Stu­dents, get ready to show your stuff! Medal Ball test­ing will be in the Plain­field stu­dio from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. on Feb­ru­ary 25, fol­lowed by din­ner and danc­ing in the Impe­r­ial Ball­room at the Amway Grand Plaza. Bob Long will be our judge for the day,  and will also be coach­ing at the Kent­wood stu­dio on the 24th.

We’ll be cel­e­brat­ing a cen­tury of dance by focus­ing on a dif­fer­ent dance each month. This month, we’re fea­tur­ing the Charleston at Kent­wood for the 8:15 pre-bronze group for the next two Thurs­days and on Wednes­days at 7:30 for the Plain­field stu­dio. Be sure to join us!

If you’ve resolved to have more fun in 2012, put on your danc­ing shoes and join

Arthur Mur­ray, Grandville Stu­dio for it’s upcoming

Pub­lic Dance:

Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 21, 2012

8 p.m. — 10 p.m.

Arthur Mur­ray Pub­lic Dances are a great way to get a taste of the out­stand­ing ball­room and Latin dance instruc­tion avail­able through our pros, and to wit­ness first hand the smooth moves of our students.

We’ll fea­ture fab­u­lous music, refresh­ing bev­er­ages, and an awe­some venue, all for just $5.00 admis­sion!

If you’d like more infor­ma­tion, please do not hes­i­tate to call our stu­dio at 608‑5149!

ALL ARE WELCOME!

Arthur Mur­ray Grand Rapids is pleased to announce that guest dance coach Agnes Kazmier­czak will be vis­it­ing our stu­dios in late Jan­u­ary and Feb­ru­ary. The Inter­na­tional Smooth com­peti­tor and for­mer Danc­ing with the Stars con­tender is sched­uled for the Kent­wood Stu­dio, Jan. 30; Plain­field Stu­dio, Jan. 31 and Grandville Stu­dio, Feb. 1st.

About Agnes Kazmierczak

Miss Kazmier­czak is orig­i­nally from Poland and now resides in Cal­i­for­nia. She, along with her pre­vi­ous dance part­ner, Urs Giesen­hainer (from Ger­many) have been fea­tured per­form­ers on “Danc­ing with the Stars” and “Amer­i­can Ball­room Chal­lenge” sev­eral times. Miss Kazmier­czak recently joined the Arthur Mur­ray orga­ni­za­tion as a Pro­fes­sional Dance Con­sul­tant. She con­tin­ues to com­pete in Inter­na­tional Smooth danc­ing, and is a highly sought-after coach world­wide. We are please to have Miss Kazmier­czak join us. Please give her a warm wel­come to Grand Rapids!

Over the last 100 years, dance icon Arthur Mur­ray rev­o­lu­tion­ized ball­room and Latin dance lessons. Here’s some fun pop trivia cit­ing ref­er­ences to our found­ing father of smooth moves! (P.S. The pic­ture on the right is from an ad cel­e­brat­ing 50 years of Arthur Mur­ray — 50 years ago! We thought it was cool!)

• The Mur­ray name and fran­chise were fea­tured in the 1942 hit song “Arthur Mur­ray Taught Me Danc­ing in a Hurry”, writ­ten by Johnny Mer­cer and Vic­tor Schertzinger.
• In the film The Sky’s the Limit (1943), when Fred Astaire and his part­ner fin­ish a dance num­ber, she asks him “Where did you learn to dance like that?” and Astaire answers “Arthur Murray”.
• In the I Love Lucy episode “Lit­tle Ricky Gets a Dog”, (1957) Lucy tells Ricky that she is receiv­ing Mex­i­can hat danc­ing lessons from Arthur Murray.
• In the 1954 film, Phffft! star­ring Jack Lem­mon, Judy Hol­l­i­day and Kim Novack, Lemmon’s char­ac­ter (Robert Tracey) is seen walk­ing into an Arthur Mur­ray Dance Stu­dio in New York to work on his Rumba with teacher Merry Anders.
• In 1957, Buddy Holly & the Crick­ets per­formed a live show at the Arthur Mur­ray Dance Party – this is the only known live footage of Buddy Holly in his short lifetime.
• In the 1960 film The Apart­ment (Oscar win­ning film) starring Jack Lem­mon and Shirley Maclaine, Lemmon’s char­ac­ter (C.C.“Bud” Bax­ter) makes two ref­er­ences to Arthur Murray.
• In a dream sequence, “Arthur Mur­ray­rock” seeks help learn­ing Fred’s “Fran­tic” dance in the Flint­stones episode “Shinrock-a-Go-Go.” In the 1987 film Dirty Danc­ing, Johnny tells Baby that he received his train­ing at the Arthur Mur­ray studios.
• In the 1995 film The Amer­i­can Pres­i­dent, when Syd­ney Ellen Wade (Annette Ben­ing) remarks to the Pres­i­dent (Michael Dou­glas) while danc­ing, “I don’t know how you do it.”  Mis­un­der­stand­ing her ques­tion, the Pres­i­dent sim­ply replies, “It’s Arthur Mur­ray. Six lessons.”
• Arthur Mur­ray is men­tioned a The West Wing episode in a con­ver­sa­tion between a con­gress­man and Toby Ziegler. The Con­gress­man says, “Per­son­ally, I don’t know what to say to peo­ple who argue that the NEA is there to sup­port art that nobody wants to pay for in the first place… Arthur Mur­ray didn’t need the NEA to write Death of a Sales­man.” Toby cor­rects him by say­ing, “Arthur Mur­ray taught ball­room dance, Arthur Miller wrote Death of a Sales­man.”

This year, we’re cel­e­brat­ing 100 years since Arthur Mur­ray gave his first dance les­son. On April 4th, in stu­dios through­out the world, we’ll join together in the biggest “birth­day” dance ever to salute the mas­ter of the global groove! This bio, drawn from Wikipedia, will help give you a sense of the his­tory of the dance legacy that we’re delighted to share with you!

Arthur Mur­ray (April 4, 1895 – March 3, 1991) was a dance instruc­tor and busi­ness­man, whose name is most often asso­ci­ated with the dance stu­dio chain that bears his name.  His pupils included Eleanor Roo­sevelt, the Duke of Wind­sor, and John D. Rock­e­feller Jr.

Arthur Mur­ray was born in Gali­cia, Austria-Hungary in 1895 as Moses Teich­mann. In August 1897, he was brought to Amer­ica by his mother Sarah on the S.S. Fries­land, and landed at Ellis Island. The Teich­manns set­tled in Lud­low Street, in Man­hat­tan with his father, Abra­ham Teich­mann. He started his busi­ness of teach­ing the world to dance in 1912 at the age of 17; he taught at night while work­ing as a drafts­man by day.

Mur­ray was shy as a child and self-conscious about his tall, lanky appear­ance. He wanted very much to be a part of the social activ­i­ties that most of his friends enjoyed, par­tic­u­larly the dances, but was afraid to social­ize with girls.  At the age of 14, a friend of his whom he admired because of his pop­u­lar­ity with girls, taught him his first dance steps.  To get prac­tice on the dance floor, Mur­ray attended wed­dings in his neigh­bor­hood, where he found will­ing dance part­ners of every size and age.  Mur­ray won his first dance con­test at the Grand Cen­tral Palace, a pub­lic dance hall. The 1st prize had been a sil­ver cup, but Mur­ray went home with­out any­thing to show for his win. His part­ner of the evening took it. This loss made an impres­sion on Mur­ray, and in later years every win­ner in his dance con­tests took home a prize.

Read the rest of this page »

Join us at the Grandville Stu­dio for our Hol­i­day For­mal Wednes­day, Dec. 14th, 8:15pm — 10:00 p.m. We’ll get you into the swing of the sea­son with refresh­ments, cama­raderie, and lots of dancing!

PLUS: Please Save the Date for our Pub­lic Dance — Sat­ur­day — Jan 21st, 8-10pm.

Look­ing for a place to try out those new dance moves?  Then please join us at the Grandville Stu­dio for a great evening of danc­ing! This FUN event is open to every­one!.  Cost is only $5/person.

Call (616) 608‑5149 for details.

What do you get for the guy or gal who has every thing? How about some thing that will give them good health, romance and social oppor­tu­ni­ties galore?

That’s what you’re giv­ing when you give our Arthur Mur­ray Hol­i­day Gift Cer­tifi­cate. You’re also giv­ing (and get­ting) great value. For a
lim­ited time only, we’re offer­ing 1 intro­duc­tory les­son, 2 pri­vate 1/2 hour lessons and one group les­son for the low price of $98 —
reg­u­lar value of $186. So if you’re look­ing to put some Merry into someone’s hol­i­days, give the gift of dance — for life!

TO BUY ONLINE: Visit the stu­dio of your choice and click on ‘gift certificates’.

This year, the Plain­field and Kent­wood stu­dios are par­tic­i­pat­ing in the hol­i­day “Adopt-A-Family” pro­gram to share the hol­i­day with a less-fortunate family.

We’re call­ing on all stu­dents to bring non-perishable food and gifts for our fam­ily to the Hol­i­day for­mal instead of reg­u­lar gift giv­ing. So please join us Thurs­day, Dec. 15th at the Kent­wood stu­dio, and help a local fam­ily have a brighter night this Christmas!

Our “fam­ily” adopted through Access of West Michi­gan, is com­prised of four boys, aged 1, 11, 13, and 17 and one mom.

Access rec­om­mends con­sid­er­ing the fol­low­ing foods for the gift bas­ket:
Meat — turkey*, ham, or chicken; Pota­toes, (fresh, boxed, or canned,) rice or pasta; Veg­eta­bles — fresh, canned, or frozen; (Pre­ferred fresh pro­duce includes: pota­toes, onions, squash, broc­coli, cel­ery, car­rots, gar­lic, pep­per, zuc­chini, green beans, col­lards, turnip greens). Fruit – fresh or canned; Bread/Rolls; Butter/Margarine; Dessert — frozen, cake mix, pie mix and fill­ing, or whipped top­ping; Gravy, stuff­ing, cran­berry sauce, pick­les or olives. Addi­tional sug­ges­tions that you might want to include:
Bev­er­age — juice, cof­fee, tea, milk; Salad fix­ings and dress­ing; Pasta prod­ucts; Soup; Jello and Pud­ding; Dry Milk; Sugar; Eggs; Cereal; Peanut Butter.

Thanks in advance for your con­tri­bu­tion to cre­ate a nice hol­i­day for this family!

The party will  fea­ture cham­pagne punch, fancy foot work, and staff and stu­dent spot lights! Be there with ‘bells on’ from 9 p.m. to 10:30. A merry time is on tap!

What do you get for the guy or gal who has every­thing? How about some­thing that will give them good health, romance and social oppor­tu­ni­ties galore?

That’s what you’re giv­ing when you give our Arthur Mur­ray Hol­i­day Gift Cer­tifi­cate. You’re also giv­ing (and get­ting) great value. For a lim­ited time only, we’re offer­ing 1 intro­duc­tory les­son, 2 pri­vate 1/2 hour lessons and one group les­son for the low price of $98 — reg­u­lar value of $186.

So if you’re look­ing to put some Merry into someone’s hol­i­days, give the gift of dance — for life! Click on the Gift Cer­tifi­cate link in the menu bar above to order yours today!

Kudos to the staff and stu­dents who attended Superama in Las Vegas last month! We’re delighted with your award-winning per­for­mances, includ­ing the many Gold and Gold with hon­ors, Sil­ver and Bronze Medals, the Top Stu­dents and Top Rou­tines awards. Hat’s off to Mr. Perez and Ms. Stu­art for receiv­ing 1st place Top Teacher awards, and the Kent­wood stu­dio for plac­ing sec­ond in Top Studio.

We also enjoyed an evening of dance at the Roar­ing 20s Party. What a breath­tak­ing show per­formed by cur­rent World Pro­fes­sional Latin Champs Yulia Zagor­ouitchenko and Ric­cardo Cocchi!

If you missed out on the fun, be sure to join us next year for a “Super” time!