Big Apple Ballroom Blitz
April 12, 2013

Riccardo Cocchi and Yulia Zagoruychenko, world professional Latin championsThis weekend, top ballroom competitors invade Manhattan for the second annual Dance Legends festival. The two-night event at the Hammerstein Ballroom features performances by world champions in ballroom and Latin dance, including 2012 DT cover star and “DWTS” pro Louis van Amstel and his partner Julie Fryer, who have earned both Latin and showdance world champion titles during their career together. Riccardo Cocchi and Yulia Zagoruychenko, who have won world professional Latin championships the past three years, will also perform, as well as reigning Blackpool professional standard champions Arunas Bizokas and Katusha Demidova and many others. There will be a special performance by brother-and-sister world junior salsa champions Raymond and Jenalyn Saraza-Pacheco, just 14 and 12 years old, respectively. (Don’t miss our April 2013 story on Dancing Classrooms, nurturing young ballroom talent in public schools.)

On Sunday, city-dwellers who want to dance like the stars can attend a lecture-demonstration and workshop with Mirko Gozzoli and Edita Daniute, the 2013 World DanceSport Federation world professional standard champions. The class is open to all levels at Manhattan Ballroom Dance studio.

Photo by DanceSport Photography/Alex Rowan

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