January 4, 2009
Superstars of Dance Premiere Review
Written by: JohnSuperstar of Dance Dancers
Irish Step Dancers (Ireland Group) – Incredible to watch. Having a bunch of beautiful girls didn’t hurt either. The guy in the front that was kind of running around wasn’t very good, but it was fun to watch.
Robert Muraine (US Solo) – Robert had performed a couple times on So You Think You Can Dance. I still love Robert and he does some incredibly things. I think he had a really poor song choice and the camera angles didn’t do what he did justice. However, I could watch him dance over and over again. Check out some of his better stuff from So You Think You Can Dance.
Carolina Cerisola (Argentina Solo) – I’m sure that Argentina has a better solo dancer than this person. She wasn’t horrible and she got better once the music picked up. However, she definitely wasn’t a superstar. Carolina could have also left the hat out of the routine completely.
Anya Garnis and Pasha Kovalev (Russian Ballroom Duet) – Another set of dancers from So You Think You Can Dance. They should have stuck to their audition for So You Think You Can Dance. This one had way too much foreplay and not enough action. The song was horrible and it wasn’t nearly as good as I’ve seen them do. Whoever choreographed this number was horrible. Pasha and Anya are so much better than this. Russia should be disappointed and should ask Karina Smirnoff to come on the show, but I’m pretty sure Dancing with the Stars won’t be giving her up anytime soon.
Nishi Munshi & Sangita Sanyal (Indian Bollywood Duet) – An interesting Bollywood Duet with 2 very beautiful girls. Something seemed just off. I think maybe the song was too fast and so they didn’t have a chance to complete all the various moves. Of course, maybe I’m just not as familiar with Bollywood and so I needed more time to enjoy the moves.
Sean Robinson (Australian Tap Dancer) – What the heck was he wearing? The problem with tap dancing is that we’ve all seen tap dancing. In fact, most of us have even seen some great tap dancers. Unfortunately, he’s probably not even as good as those other tap dancers we’ve seen.
Bei Zheng (China Ribbon Dance) – Much better than I thought it would be. I guess I was just a little disappointed, because ribbon dancing is much cooler when there’s a whole crowd of people doing a ribbon dance in well synchronized patterns. Bei did represent China well.
Gumboot (South Africa Group Dance) – Definitely not the most impressive dancing I’ve ever seen, but I enjoyed watching it thoroughly and couldn’t stop watching. I think the fact that it was pretty unique made it fun to watch and very entertaining.
Contemporary Dancers (Australia Group Dance) – Some interesting material. I don’t know why, but I just couldn’t get over the knee pads. Why have those annoying looking black knee pads. Just looked odd and annoying. A bunch of really great dancers on the floor. Would have just liked to see a little better choreography.
Damien O’Kane (Ireland Solo) – Pretty good. I much prefer Irish step dance in a large group. Also, I would have preferred seeing a girl do the solo, but that might just be because I’m male. I’m surprised the judges scored him so high. Didn’t deserve that high of a score.
Sduduzo Ka-Mbili (South Africa Solo) – A zulu dance? I like the name of the dance. The guy was very flexible. However, it just felt like an odd mix of cheerleading, contemporary and the lawnmower move some high school students might do. A lot of energy coming out of that man.
Georgia Ambarian & Eric Luna (US Duet) – Some absolutely jaw dropping lifts. I once saw the US Amateur Cabaret Championships and it was one of the most thrilling performances I’d ever seen. This wasn’t quite up to that level, but still should have been scored higher than they were scored. 7, really?
Miriam Larici & Leonardo Barrionuevo (Argentina Duet) – Honestly, is this the best Argentinean Tango they could find? Maybe I’m just used to the US version (if that exists), but I was rather disappointed with what can really be an incredibly sexy and wonderful dance to watch. I will admit that the section at the end where they were doing all sorts of quick kicks was pretty nice, but otherwise it felt really flat.
Julia Bantner (Russia Solo) – Seemed like a very russian style, a russian song and a russian look. I enjoyed her dancing a lot and wish that all of the dances would have been as good as hers. Too bad the judges didn’t like it at all. I’d love to hear why the judges scored what they did.
Amrapali Ambegaokar (India Solo) – Incredibly impressive. Could be my favorite dance of the night. A great display of dance from India and an even better example of the types of dances that should have been brought to the show. The bells around her ankles made the spins even more interesting and fun to watch.
Shaolin Monks (China Group) – A stunning performance and a great way to end the show. Some people might say Kung Fu wasn’t dancing, but it was indeed great dancing. All of it except for the little spear stunt at the end. I enjoyed it thoroughly and they certainly deserved the high score they got. The kids were really fun to watch too.
Check out the final Master Scoreboard for each country (not that they really mean anything):
Argentina 123
Ireland 123
China 117
Australia 114
Russia 114
United States 114
India 113
South Africa 112
Hosts
Michael Flately should stick to dancing and stop the judging. He just added nothing to the show. Susie Castillo was surprisingly good. The biggest problem for her is that there wasn’t any rhyme or reason to when we’d see her and when we wouldn’t. I hated that they didn’t have continuity in that regard.
Judges
Honestly, what’s the point in showing the judges. They pretty much say nothing. If they aren’t saying anything, then showing them revealing the scores is incredibly boring TV.
Also, Did China know how to speak English? maybe that’s why he only ever gave a score of 8. It’s the only score he knew how to say. Sad, because there are so many Chinese that speak English better than most Americans. Ok, so he scored a few other things, but it was just embarrassing.
See you tomorrow night. Let’s hope it’s a little better than tonight. It wasn’t horrible tonight, but I expected more from Nigel.
Tags: Amrapali Ambegaokar • Anya Garnis • Bei Zheng • Carolina Cerisola • Damien O’Kane • Dancing with the Stars • Gumboot • Irish Step • Julia Bantner • Karina Smirnoff • Leonardo Barrionuevo • Michael Flately • Miriam Larici • NBC • Nishi Munshi • Pasha Kovalev • Robert Muraine • Sangita Sanyal • Sduduzo Ka-Mbili • Sean Robinson • Shaolin Monks • So You Think You Can Dance • Superstars of Dance • Susie CastilloSuperstars of Dance Premiere – List of All the Dancers
Written by: JohnARGENTINA
Sandar serves as coach for team Argentina.
The judge for team Argentina is Maria Pogee.
cabaret artiste soloist
Carolina Sarasola – contemporary Tango dancer soloist
Miriam Larici & Leonardo Barrionuevo – Argentinian Tango duo
group performing Gaucho style dance in which the Gaucho’s use their bolas’ to produce intricate rhythms
AUSTRALIA
Jason Gilkison serves as coach for team Australia.
The judge for team Australia is Kelley Abbey.
Sean Robinson – tap dance soloist
contemporary dancer soloist
Latin ballroom duo
group performing contemporary dance
CHINA
Matthew Ahmet of Britain serves as Coach for team China.
The Judge for team China is Master Haiyang Wang.
traditional Chinese ribbon dancer soloist
double whip soloist
acrobatic ballet duo
The Shaolin Monks Kung Fu group “Shaolin: Wheel of Life”
IRELAND
Marie Duffy Pask serves as Coach for team Ireland.
The judge for team Ireland is Daire Nolan.
Damien O’Kane – Solo Step Dance
Irish Step Dancers. This team is assembled from different groups currently performing all over the globe.
INDIA
Nakul Dev Mahajan serves as coach for team India.
The judge for team India is Shirish Dayal.
Amrapali Ambegaokar – Bharantanyam dancer soloist
Kathak soloist
Nishi Munshi & Sangita Sanyal – Bollywood duo
group performing Bhangra
RUSSIA
Stanislav Issaev serves as coach for team Russia.
The judge for team Russia is Mikhail Smirnov.
ballet dancer soloist from the world famous Bolshoi Ballet
Julia Bantner – contemporary dancer soloist from the world famous Bolshoi Ballet
Anya Garnis and Pasha Kovalev – ballroom duo
group performing Cossak
SOUTH AFRICA
Tandi Bhengu serves as coach for team South Africa.
The judge for team South Africa is Harold Van Buuren.
hip/hop dance soloist
Sduduzo Ka-Mbili – Afrofusion dance soloist
World Champion jive-inspired dance duo
Group performing Gumboot, a style of dance that was born in the gold mines of South Africa
UNITED STATES
Marguerite Derricks serves as coach for team USA.
The judge for team USA is Tony Selznick.
Robert Muraine – popping dancer soloist
tap dancer soloist
Eric Luna and Georgia Ambarian – World Champion cabaret style ballroom duo
group performing hip hop












