Zouk Nation - "Zouk is the dance of the 21st Century"

Premala has been teaching Zouk in Perth, Western Australia for the last two years and is loving it.

Originally trained as a Salsa instructor, her love affair with Zouk began two years ago on a trip to Brazil, where she spent time studying Zouk with some incredible teachers in San Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

Since returning to Perth she has been traveling around Australia teaching and performing Zouk in the attempt to introduce it to others and so that the Zouk scene in Australia will continue to flourish.

Carioca Caio Victor, better known as K-Yo Victor, is 26 years old and is a well renown Brazilian Zouk instructor and DJ from Brasilia.

For four years, K-Yo taught at the Studio Dance By CIA and now he teaches at the IJC (Institute Juliana Castro – www.julianacastro.com.br) in Brasilia. He has taught Salsa and Ballroom Dance and has specialized in Zouk since 2004. In 2005, he joined the group SOULZOUK and currently works alongside Luciana Guinle and China.

K-Yo’s style of teaching focuses on the melody and the conduct of the lady. He has taught classes in Brasilia, Belo Horizonte, Uberlandia, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, and Salvador.

Krullaine has been dancing all her life, but she discovered Zouk and other Brazilian dances in 2003. Right after she started, she joined Claudio Gomes’ Zouklovers, performed in several locations & congresses (national & international) and helped out with the lessons. In 2004 she went to Brazil for 6 months, to take a lot of lessons there in Zouk and Samba de Gafieira, but off course also to enjoy that beautiful culture and the incredible beauty the nature has to offer! Since then she’s traveled more to Brazil.

Pablo has been dancing Zouk since 2003, when he was motivated to learn by his sister who lived in Porto Seguro (a city long associated with Zouk Lambada).

He trained with Gilson Damasco, who taught him numerous teaching techniques in addition to passing on his enthusiasm for the dance. Along the way, Pablo was influenced by dancers such as Braz, Didi and Mauro Fuster (from Argentina).

He has participated in many Zouk-Lambada Congresses (including Barcelona and Amsterdam) and was invited to be an instructor at the International Zouk Congress in Porto Seguro in 2009 and 2011, Sao Paulo in 2009 and Rio de Janiero in 2010.

Antje’s first dance experience was a beginners course in a range of dances in Tanzschule Sandmann, Vechta, in 1999. In the following five years, she learned some of the most popular ballroom dances: Discofox, Cha cha, Ballroom Rumba, Waltz, Viennese waltz, as well as Jive, Quickstep and Tango, reaching ADTV Gold Star level.

Ramnish started dancing salsa inspired by some of the performances at a Latin Beat event in New Zealand. He completed most of his early training in New Zealand with instructors from Salsa Magic, Latinos Bar, Cuban Fusion and Salsa Bomba. After completing his early training in New Zealand, he furthered his training overseas (mainly in Australia and Germany) at various Congresses, dance festivals and private training. During this time, he attended classes and workshops run by world class instructors such as Edie the Salsa Freak, Al Espinosa, Jamie Jesus, Little Liz, Kadu Pires, Larissa Thayane, Oliver Pineda and Luda Kroitor.

Holding the auspicious honour of being the first person to ever offer Brazilian dance lessons in Australia, Tarcisio has amassed over 35 years of experience in dance instruction. Prior to founding Rio Rhythmics Latin Dance Academy in 1994, Tarcisio had already more than 20 years of experience as a dance teacher, performer, choreographer and percussionist behind him. A dance graduate of the University of Physical Education in Goiânia, Brazil, Tarcisio has also independently completed hundreds of hours of study in many styles of dance, including ballet, jazz, tap, contemporary and modern dance. Tarcisio is a Master of Capoeira, and travels back to his homeland of Brazil more than once a year to further polish and enhance his Latin dance knowledge.

Enjoying a sixteen year career Larissa began dancing jazz at the tender age of eight, expanding into classical ballet within two years. After competing in numerous high profile festivals of contemporary and classical dance – including the CBDD Rio de Janeiro Dance Festival, Curitiba Dance Festival, Joinville Dance Festival and Belo Horizonte Dance Festival – she was recognised as a professional classical dancer by Escola de Danças Classicas do Teatro Guaira (the School of Classic and Contemporary Dance of the Guaira Theatre) in Curitiba, Parana at only seventeen years of age.

Exposed to samba by his parents and family, Latin dance has been part of Kadu’s life from infancy. With formal dance training in samba rock and pagode (extremely popular Brazilian styles) beginning at the age of fifteen, Kadu’s appetite for professional tuition saw him quickly expand into zouk-lambada, samba no pé, hip hop and even ballet. In no time Kadu was dancing with the three largest and most popular dance centres in São Paulo; Bar Avenida, Lambar and Carioca Club.

Claudio and Monica are the pioneers of Zouk Lambada in Sydney. In 2005, long before the term Zouk became known in the dance community, they introduced this style while teaching at LDA. Since then, they have trained not just students but also dance professionals from different backgrounds and levels of expertise.

In the early 1990’s Claudio Gomes & Monica Leite started their training at different styles of Brazilian dance, such as Samba de Gafieira, Forro, Bolero and Soltinho at Jaime Arouxa’s well known studio in Rio de Janeiro. A couple of years later they fell in love with Zouk Lambada and it became their major passion ever since.