New Senior Center Dance Instructor Doesn’t Miss A Step

By Jan Howard

Newtown Senior Center country line dancers have a new instructor. Lynne Flanders of Waterbury has taken over for Jane Dwyer, who retired recently after 14 years of teaching at Newtown and other area senior centers.

“She’s phenomenal,” Director of Senior Services Marilyn Place said of Ms Flanders last week. “She’s so good.”

Ms Flanders has been teaching country line dancing at several senior centers in the area, such as Danbury, Southbury, Oxford, Brookfield, Ridgefield, and Bethel, and across the state for almost 20 years. Some are full time and others are short rotating courses for six to ten weeks at a time.

“I am head of TIM [Teachers Independent Meetings] where we share information from instructor to instructor on dances, techniques, and ideas,” Ms Flanders said. She is past president of the New England Western Dance Association and has been teaching at Illusions Dance Club & Restaurant in Wolcott since 1999.

While she uses mostly country music in her classes, she also incorporates some 50s and rock music in her dance routines, she said.

She has also taught for the Adult Education Department in Waterbury and the Park & Recreation departments in Southington and Watertown. She has also taught at Pinecrest Country Club in Shelton, the Essex House in Essex, Jasper’s in Berlin, and was a guest instructor at G.W. Café in Southington and Kangaroos and Boot Scooters in Milford. She has been a DJ manager and instructor at Testa’s Banquet Hall in Southington and also DJs for weddings and private parties.

Her free time, she said, is filled with dancing and traveling with her team, Lynne’s Lines. She coordinates several dance trips, including weekends to Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maine, and other states. She also teaches at fairs, country clubs, barn dances, concerts-on-the-green, benefits, and other events.

Lynne’s Lines performed and she taught at the first annual “Just Gotta Country Dance” weekend event at Lake Quassy Amusement Park.

Ms Flanders has been country dancing since 1986 and had square danced for many years prior to that. She has taught country line dancing at several square dance clubs and at the 36th New England Square & Round Dance Convention in 1994 and the 30th Connecticut Square Dance Festival in 1998.

Ms Flanders has also choreographed dances, some of which have been published in the magazines Country Dance Lines and Step By Step.

The class meets on Thursday at 1:30 pm. The fee is $1 per class, and no registration is necessary.