A Team Routines

In October 2015 members of the A team, led by Stuart Cork, led a crowdfunding campaign to raise money to have our new music produced by a professional orchestra and singers.  Thanks to the generous support of friends and family, the team exceeded all expectations and were able to enlist the support of the experienced German producer Knut Kornatz and his orchestra and singers to produce the new XS music.  And Wicked was born.

At the end of the 2009 season the team produced a Shirley Bassey music, intending to start work on it the following year.  However, at the 2009 British National Championships, Ystrad Fawr danced a Shirley Bassey programme and the team’s visit to Tiger Bay was put on hold for four years.  But XS Latin always intended to return to the idea and, after winning their sixth British National title with Bat Out Of Hell, the team started working on The Girl From Tiger Bay in January 2014.

After Night Fever and Priscilla, XS Latin sought a departure from the disco based routines of 2008 – 2011.  And so the team’s first rock themed routine was born.  Bat Out Of Hell was XS Latin A Team’s 10th routine and a celebration of the dramatic and highly theatrical music of Meatloaf.

A trip to the theatre in London in Autumn 2009 for several members of the team, which resulted in one member enthusiastically taking to the stage (and struggling to find his way off!), provided the inspiration for XS Latin’s 9th routine, Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.

The inspiration for this, XS Latin’s 8th themed routine, was the London stage production of Saturday Night Fever, which played at the London Palladium and was choreographed by Arlene Philips. One of the team members, along with her sister, displayed a worrying devotion to the production, having seen it on stage several times, and, after some successful campaigning, persuaded the coaches and the team to buy into this theme. Perhaps a little dancing to Staying Alive at the 2007 World Championship’s after-party proved the clincher …

Taking its inspiration from some of the classic musicals of the 1960s and 1970s, On Broadway aimed to capture the feeling of the Broadway or West End theatre land.

After five previous routines which were inspired by pop or film music, XS decided that the sixth routine was about time for a latin formation team to use authentic Latin American music and Song of South America was born.

Following on from the Aladdin theme did not prove to be an easy task. Former member David Mallabone, having turned professional in 2004, was now on board as a coach and so, as an easy induction, was given the task of arranging the music for the new theme. Having completed a My Fair Lady themed music and rejecting it and then completing a George Michael themed music and rejecting this too, things were getting desperate! Finally, using Bruce’s experience and inspiration, the idea for a Tom Jones theme was suggested and followed through.

A discussion in Vilnius Airport on the return journey from XS’s first trip to the IDSF World Championships turned into a brainstorming for a new theme and Aladdin emerged triumphant from that debate. Inspired by the Disney animated movie, this routine debuted at the British National in November 2003.

The arrival on the big screen of the Baz Luhrmann film, Moulin Rouge, provided inspiration for the third XS routine. This time, the music and choreography were done ‘in-house’ and the team, for the first time, appreciated the enormity of the task of putting together a music and choreography for 8 couples and 6 minutes that moves smoothly between the cha cha, rumba, samba, paso doble and jive.

Following the success of Sarafina, the team decided to purchase its second routine from German team TSG Braunschweig. With Bruce Lait now on board as coach, and a large turn around in membership, the team spent the latter half of 1999 and the first half of 2000 working on the new choreography.

Loaned from TSG Braunschweig (at the time a first division German latin formation team), Sarafina was the routine that started it all.