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Claudio Gomes is the pioneer of Zouk in Sydney

Claudio was born in Rio de Janeiro and learned all Brazilian rhythms social dancing styles in the 1990’s at the prestigious Jaime Aroxa school. He was living in Rio de Janeiro when Lambada was created and later transmuted into Zouk. During those years he took regular weekly classes with the 3 main teachers who structured all the theory of Lambada and Zouk dance styles: Jaime Aroxa, Adilio Porto and Renata Peçanha.

In 2002 he moved to Sydney – Australia and in 2004 introduced the Rio Zouk style at LDA – at the time the largest Latin dance school in Sydney.

Between 2004 and 2014 under the Rio Zouk Sydney brand he taught weekly classes to over 2,500 students and formed dozens of Zouk teachers many of which are still teaching across Australia.

A short list of leading Zouk teachers Claudio taught, currently active in Australia
Amit Arora– Owner of LDC  – International Zouk Performer
Jane Gamarnik  – Head Zouk teacher at LDA (Sydney) – International Performer
Sunny Wo – Head Zouk teacher at LDA – Director of Ascend (Sydney)
Heidi Anastasia  – Director of Zouk Unity, Qi Zouk and Zouk Ink  (Sydney)
Brad Taylor  – Head Zouk teacher at Tropical Soul and Latin Motion (Sydney)
Robert Michael  – Dance Latino school instructor and choreographer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upOUzy5gaE0&list=PLGX9krxRp7ax1-VhsDpjCxMrf_acrekgt&index=4

 

In 2015, after retiring from teaching weekly classes, Claudio became the recipient of the 2015 Adilio Porto award for outstanding contribution to the Sydney and Australian Brazilian Zouk community. In 2019 he received the Brisbane Zouk Congress Appreciation Award for teaching 10 years of Zouk in Congresses in Brisbane.

His congress classes are full of energy and students often feel inspired by his passion and love for this rhythm.

Since moving to Canberra in 2017 he taught Zouk Master courses and workshops to a number of current Zouk teachers in ACT. He has also been dedicating his dance skills to the development of Biodanza – a Human development system involving music, movement, science and arts.

 

In February 2024, while attending an exclusive Biodanza training for teachers in Buenos Aires, conducted by Veronica Toro—daughter of Biodanza system founder Rolando Toro—Claudio was invited by Alex Toro, Rolando’s grandson, to showcase his passion for dance. The acclaimed performance was recorded and the video below captures the essence of the event, which quickly went viral within the Biodanza community. It has since been used as a promotional tool on social media for this dance system.


His core values when teaching classes are: