We recently connected with Tanya and Sondre and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Tanya and thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.
We were not planning to be full-time professional dancers. I am a mother going for the competition as a bonus activity to my motherhood (it was before partnership with Sondre) and Sondre was 20 years old when we started dancing. He just finished school and was searching for a dane partner to teach with, Our partnership started as a fun interesting try-out when Sondre invited me to assist him at one of the events in France. It was August, 2015. I had been finishing my partnership with a Ukrainian dancer Ivan Katrunov. Sondre didn’t have a dance partner at that time. We had no expectations. However, the dance world noticed us and admired the fact of partnership. We got invited to teach at many events, to perform and compete for the Dance Federation of Norway. It was already in September-October, 2015. The first time we realised that it becomes our professional path, when our schedule got filled with events for the whole year. It started in 2016-2017, especially after winning the World Championship in France. It brought us status and value in the swing dance world. Another little aspect of it was financial ability to sustain our lives without regular “normal” jobs. I was able to bring my part to the family and Sondre was self-sufficient guy living from the dance. Probably this was the real moment of establishment as professional artists.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Our partnership path started long before we actually got together. Sondre was born and grew up in Dombås (central Norway) and started dancing at 5 years old. At the age of 8 he took part in his first Swing dance competitions and at 13 began teaching swing dance locally.
In 2007 he went for Norway’s got Talent show and since then his dance career has really started;
In 2009-2010 he began competing in Boogie Woogie and got European Champion title in Boogie Woogie Juniors class 2010 (Stuttgart, Germany);
In 2011-2015 he also started dancing and competing in Lindy-hop which brought him:
– World Champion title in Boogie Woogie Juniors class 2011 (Stuttgart, Germany);
– 1 Place in European Swing Dance Championship Strictly 2013 (London, UK);
– 1 Place Boogie Woogie Cup 2014 (Munich, Germany);
– 7 Fast feet jack’n’jill victories in 2011-2014.
Tanya was born and grew up in Kiev (Ukraine) and started with classical dance at the age of 4. At 9 switched to acrobatic Rock-n-Roll. Since then she had been practicing and taking part in different projects also connected to Modern jazz, Contemporary dance, Boogie Woogie and Lindy-hop.
In 2000-2009 actively danced and competed:
– won World Cup in Rock-n-Roll Formation category;
– got promoted to R-n-R national judge of 3rd category in Ukraine;
– got to 1/2 finals of Ukraine got Talent show with Boogie Woogie showcase;
– made LL.M in International and European Public law at Erasmus University (Rotterdam, Netherlands);
In 2010 got married and became a mom of a son
Her husband supported my dancing very much letting me travel and compete as much as I wanted.
In 2011-2015 she got into dance partnership with Ivan Katrunov and started internationally competing in Boogie Woogie
– won 4 World Cups in boogie-woogie Main class;
– worked as cartoonist at stop motion studio Novatorfilm (Kiev, Ukraine). This job helped to clear the head off dancing.
– got Master of Sports of International Class in Ukraine
In 2015 our dance partnership started, when our friend Jessica Kaiser from Austria told Sondre that Tanya is moving out of Ukraine and maybe a good dance partner. Sondre invited her to teach at SwingAout Festival 2015. Since then we had been competing, teaching and performing boogie woogie all around Europe and outside of it. With great joy we used to travel sharing the love for swing dancing in general and boogie woogie in particular. We also started our own dance event called Boogie Feet’s Festival in Sondre’s hometown Dombås, Norway for inspiring and bringing up swing dancers from many different countries.
After the Great Change, as we call pandemic times, we have grown an online community to share our passion for dancing via modern means of communication
Our credentials of 2016-2022:
World Champions 2017, 2019
Vice World Champions 2018, 2021
European Champions 2018, 2019
Nordic Champions 2017, 2018
Norwegian Champions 2017, 2018 and 2019
Two times SAP Final World Cup winners
10 World Cup wins all over the world including USA and Russia.
The biggest YouTube Swing Dance Couple 2021 – Silver Button Holders
Right now we both live in Dombås, Norway and trying to establish our lives from the scratch
We’d love to hear your thoughts on NFTs. (Note: this is for education/entertainment purposes only, readers should not construe this as advice)
We admire the creativity of the modern world and were even thinking that producing NFT of our own selves would be a fun idea. The only thing is that we both aren’t sure how exactly we should do it :) It can be images, pieces of videos or dances… Not sure yet.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
The main lesson is that any relationships need much work and effort to keep on going and be productive. And sometimes dance partnership is even harder than a family, because it is connected to achieving the goals, producing things and working side by side, while still staying imperfect human beings. The amount of time together and level of stress it creates is so big that burn-outs are there from time time. This is when mutual work and respect must be there. Otherwise, partnership won’t be possible.
Contact Info:
- Website: sondreandtanya.com
- Instagram: @sondretanya
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sondreandtanya
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWJqJBp1rJWdJSQrEi5-ukQ
Image Credits
EDF