On Saturday, members of the Yale Ballroom dance team showcased the semester’s work with a variety of dance styles.
Hannah Liu & Laurentia Woo
Contributing Reporters
Hannah Liu, Contributing Photographer
Dancing the night away, students gathered on Saturday evening in the Jonathan Edwards College dining hall to watch Yale Ballroom’s annual Winter Ball.
The event featured 18 dances in different styles, from bolero and Viennese waltz to rhythm cha-cha and rumba, along with two larger group dances for the beginner and advanced groups.
“I thought it was very powerful,” Pierce Nguyen ’29, an attendee, said. “When you think about ballroom dancing, you think of a slow kind of dancing, but it could also be really energetic and lively and bring your spirits out.”
Yale Ballroom annually hosts a ball in the winter and spring. This year, the 2025 Winter Ball was in the JE dining hall. The group has previously held its performances in theaters and other residential performance spaces.
In addition to dance choreography, the ball featured a wide variety of musical styles. Notable songs included “Into the Unknown” from “Over the Garden Wall” and “Gangnam Style” by PSY, as well as two songs with Mandarin lyrics.
“There’s so much that takes my breath away,” Thomas Whitehurst ’28, who joined Yale Ballroom this semester, said. “We’ve got some really cool choreography. I was surprised to see dips where the follower is really close to the floor, and one where the follower does a cartwheel mid-air, all in the span of half a second.”
According to Sasha Spiegel ’26, a senior team member and new captain, the Winter Ball has no unifying theme. Instead, each pair or choreographer creates their own piece, to promote creativity and individuality.
“It’s a beginner-friendly team, but also competitive,” Spiegel said. According to the captain, the dancers choreograph original pieces and throughout the year compete in 19 different styles, which fall into four broad categories: standard, Latin, smooth and rhythm. As one of the few dance teams at Yale to compete in conventions, Yale Ballroom is also registered as a club sport.
While some of the Ballroom performers have years of experience in the craft, the group also offers a learning space for new dancers.
Spiegel joined Yale Ballroom first year with no prior experience and said she stayed for the community. She hopes the Winter Ball spreads awareness of what the team offers and shows people how welcoming the community is.
During intermission and after the performance, audience members took to the floor to dance in pairs or participate in group dances.
Yale Ballroom started in 1988.
link