BRISBANE ZOUK FESTIVAL 2023
WAS SUPER AMAZING! <3 <3 <3
Brisbane Zouk Festival 2023 was amazing with so many unforgettable memories, smiles, hugs and wonderful friends, new and old! ❤🤗
This one is an extra special and emotional event for us, and what a feeling seeing so many friends as well as new dancers coming along and bringing such a joyful, friendly and excited energy with them! 💖🤗
So, thank you to all you amazing supporters who make our festival one of your chosen dance events for the year, and came with an open mind for learning and open heart to be inspired and make the most of being all together in such a beautiful space. ❤️ We never take this for granted and we appreciate it from the deepest part of our hearts. 🤗💝
BZF is a festival with the aim to bring everyone together, to celebrate Zouk, awesome dancing and friendships & to value our national instructors and artists and their wonderful communities in all corners of Australia & New Zealand, as well as introducing some inspiring and unique international artists from further away to experience. 🙂
We loved and felt that incredible vibe of having everyone together, and we can't say this too much, we’d like to extend our warm and heart felt appreciation to so many of you who made this event happen and with a big success! 🤗❤️
Firstly, thank you to everyone, & to all the dancers, from all around Australia, NZ and further afield who came along with such a positive energy and vibe and supported this community event. We’d like you to know that we acknowledge your support, appreciate it, and feel humbled and excited that you chose to be a part of this special festival. ❤️🙏❤️🙏🤗🤗🤗
This could not have happened without all of you, as well as a big crew of helpers. So, we’d especially like to give a big shout out to our tireless volunteers who kept things going smoothly behind the scenes. 🤗🙏
Thank you for your teamwork and organisational skills as well as your warm welcomes at our registration desk, Emma, Nasim, Amatulla, Camille, Rosa. We also have our guys putting in some extra muscle power on top of it all, so thank you, Matty, Lucien, Dan, Doug, Dylan & Kerry. A special mention and thanks to Sibell's brother, Toncie, for doing an amazing job as our airport bus driver and extra mention for going the extra mile in helping, to our special friends, the super awesome Emma and Amatulla. 🙏❤️
Also a big note of thanks and recognition to Kerry for his additional help with set up of sound & lighting as well as driving and all the various ways he helped us, on top of his wonderful filming. ❤️
Another special moment of our event, is being able to create a small space just to get together to connect and share, and so we'd love to extend an extra big thank you to our artists who were so generous in offering their support & ideas, and for their contribution towards Conversation on the Green, as well as their time in facilitating these lovely sessions to bring people together to share their ideas, thoughts and feelings. ❤🤗
Also we can't forget, a special mention goes to our craftsman and artist, the amazing Luke, for his design and construct of most of the BZF signage you would have seen displayed in the Studios and on the stage. ❤⭐
He brought us another little creation this year 🤗, and has been instrumental in making the look of BZF extra special with the various signage created and added to the mix over the years 💖... and our Stage just wouldn't look as beautiful without our BZF💛 sign! ;)
On that note, we would also love to give our BIG gratitude to all the team leaders and teachers who trained, encouraged and brought their performance teams along to provide their wonderful entertainment for our Shows nights. It’s a lot of hard work and dedication, so thank you to the Teams and dancers, and of course our own Cloud9Zouk teams. 🙏💖
We loved all of your performances and the inspiration it brought to our audience of family, friends and fellow dancers. ❤️👏✨
Also, a big shout out to our MC Matthew, who we appreciate for stepping up many times for us now as MC, and who did a great job entertaining our audience and introducing our awesome performers. 🙂✨
We all know that this wonderful and united community that we have here in Australia & New Zealand is only possible because of our amazing national Artists who go out there day in and day out putting in the hard work, introducing new people to Zouk and creating communities in their parts of the world. ❤
Your workshops were so well received and appreciated and we are so privileged to have you being a part of our festival and supporting us. 😍
Our gratitude to our Australian artists - Shaun & Nikki, Izzy & Steve, Karen & Xarjie, Sunny & Heidi, Jeff & Sara, Peter & Jess, Kylie & Abs, Rafael & Juliana, Stephy & JoJo, Sarah & Bruno, Jiten & Riana , Joe & Jenna, Jack, David, Kayleigh & Magno, Dhishan & Milena, Jimmy & Natalia, Alana, and our own Behrouz. ✨💖
And extra appreciation for the extra travel, efforts and resources by our New Zealand artists, in being here in Australia to join us and add to the great vibe of all dancers from all parts coming together in a good spirit.🙏😀
Thank you so much, Shannon & Trajano, Dharshana & Rebekah, Adam & Gabrielle. 🙏🤗❤️
We would love to dedicate this festival to you all and celebrate with you! ✨ ❤
And... our amazing International Artists for 2023 have done it again! Giving world class workshops, being so humorous, and humble and down to earth and dancing away with everyone. 🤗
We loved having them all as part of our festival, and appreciate their efforts in coming all the way across the world to be here and to still deliver their best each day, even with jetlag and the late nights...
Thank you, our biggest hugs and appreciation, Lucas & Thayná , Iago & Vanessa, Dominik & Monika ❤💖🤍 🤗🤗🤗
And of course we cannot forget our Amazing DJs who kept the parties pumping. 🎶🎧 You guys are the heart of the parties and took everyone through a wonderful journey every night. So, thank you so very much for working hard to give everyone the best experience. 🙂
Kudos to our BZF DJ's 👏 - Sexy Alexy, Grevo, AJELLA Zouk, Panda, DJ Link, DJ Habibi, Trajano, Tayler, DJ Berries/Logan, Dharshana, Jeff, DJ Kadi, Shez and Behrouz/DJ Double B. 🙏
Once again, we’d like to say a big thank you to our Photographer & Videographers who captured all those beautiful memories of the weekend. 💖
Our wonderful Bob McGahan Photography for being there as always, we love your presence at our events & especially appreciate the extra long hours given to a festival like this, our videographers, Roman, who has been there for us for many 'gigs' now :) and Kerry (Call This Guy) , for all of their hard work, professionalism and commitment. We love you guys and what your create for us and our attendees and artists to be able to look back on and remember all the special moments. ❤
Our aim was to have an inclusive, warm, and friendly event for all of our community to enjoy, and to give the opportunity for people to get to know and appreciate all of the instructors and community leaders, and their fellow dancers. So we very much appreciated the beautiful venue, The Old Museum , and would like to thank Sandra & Alannah and their wonderful crew and team for their lovely assistance and guidance. ♥️
A thank you as well to our sponsors and stallholders, so that we could offer the little extras to our attendees - our appreciation to Jeni and Bizee Bodyz for returning with her gorgeous & practical dancewear, Shimbie and Cosmetic Injection Co & Vitamin Infusions, bringing you wellness & beauty from the inside out, and Dr. Cass for her chiropractic skills and bodywork to help our dance friends survive all the hours of dancing. 😉
Also, we appreciate Monique from Byron for bringing us her Compassion Exercise, just to support our dancers with some beautiful energy and an exercise to go from head to heart space. <3
And of course our lunch breaks are so much more convenient and an enjoyable break with having our food vendors close and ready. 😋
Our appreciation to Marie and her lovely family for bringing their beautiful Rolling Bean van to help us kick start our mornings with coffees, teas and the tastiest pastries, to Tony Tran's Vietnamese Fusion, and Karan at Red Eye Espresso & Indian, and Eleni bringing Charlie's Baltik BBQ for some tasty lunch options, and also the beautiful Made for her fresh and delicious Ibu Bali Street Foods for being there on Sunday as well as providing foods for our Monday boat trip 😋
And lastly, but not leastly ;) our regular 'refreshment masters', Indah & André from Nude Juice for the best juices in the world. 😋
Another thing that has become a little bit of a tradition at BZF, is our Sunday BBQ.
We were grateful to have the assistance of two caterers this year for our BBQ Spitroast for our Sunday lunch, which so many people enjoyed, and made it possible to have a relaxed and sociable break for us all to enjoy the food, the beautiful lawns and spending some fun and friendly time together.
So, thank you, Ryan & Allan from Outdoor Living Australia for taking all the hard work and planning of bringing the equipment and cooking off our hands for this year, as well a thankyou to Lynda for her help, time and effort put into planning, preparing and bringing the salads and veg portion of the bbq. Everything was delicious and was great to have you there looking after things for us all 🙏🙏
Let's not forget to mention another little highlight and amusement during our Sunday lunch.. and that is the 3-legged race. There was so much laughing and cheering by the crowd, so thank you to our competitors as well as to Adam and Shaun for coordinating and announcing the race!
To cap it off, we had a new post-festival activity, introduced last year, as a way to unwind and relax on the Monday, while still being able to socialise and mingle
And this was the 3hr Boat Trip down Brisbane River, skippered by Barrie's lovely and friendly crew from Brisvegas Cruises aboard the charming Lady in Red vessel. What a wonderful way to spend a beautiful Brisbane morning with friends from all over. ⛵ With special thanks Alexy for DJ'ing and bringing the cruisey tunes. 🙂🎵
So, a final BIG thank you to you ALL, we hope you had an amazing time, and we thank each and every person who was a part of this magical weekend with us. ✨
Let’s do it all again ( and more 😉 ) at BZF 2024!
💃🕺🙌
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