HotLinerz's Dance-Log

Mr Daniel Leong, a very good dance friend of mine, recently celebrated his 60th birthday, and had a birthday party, with good food and what else… line dancing!

2-3 weeks before his birthday party, I took the initiative to choreograph a birthday dance for him. I had wanted to choreograph to another piece of Happy Birthday song (a fast waltz) but was thinking if it’ll be too boring. And while chatting with another LD enthusiast from Toronto, Carmen Mah told me of another upbeat Happy Birthday song sung by DJ Bobo. I took a listen and liked it very much… ooh, I love sambas!

It was meant to be a surprise for Mr Daniel Leong, telling him that my group would be putting up a performance during his  birthday party. In actual fact, I had secretly sent out the dance script and demo video (done with Rosalind Yeo) to the list of his invites (just about 15 emails – extracted from his email) and told them the surprise plot. Also told them to pass the dance to whoever they knew was coming as I had no idea who are the 150 pax he would be inviting!

The dance was purposedly made simple cos I thought, who would be dancing to  birthday songs on non-birthday days! And who would take the trouble to remember a dance u dance to only once in a while (during birthdays)? And what about the people who didn’t know of the dance earlier but want to dance it during a birthday party? So it must be easy and easily picked up off the dancefloor. So, the result was a high beginner samba line dance, with ‘a-counts’ instead of the usual ‘&-counts’ due to the samba beats. (The ‘a- count’ is the count slightly slower than usual ‘&-count’)

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t worried if no one would pick up the surprise dance for Mr Leong. I kept reminding my usual friends dancing with other groups about the dance and if they had practised it. They assured me they had and that no one had breathed a whisper about it to Mr Leong. And to reach it out to Mr Leong’s own students, I had asked another friend who had their contacts to inform them. Turned out, they knew about it already and had already secretly practising it! So, safe to say, there will be people dancing the Birthday Samba for Mr Leong 🙂

Mr Leong who was trying to arrange his programs of the party kept asking me via emails what my dance performance is titled, and when we want to perform it? I just replied to give us a slot before he cuts his birthday cake but refused to divulge the dance title haha!

On the day of the party, just before he cuts the birthday cake, it was announced that there will be a surprise birthday dance for Mr Leong and everyone just got down to the dance floor! I was pleasantly surprised that the secret dance did managed to reach everyone, or almost everyone! A lady came to me and said, she heard abt the dance but couldn’t find the sheet from my blog/yipee! Oh well, I can’t release it, can I? Or it won’t be a surprise no more! Indeed, when asked abt it later on, Mr Leong said he had no idea at all abt the birthday dance and was really surprised. 😀

Ah, so here goes, the script for the dance and the demo video. Hope this dance will be danced to during birthday parties! Or else, do substitute with any another suitable samba music. 😉 Enjoy!