By Heather Matthews
Staff Writer

Every Sunday night the Queen City Ball Room, located on Dow Street, hosts a family reunion of sorts.

The members of the Queen City Ball Room’s Teen Team, comprised of 16 area teens, come together for rehearsals and dance lessons. However, the weekly meetings are also a chance to spend some time talking about their weekend, getting advice on life’s stickier issues, and spending time with a group that they have come to consider their family.

“I love the team to death,” said Ian Norman, 17, of Derry. “The whole team is just like a little family. I know they will always be there for me and I will always be there for them.”

The dancers aren’t the only ones that have formed bonds with the team. For team instructor Joseph Butera, of Merrimack, the team allows him to feel like a father, despite the fact he doesn’t have any children of his own.

The Teen Team studies a diff erent style of dance every three to four months. At left, Caitlin Walker, 19, of Concord prac tices the Paso Doble, the dance of the bullfi ghter, with her dance partner, Christopher Brandes, 18, of Dublin and classmates Carrie Cody,15, of Antrim and Garrett Brandes,16, of Dublin.

“These are my kids,” said Butera. “The day I stop doing this will be a very sad day for me.”

The Teen Team was started in early 2004 by Butera, Queen City Ball Room owner Karen Tebeau, of Manchester, and her daughter Nicole.

Although the team started out simply as the Teen Swing Team, focusing on the Lindy Hop Swing, a high-energy dance designed for youth, the teens involved have helped the group expand to other forms of dance, including the Cha Cha, Mambo, and the Paso Doble.

Each dance is studied for 12 to 15 weeks, culminating in a performance. Most of the team’s performances are done at charity events or in nursing homes, helping the teens become more involved with their communities.

“(The teens) really pick up the tempo of the show,” said Tebeau. “Their shows feel really upbeat.”

For Tebeau and Butera, providing teens with the chance to learn ballroom dancing, and an opportunity to exercise and socialize, was the driving force between the team’s creation. “My goal with everything I’ve ever done has been to give something wholesome for kids to follow and feel good about,” said Butera.

More importantly said Norman, Sunday nights bring a respite from being a high school student.

“It helps keeps my stress level down,” said Norman. “It’s my one escape during the week. It gets me through school and helps me get through the things that I am dealing with in my life. I just come here and dance.”

Once the teens enter the back room of the studio, they are able to enjoy dancing without any pressure from the outside world, including the “geek stereotype” many of the teens said comes hand-in-hand with being a ballroom dancer.

“I love the way it makes me feel. I’m comfortable here. We can be goofy,” said Caitlin Walker, 19, of Concord. “We can just be kids.”

Many of the teens joined the team before the ballroom dance craze hit the television screens a few months ago with shows like “Ballroom Boot Camp” on TLC and “Dancing with the Stars” on ABC. With the success of such shows, ballroom dancing has been growing in popularity. Although it wasn’t exactly the television shows that brought him to the team, Garrett Brandes, 16, of Dublin, said that before his time in the studio he had never thought of joining a dance team.

“Most people think this is a geeky thing to do,” he said. “But, it is cool (to dance).”

Christopher Brandes, Garrett’s older brother, agreed.

“It is kind of cool,” he said. “You have two separate bodies moving at one time, as one.”

Nicole Tebeau, 16, who has been dancing since she was 18 months old, said she was never bothered by what other people thought about ballroom dancing because it was so much fun. She helped her mother and Butera form the group to help more teens enjoy the art.

“I want other teens to have as much as I am,” she said. “Everyone has a lot of fun and we’ve really become a little family. I’d love to see more teenagers dancing.”

For more information on the Teen Team visit the Queen City Ball Room’s Web site at queencityballroomnh.com.