The Claremont Colleges Ballroom Dance Company

As it turned out, it was all fun and no panic at this particular disco—unless you count Alison Cumming (PO ’06) in her not-strictly-seventies band-inspired getup. She was far from the only attendee to go all out for the occasion: Pomona freshman Samuel Chase Cunningham, in a pink shirt, sunglasses, a fantastic yellow jacket and pants to match, struck me as the incarnation of Saturday Night Fever.

"Wow," I said, "you must be really hot in those clo--"

"I don’t wanna talk about it," Sam muttered.

He may not have wanted to talk, but he sure wanted to dance—as did almost everyone else in Edmunds Ballroom on Saturday, February 23rd, with CCBDC’s Disco Party in full swing. The event included a funky Hustle lesson, followed by a night of games, contests, crazy seventies-style costumes, and, of course, dancing.

"I think it was amazing," said Jeffrey Lin (PO ’11), who gave hosting a whirl for the first time at the Disco Party. "I was so happy that a bunch of people showed up that weren’t part of the dance team, right? And like, they were really into it, they were all dressed up and ... once we got the Hustle going, they were in it. It was amazing."

The crazy, everybody-in attitude was a big part of making this event the favorite party of the year among many team members. Of course, it may have been anything-goes on the dance floor, but CCBDC still put on some flashy formation performances: Tour team heated it up midway through the night with their Disco routine, which Pomona senior and Disco dancer Julie Siloti said was her favorite part of the evening, and Regionals offered up a flash-forward to the next decade with their 80s medley.

"I think the success was that we were able to reach so many people," Jeffrey concluded. "We reached a lot of different age groups ... we had a lot of alumni come back. We even had a couple of adults who did some swing, and that was really cool."