Tango Al Fresco, the Mayors Thames Festival and a tango front cover

This front cover features Tom and Margo dancing under the Oxo Tower at the Mayor’s Thames Festival. I shot it in 2008 with my phonecam (a Sony Ericsson k800i) I think.

I’m looking forward to the dance we’ll see during the closing weekend of the 2012 Olympics. There’s so much going on that I don’t expect to watch the closing ceremony live. The weekend provides another opportunity to attend the Al Fresco weekend organised by Kele Baker in aid of The Royal Parks Foundation. It’s also the Mayor’s Thames Festival in exactly one month. An annual highlight in many social dancers’ year, I need to start looking for suitable preview images.

Apparently London’s largest free festival, the Mayor’s Thames Festival it includes river races, interesting food, a Night Carnival and a huge firework finale. No prizes for guessing where the Mayor’s Thames Festival is held, and the Al Fresco weekend is always in Regents Park. I’ve shot it every year (even when I was on chemo when I discharged myself from hospital to do so) and way before that when my DSLR was little better than my phone cam. I’ve always felt a little compromised, wanting to be taking photos everywhere and to be joining in with the dancing at the same time.

Kele Baker has organised the Al Fresco weekends for years, first in aid of trees that were lost after the big storm and more recently to the Royal Parks Foundation in aid of tree planting in Regents Park.

I submitted the image alongside others I had taken with my Nikon D80 and believe it made front cover over others due to its strong composition, the angle of which would be impossible with a regular DSLR. The image is poor quality because I had to download it from facebook.

Link to Dance Al Fresco and Tango Al Fresco here
Link to Mayor’s Thames Festival