90s hen party dance class Leicester [ tracking lines · leicester rerun ]
Girl bands on one side, boy bands on the other, and a room of people rediscovering that they never actually forgot any of it. Everyone in the room is on the same number, written down alongside the hired room's venue cost: £185 for the ninety we would book, or £160 plus venue if an hour is all the day allows.
Twelve people,
one decade
The final shape, held until the phones are satisfied. Nobody plans to end here and every rerun does.
Get the slot down while everyone is keen
An approximate date and an approximate number of people is all the desk wants to begin with. A call comes back the same day carrying the dates still open and one written figure with the room already inside it. Nothing needs finalising yet — not the names, not the decade's finer points, not even the theme, because a hen party dance class is far easier to hold early and decorate later.
The date is the commitment; everything else stays loose. A hen do dance class can change its material weeks after the slot is held, and the theme on a dance hen party gets swapped regularly at no extra cost. Nobody needs prior training of any kind, which removes the objection that usually kills off hen party ideas before they reach a vote, and among the hen party activities being weighed up this is the one that puts the sixty-year-olds and the twenty-two-year-olds on the same line doing the same thing.
Material built for the living-room carpet
The reason this decade works so well on a party of non-dancers is that the choreography was never made for dancers in the first place. It was made to be copied off a television by people in their socks, which means the shapes are big, the counts are obvious and the whole thing is engineered to look right when a line of people does it slightly out of time. That is not a compromise; it is the point.
Nothing is pre-blocked. The routine is composed on the day, in front of you, once the teacher has clocked who is nervous, who has already declared herself the lead, and who did years of dance at school and has mentioned it to nobody. Whether the room is all beginners or has one trained dancer hiding in it, what gets made is cut to that particular set of people.
Across ninety minutes there is space for the girl-band side and the boy-band side to meet if the room wants both, with the teacher finding the join, plus a closing set-piece and time to go round again without anybody watching the clock. Sixty minutes keeps to a warm-up, one track learned from start to finish, and a last beat that photographs well. Nothing is recorded from our side; whatever ends up online is entirely your own doing.
The nineties ran on formations — the shuffle into a V, the step forward on the key change, the synchronised sit on stools that are not there — and formations only look sharp once everybody knows where they are standing. That is the honest argument for the longer booking: half an hour more for the group to find its spots, so the last chorus looks like a band rather than a queue.
If there is a track the group would riot without, put it in the message box and it gets considered properly.
Five tracks screen-test; the room decides who makes it
Wannabeeverybody claims not to remember it and everybody remembers all of it
likely lead5,6,7,8counted in the title, forgiving on the feet, ruinous for dignity
near-certainSaturday Nightthe arm sequence half the country half-knows — finally drilled straight
crowd insuranceBaby One More Timesharper and more attitude-driven; the party with something to prove asks for it
strong contenderBackstreet’s Backclosing-shot material — unison, big arms, a great deal of pointing
the creditsThose five are contenders and nothing firmer. A long queue of one-hit wonders waits behind them, and what gets danced is decided with the party already in the room.
[ a one-hit wonder you cannot live without? ]Say so and it gets a screen test.
Rewind to the rerun desk ↑
Where the rerun sits in a Leicester day
Central for a reason. Eat somewhere near the Clock Tower, take the class in the early afternoon while everybody still has functioning legs, then spill out into Highcross or across to Victoria Park if the sun has turned up, performing the routine badly on every pavement in between. Parties travel in from Loughborough, Hinckley and Wigston on ordinary trains and buses without anybody organising lifts.
Wardrobe is entirely the party's own affair. We hand out nothing at all — no denim jackets, no butterfly clips, no jelly shoes, no accessories of any description — and every group that has gone properly overboard has been glad of it in the footage. Gym kit changes nothing about the class itself, only what the pictures look like afterwards.
Written confirmation carries the address, which saves the usual scramble on the day itself.
Two stubs from the late-night rerun
"Four of the party were not born until 2001 and they ended up leading the last section, which tells you how little the decade actually matters. The rest of us were unbearable about knowing the words and the teacher let us be."
"Sixteen people, one price, no per-person maths and no chasing for a final headcount three weeks out. The room was booked for us, written into the quote, and five minutes from where we were already drinking."
Six questions, straight answers
The seventh is always whether the group can be split into rival bands — ring 07535 351968 and ask a human. It can, and it rarely stays civil.
Is the 90s class priced by the group or the head? +
The party pays once, as a group, rather than everybody sorting out their own share. The class itself is £185 for ninety minutes or £160 for sixty, and the hired room's venue cost is added to whichever you choose. Since room rates change from date to date and parking and similar extras can be added, the written quote is the version to trust.
What kind of space does the rerun get? +
The rerun takes place in a central Leicester room we hire for the afternoon, kept private to your party and confirmed by name in writing. It sits close enough to the Clock Tower to walk from lunch and on to Highcross afterwards.
Which tracks from the decade usually get cast? +
Wannabe, 5,6,7,8, Saturday Night, Baby One More Time and Backstreet’s Back screen-test most often, with a long queue of one-hit wonders behind them. The teacher casts from it once the party is in the room.
Is it boy bands, girl bands or both? +
Both, and the split is yours. Girl-band material runs sharper and more attitude-driven; boy-band material is unison, big arms and a lot of pointing. Plenty of parties take one of each over ninety minutes.
Are the scrunchies and the denim down to us? +
All yours. We lend nothing and sell nothing — denim jackets, butterfly clips and jelly shoes very much included — so the outfits are whatever the group can dig up. Gym kit gets the same class, minus the photographs.
Will a room of non-dancers cope with this? +
Comfortably. This era's choreography was made to be copied off a television rather than performed by professionals, no dance experience is needed anywhere in the party, and anybody can sit a section out.