Dance Mums with Jennifer Ellison

Dance Mums with Jennifer Ellison is the British version of the popular American reality TV show Dance Moms. Like the American series it is centred on a dance school, this one is the Jennifer Ellison Fame Academy (JEDT) based at Jelli Studios in Liverpool and run by actress, dancer and singer Jennifer Ellison. It follows a similar format to Dance Moms, where every week the team take part in a competition. The second series is currently showing on Lifetime UK on Mondays at 9pm.

The members of the team are Tayluer Amos (who's been called the UK Maddie), Sam Dennis, Eleiyah Navis (big Eleiyah), Aleah Simpson (little Aleah), Chloe Fenton and current newest member Leah Rose. The mothers are Maxine (Tayleur's mum), Charlotte (Sam's mum), Kelly (mum of Eleiyah), Danielle (Aleah's mum), Serena (Chloe's mother) and Lisa (Leah Rose's mum). Former cast members are Chloe Greenwood (aka Chloe Senior) her mum Carol and grandma Nana Linda, and Molly Thorpe Franklin and her mother Helen.

Tayluer is the star dancer but Eleiyah is also good and Chloe often performs well. Sam is also a strong dancer but tends to be overshadowed by Tayluer. Little Aleah is one of the weakest dancers and doesn't always fully take part in the group dance. Sometimes she has a small featured part at the beginning and end, something which irritates her mum Danielle who wonders why she's paying for her daughter to have dance lessons when she's not doing much dancing! The two most outspoken mums are Charlotte who feels Sam needs more opportunities and Danielle who has been asked by Jen to leave the studio more than once!

Similar to the ALDC's (Abby Lee Dance Company) rivarly with Cathy's group Candy Apple's in the US version, the Jennifer Ellison group also have competition in the form of the Debbie Barras Academy of Performing Arts, which is run by Debbie Barrass. One of her star dances is Ali Rasul who played Billy Elliott in the 2012 to 2014 West End show. Jennifer nicked him at the end of one competition, pulling him into the room with her team! lol. He later did a performance with the JEDT for Phantom of the Opera, where he had to kiss Tayluer.

Also like Dance Moms, Jen does a pyramid every week where the dancers are ranked based on their performance the previous week's competition. The winner goes on the top. A new twist in this series is that the winning dancer and her mum each get a tiara to wear for the current week.

I prefer Dance Moms to the UK version but I do like this one as well. I think it's improved in its second series. There's certainly a fair amount of drama! I also prefer Jennifer to Abby, I just don't like Abby's attitude and the way she treats people. I also think Jennifer has an advantage because she actually dances and competed herself so she can physically demonstrate the dance steps and also is more likely to know what her students are going through. I don't mean Abby is a bad teacher because she doesn't dance but my opinion is that it's good to learn from someone who dances themselves. I belly dance and both my main teachers and others I've learnt from did the dances themselves, it helps if the teacher can demonstrate the steps and dances. But I know that people learn in different ways. :) Abby must have danced at one time because she studied it at her mum's school but she chose not to perform and you don't see her dance much on Dance Moms, although she occasionally demonstrates a step. And obviously she has her assistant Gianna and other teachers.


So Dance Mums is entertaining and worth a watch if you like the original. :) I don't have a favourite dancer like I did for Dance Moms (it was former member Chloe) but I think Tayluer and Sam are good and Aleah is sweet. :)

Here's a preview video for Series 2:

Update 12/4/21: Video has now gone, so I've replaced it with this trailer (S1):

And here is a video of the group performing the dance Madhouse in Series 1:

Also if you'd like to see what happened when the girls performed for Abby when she came over to the UK, check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOA7YJzLWU8


For more on Dance Mums visit these links:

Official  show website: http://www.dancemums.tv/

Jennifer Ellison Fame Academy official site: http://www.jenniferellisonfameacademy.com/

Dance Mums Wikia (Wikia tends to slow my computer down): http://dancemoms.wikia.com/wiki/Dance_Mums


And here are some links for the girls:

Tayleur's offiicial website: http://taylueramos.com/

Sam's official site:  http://www.iamsam.uk.com/

Eleiyah's Twitter: https://twitter.com/Eleiyah_DMUK

Chloe's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-tpi6luMEmhUa-SIj456OA

Aleah's Instagram: https://instagram.com/aleahdancom/

Leah Rose's Instagram: https://instagram.com/leahrosedancemumsuk/



If you're a fan of Dance Moms US here are some more posts:

Post about Dance Moms: http://starsparklex.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/dance-moms.html

Asia: http://starsparklex.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/dance-moms-asia.html

Asia vs JoJo: http://starsparklex.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/dance-moms-asia-vs-jojo.html

Former dancer Chloe (my fave): http://starsparklex.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/dance-moms-chloe.html



Do you prefer Dance Moms or Dance Mum UK? Or do you like both? :)