~ ALASKA SWING DANCE ~

WELCOME TO ~ NELLEE’S LINDY HOP SHOP

SWING HISTORY

CHAPTER 21

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(Text is adapted from “The Swing Book”):

“EVEN MORE OFTHE REBIRTH OF SWING”!!!! !!

Post Blow-Up Swing!!!

SWING WAS KING AGAIN IN THE 1990’S AND NO ONE SEEMED TO BE SINGING THE BLUES – OR SO IT SEEMED. While the success of swing was unexpectedly huge, the expectations for swing dancing ratcheted up 1000% Everyone got dollar signs in their eyes and club owners rushed to start swing nights – not realizing that most dancers don’t drink much except water. When some of the dance venues inevitably started folding, the media started writing it off as just a passing fad. There’s even a Sprite Ad slamming swing as a passing fad.

The truth isn’t so bleak. The Brian Setzer Orchestra was on the Today and the Tonight Shows in December 2005.

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy sang “Mister Heatmiser” on The Today show in December 2005 too! Although Rock a Billy “Big Band” swing is obviously still going strong, as Lindy Hoppers become more experienced dancers they’ve been dancing to bands that play more mid-tempo songs. “I definitely was affected and influenced by what dancers were interested in and looking for,” says bandleader Bill Elliot. “on our first CD everything is fast and slow. By the time of our second I was including several midtempo numbers.” The classic big bands are as much an inspiration to neo swing bands as jump blues. Elliott cites Tommy Dorsey as an inspiration.

Bill Elliot Orchestra Tommy Dorsey Orchestra

No matter what style of music they play, all of the bands encounter some friction with the dancers, and vice versa. “We joke about it because the dancers and the bands are really like people in a dysfunctional marriage,” says Elliott. “Each needs the other but can’t really get from the other what it wants. What the dancers want from the bands is exactly the tempos that they want to dance to all night long. But each dancer has a different idea of what that is. What the bands want from the dancers that they don’t get enough of is applause and admiration and appreciation.”

There’s conflict among the dancers themselves, too. A different type of Lindy Hop, dubbed “Hollywood Style” by its populizers Sylvia Skylar and Erik Robinson is a smoother way of swing dancing. It’s best seen in movies like Buck Privates and Grovy Movie. Savoy-style aficionados and Hollywood fans don’t always get along.

HOLLYWOOD STYLE

Savoy Style

Savoy Ballroom, New York, 1940s

But there are more types of swing styles and music than ever before. Neoswingers are embracing rockabilly and some bands are trying to hybridize rap and swing (such as the Yalloppin’ Hounds) and soul and swing (like Vargas Swing). Realizing that in swing’s heyday, people would dance waltzes, tangos, cha-chas and foxtrots as well as swing all in one night, Lindy Hoppers are adding everything from hip hop to salsa to their repertoire. Like at Club Soraya, swing and jazz are mixing together, and new nightclubs are opening in LA that feature swing and blues dancing (check out http://www.speakeasyblues.com) – something Club Soraya’s Sunday Swing dance has had for sometime!!

Many people are relieved that swing may no longer be the fad of the moment. To people who are passionately attached to the music, dance, and style of the swing era, it feels like it’s theirs again – not just the latest marketing hype. Swing’s grass roots are as strong as ever.

NEXT TIME:

LEGENDS OF SWING!!!!

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