
When in Houston, Texas, I was fortunate to have a weekend off work and decided
to go and see what is worth seeing there... Obviously, besides the compulsory
visit at the Space Center, as a dancer I was looking to attend a local ballroom
danceing event. Having not found a single one, I decided instead to attend the
16th Annual Texas Championship Pow Wow on the 13th of November
2005. It turned out to be a most interesting event.
What is a Pow Wow? As described by
PowWows.com (a community website organized to hold all kinds of
information about Pow Wows - just as DancesportInfo.Net is holding all kinds of
information on DanceSport), "Pow Wow time is the Native American people's
way of meeting together, to join in dancing, singing, visiting, renewing old
friendships and make new ones".
Ladies Fancy Shawl
" The Pow Wow begins by the Grand Entry. This is the entry of all the people
entering the arena. This originally was a parade through the town the Pow Wow
was in. Even today in some Pow Wows, these parades are still held. During the Grand Entry, everyone
is asked to stand as the flags are brought into the arena. The flags carried
generally include the US flag, tribal flags, POW flag, and eagle staffs of
various tribes present. These are usually carried by veterans."
Northern Traditional - with this
movement the dancer is
imitating dodging a bullet
On a Pow Wow, everything is revolving around the traditional indian
culture. You can, of course, buy an immense variaty and number of goods for
and from the indian lifestyle. (Sounds familiar? Oh yes... on all major
competitions there is a dance exhibition around the ballroom where you can buy
an immense variety and number of dance goods...) You can buy traditional indian
food. And you can hear traditional (live) indian music, singing, and watch or
participate in dance competitions. And of course, this is where similarities
begin to pile up.
Lady judge uses the same
pen and paper
Dance contests are broken down
to categories, just as they are broken down to categories in Dancesport.
However, in "our world" they are, of course, grouped into Latin-American and
Ballroom styles. In Pow Wows, the different dance events are run separately.
Within the categories are either woman or men are dancing. The different
categories:
Buckskin,
Cloth,
Fancy Shawl, and
Jingle for women, and Chicken,
Grass,
Fancy Feather,
Northern Traditional and
Southern Straight for men.
Respectable
judges
The different dance styles are all based on their historical roots. Just as the
Ballroom and Latin-Anerican dances, all of them have a story behind. If you are
familiar with the culture, you will notice and recognize this story as the
dancers move. To accompany and strengthen the story, each dance style has its
special "dress-code" (sounds familiar?). Looking at the pictures is enough to
recognize the dance - but just as with Dancesport, you will not be able to find
the best dancer by looking at a frozen moment in time.
Just as with every dance competition, you need judges who will give you the
result. And just as with Dancesport, the more experienced ex-champions are
asked to do this task. Dress-code is as formal as in our case - only of course
instead of tuxedos they wear the traditional indian outfit also. And as our
dancing is comprised of mixed-gender couples and so judges are also mixed, in
this case (or maybe was it just this time and my experience?) only ladies are
judging the ladies competitions, and men are judging mens competition.
Men's Fancy Feather
The event was surrounded by a number of other entertainment
programme (in Europe we sure have a lot to learn on how to enertain
the audience during an event, something the Americans do
extremely well - just look at any american national sport). This
included an "amateur" dance contest for the audience (where some
contestants performed extreme moves that obviously had nothing to do with the
traditional moves - mind you, the young boy who started a form of streep-tease was
eliminated in the second round...), a draw for those who bought tickets the
income of which went to the organizers' pool and the prizes were traditional
indian rugs, and of course some "general dancing".
Northern Traditional
Music was provided live by Little Eagle and his band. Again there are
similarities here - although to my untrained ears all the songs seemed nearly
identical, they were obviously quite different to the dancers - at one point
the MC mentioned that the song played is a well-known traditional song... Just
like it is tradition to play the same songs in Blackpool, for example.
Northern Traditional
And to the dancers themselves. It was a very interesting experience to see after
watching many, many couples in Dancesport, how do the results go. Not
understanding the basics, of course, it is hard to decide - but I was glad to
see, that at least a little tiny bit of that experience helped to find at least
the top half - those that are the most experienced dancers. Other than that, it
was just a nice experience to remind me that all our dances have ther roots in
history - and that dancing is or should be so much more than just movements for
music. There is a story behind the dance, and there should be intention behind
the movements also.
Should you be more interested in this style of dancing, I suggest to look around
the web for Pow Wows - go there and watch yourself. Oh - did I mention?
Admittance was free...
Peter Suba