Intergenerational Tea Dance

Magic in Motion: Westbourne’s Intergenerational Tea Dance

This week we held an Intergenerational Tea Dance for some of our pupils, staff and visitors. These Tea Dances are the brain children of Anny and Aubrey Abrames at Harmony Music School who host tea dances on Wednesdays, at different venues across the city, from Meadowhall to the City Hall, via many church halls and community spaces. Many of their sequence dancers are regulars and were delighted by our sprung floor in the Main Hall! They were all keen to teach us the sequences and were delighted to be surprised by being taught the Westbourne Chachachá that pupils (and sisters) at Westbourne, Neve and Neema, had choreographed to Taylor Swift’s “Shake it off”. They had been busily rehearsing with some of our pupils and staff over numerous lunchtimes leading up to the event.

The powerful combination of dancing, music, good food and a friendly, fun and patient group of people, proved you could get a group of teenagers learning dance moves and indeed dancing with a group of pensioners. Pupils from Year 7 to 11 enthusiastically joined teachers in learning the rumba, chachacha and ballroom dances, and then sat among our guests to share lunch and discuss everything from holidays to politics. Repeatedly I heard that it was the best day of the year so far.

It appears there is something quite magical about intergenerational gatherings!

Watch a video of the highlights here.