Dancing Duo JoAnne and Tony Barbetta

Learning dance has kept couple moving in retirement

By Deborah Jeanne Sergeant

JoAnne and Tony Barbetta of Manlius aren’t taking retirement lying down.

For the past 14 years, the couple, now in their 70s, has taken dance lessons at Fred Astaire Dance Studios in Fayetteville.

With many other couples, the wife drags the husband into dancing lessons.

The Barbettas buck that stereotype.

“My husband signed us up for dance lessons,” JoAnne said.

They study all styles of social dancing such as salsa, West Coast swing and more. The couple winters in Florida and attend dances every Saturday night in their community.

“We go out dancing every opportunity we can,” she said. “It’s a way to have a partnership connection that’s happy, uplifting, joyful. It’s a wonderful way to connect and have a good time.”

In addition to the fun, she likes that dancing helps improve the body mind connection as the mind must pay attention to the rhythm, coordinate the steps and pay attention to the dance partner. She feels that the last aspect of dancing is tougher on men as they have to “remember everything for themselves and where their lady is, and where their lady needs to go and how to get her there. Dancing keeps you young. It keeps your body moving, your muscles moving. I think it fights depression, loneliness and a lot of things. It’s the best thing for a human being to do.”

She encourages everyone to try dance lessons, even if they don’t have a partner. She especially lauded the instructors at Fred Astaire as “professional and patient” and noted that the social dances hosted by the school are “a lot of fun.”

Many of the students at Fred Astaire are people who received a gift certificate for lessons but would have never considered trying dance lessons and still attend the school.

“The dance community is the one place where we have found everyone to be happy and enjoying life,” she added.

Social dancing isn’t the only style available in lessons in the area.

Kathleen Rathbun owns Ballet & Dance of Upstate NY in Syracuse.

A 55-plusser herself, Rathbun said that many of her students study ballet because they want to get back into it. However, some are completely new to the style. The school sometimes offers jazz dancing lessons, too.

“The benefits we see are obviously physical,” Rathbun said. “Plus, you have to really use your brain as there are different combinations all the time. You’re working on certain muscles and use them correctly.”

Especially for people who hate pounding the pavement or slogging through a gym workout, a dance lesson “doesn’t feel like you’re working out,” Rathbun said. “Your whole mind and body are involved in this amazing art form and every muscle gets developed and use. You also get to listen to beautiful music.”

She has students who are at least 75, a testament to the notion that age is just a number.

“It’s different from aerobics,” Rathbun said. “You can do as much as you can do. If you want to do less, you can. You can do whatever your body lets you do and get a ton out of it.”