Dancing in Salt Lake City

[caityrosey]

My husband and I will be heading out to Salt Lake for a week in June. Any good places for social dancing out there?

[reb]

Bring oxygen!

[LindyKeya]

Your best bet for ballroom dancing will be the Murray Arts Centre, which has big ballroom dances many nights of the week. 2 big ballrooms (both aren't always available(, sometimes a live band. It is on State Street at 48th South (technically in Murray, as you might guess).

There also used to be a web site that listed different ballroom venues in Utah (something like danceinutah.com), but I can't seem to find it.

[caityrosey]

Was just talking to a friend who lives out there. She says she heard about dancing at the Murray Arts Center when she was a student at BYU. She says they often have two different dancing things going on in the two different ballrooms...one is usually swing, the other is more (quote) ballroom-y (unquote). I take that to mean that the second group tends to do more things of the foxtrot/waltz persuasion.

Ever been to either one LindyKeya?

[silverdancer]

This would be great info for me as well. There is a group of us college dancers that go out to the BYU camps in the summer and we are always looking for a way to socialize with local dancers (when our feet aren't in total misery of course ;) ) We went to this little cafe in Provo last summer and they had salsa/latin/merengue music and dancing. Not sure if this happens all the time though.

[tunape]

This would be great info for me as well. There is a group of us college dancers that go out to the BYU camps in the summer and we are always looking for a way to socialize with local dancers (when our feet aren't in total misery of course ;) ) We went to this little cafe in Provo last summer and they had salsa/latin/merengue music and dancing. Not sure if this happens all the time though.

Murray Art Center(MAC) actually has 3 floors, the third annex building tends to have salsa and merengue. you should call to check, haven't been there in years, but it's a friendly and safe atmosphere.

[LindyKeya]

(Yes, I've been the MAC, as it is known, many times.)
Actually, I'd only call it two floors. There are two separate buildings -- the main, Murray Arts Centre building, which has an enormous ballroom, with a smaller room attached where they usually do the preceding lesson, and, occasionally, they might have another "dance" going on in that room. The big ballroom sometimes has a "band" and plays a wide variety of ballroom/latin/swing music. You'll generally find an older crowd in the main ballroom than anywhere else at the MAC. (And that isn't necessarily a bad thing. You may find a lot of men in their 60s, but they can dance up quite a storm.)
The other main floor is is the "Dance Centre" building. It used to be WCS in that room on Fridays, and ECS on Saturdays, but when we left Utah, that had gradually been changing. The nice thing is that one cover charge gets you in to everything, although the lesson is a couple dollars more. Calling the MAC or checking out their website will verify what they're doing now.
(Incidentally, in the same building as the MAC, the owners also own a shop that sells dance shoes, fabrics for ballroom costumes, ostrich feathers, etc. I don't recall how their prices are, but if you're there, and in the market for any costume stuff specific to ballroom, it would be worth checking out.)

And it is truly friendly and safe. I wouldn't recommend leaving valuables in your car, but the owners do a good job of keepings things nice.

Outside of dance studios, I don't know of any other place in the SLC/Provo metro area that has public "ballroom dances" on a regular basis. Plenty of other swing and/or salsa dances (and indeed, BYU and the U both have swing clubs who hold weekly swing dances throughout the year, including summer).