If producer Harley Medcalf had not witnessed “a scintillating display of Ballroom and Latin dancing” over “20 mesmerising minutes” at Sir Elton John’s 50th birthday celebration at the Hammersmith Ballroom in London (March 1997), his Burn The Floor company might never have been born.

Over the past six years Floor Play, directed and choreographed by three-time World Champion Latin Ballroom dancer Jason Gilkison, has played to more than 3 million people in 93 cities. Now it’s our turn, in Wellington, Christchurch and Auckland [click on the hyperlinked title above for tour details].

Basically a highly accomplished demonstration of Latin and Ballroom dancing (described by some wit as the vertical expression of a horizontal desire), with 16 lithe dancers, two live singers and four live musicians – more often than not doing orchestral karaoke to a recorded band and (sometimes) backing singers – Floor Play is a show for people who like to watch, especially if they like lots of salsa on their ballroom floors.

Judging by the enthusiasm of many at the opening night, it appeals mostly to people who want to dance competitive ballroom, are already into it, or have done it in their relative youth. If it’s in your blood and bones, you are more likely to share the experience vicariously. Others may feel like wallflowers after a while, not necessarily enraptured by other people having lots of fun when all that’s available for us is to watch how clever they are.

By comparison, Swan Lake On Ice, on the same stage six weeks ago, used the rich emotional textures of a classical good versus evil love story as a mean of delivering much more skill and spectacle. With no through-story and a relatively limited palette of man-woman subtexts informing the choreography, you have – as I say – to really be into ballroom culture to sustain your interest in, let alone get much of a genuine thrill from, Floor Play.

Salsa permeates most of the show, otherwise varied with Samba, Tango, Jive, Jitterbug, Cha-Cha, Charleston, Rhumba and Waltz – all danced with great energy and flair. Most of the time the individuality of each dancer, pairing or tripling (etc) is given the freedom to express itself so that most pleasure is to be gained from watching the detail, while hoping you’re not missing something even better elsewhere.

Book-ended with the rather banal lyrics of John Miles’ ‘Music’ (Music was my first love / And it will be my last / Music of the future / And music of the past …) the more memorable moments of the score range from Leonard Bernstein’s ‘Tonight’ from Westside Story through Aretha Franklin’s ‘You Make me Feel’ (like a natural woman) and Duke Ellington’s ‘It Don’t Mean A Thing’ (if it ain’t got that swing’) to Carl Orff’s ‘Carmina Burana’, culminating in Creedence Clearwater’s ‘Proud Mary’ (rollin on the river) for the encore.

High point of the first half for me was a Tango sequence involving one woman and five men, where her being blindfolded and abandoning herself to their supposed leading made her shine even more, thus accentuating the essence of Tango. In the second half – which I expected to change gear but largely served up more of the same – the ensemble work to ‘Carmina Burana’ was especially powerful.

While there was no programme available for the audience and no rundown of the show, the dancers – hailing from Australia (7), Russia (2), Sweden (2), Italy (2), Britain (2) and Germany (1) – the two singers from Australia and the New Zealand musicians were introduced at the end to great acclaim. They clearly love their work and their pleasure is infectious to susceptible types.

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