Dance Suomi, or simply Dance, is a Finnish televised dance competition with a format based on the American dance show So You Think You Can Dance. As with other shows in the So You Think You Can Dance franchise, the competition places young dancers from a wide variety of stylistic backgrounds in competition, with a combination of judge decisions and at-home-viewer votes deciding who persists in the competition from week to week. The show is hosted by television personality Caro Axel Smith (credited as "Axl" Smith) and has a judge's panel formed by Marco Bjurström and Merja Satulehto, with a third rotating seat for guest judges. The first season's winner, awarded a cash prize and a dance school scholarship opportunity in New York, was Sam Vaherlehto.[1]
Season 1
Open auditions for the first season of the series were held in 2010 in Helsinki,
Tampere, and Oulu. Over 400 dancers applied and auditioned for the show. Of these, the judges panel selected 60 dancers for their boot camp "shortlist". From these 60 competitors the season's Top 16 were selected to compete in the first season's live shows.[2]
