I had a conversation with my friend Ann earlier this year where we discussed what our greatest moments in our lives were up until that point. She then told me that she expected Frankie95 to be one of those moments. She brought this up since I was one of the people working on the event. No pressure at all. It was during this conversation that we realized that “greatest” doesn’t necessarily have to have a positive conotation. Hitler had the greatest impact on the course of the 20th century, but I’m pretty sure we’re not going to build him a monument anytime soon.
The Lindy Loggers
We’re at a pretty quiet time in the Lindy Hop world as there are no major or minor events happening until Lindy Focus and Snowball right after Christmas. This is probably a good time to get caught up on your online Lindy reading. The Lindy blogosphere is surprisingly larger than you think. When I started this post I thought I was just going to describe a handful of sites, but once I was done compiling URL’s I came up with over 50.
Lindy Hop and the Future Historical Record
Kelly Porter, a dancer out in Seattle, WA, is going forward with an idea that is long overdue. She is encouraging people to talk to their older relatives about life and dancing in the early half of the 20th century and is creating a web site designed for anyone to share this information. The site is called Jazz Era Voices, http://www.jazzeravoices.org/
WCS OCD: Jordan and Tatiana in 2009
I made a few offhanded observations in my US Open post about Tatiana Mollman and Jordan Frisbee’s winning performance in the Classic division this year to Coldplay’s “Viva LaVida.” They took the unorthodox (for West Coast Swing at least) approach of performing a routine they’ve been doing for most of the year instead of performing a new one. I thought I’d put those theories to the test by watching every YouTube example of this routine that I could find. See what I do for you?
Carla Heiney & The Boilermakers on So You Think You Can Dance
Last night Ellenore Scott & Ryan Di Lello performed a Lindy Hop piece choreographed by Carla Heiney on So You Think you Can Dance. The dancers did a great job with the performance given the tight time constraints, but any woman that can teach me how to dance should have no problem with much more gifted performers.
I remember the years taking lessons from Carla while she was still studying biology at the U of Maryland. When she told me about her dream of becoming a full time dancer I thought to myself “A full time Lindy Hopper? Really?” I was worried about her earning a living, never mind any kind of notoriety.
Anatomy of a Dance Contest: The Champions’ Strictly Lindy Hop Division at ILHC 2009 pt. II
There’s been a lot of discussion about the use of pre-planned choreographed sequences in social dance contests for awhile now. (Yehoodi, Lindybloggers, and White Heat) Event directors Nina Gilkenson, Tena, and Sylvia shared those same concerns. At the same time, they didn’t want to tell the dancers how they should dance . . . even though they really wanted to.
Anatomy of a Dance Contest: The Champions’ Strictly Lindy Hop Division at ILHC 2009 pt. I
I’ve already written quite a bit about this past International Lindy Hop Championships, but to illustrate how complex any one part of an event can be I’m going to give you a peak behind the curtains of The Champions’ Strictly Lindy Hop Division at ILHC 2009. This one competition took about 20 minutes out of a four day event. Theoretically, a dance contest sounds like a deceptively simple recipe: Add one part music, several parts dancers, and it’s off to the races, right? In reality . . . not so much.
There’s a very thin, delicate and ever shifting line between managing an event and just letting it happen. There’s no secret formula for making sure everything goes right, just as there’s no way to anticipate and prepare for everything that can go wrong. There’s a lot of moving parts; not just logistical, but also creative and political. Details are plentiful, and it’s remarkably easy to be tripped up by even the smallest one.
Make good decisions, and if you’re lucky, you may be rewarded with something very special.
ULHS is Dead! Long Live ULHS!
The Ultimate Lindy Hop Showdown has been the standard bearer and trend setter for the Lindy Hop community ever since it started in 2002. This weekend’s 8th annual ULHS marks the event’s debut in New Orleans, LA as well as its first major format restructuring since 2003. This year, ULHS is breaking away from the phrase jam for the finals that it helped to pioneer. Instead, event promoter Amy Johnson is instituting tournament style, head to head battles for the formerly known "Liberation" division to determine which two couples will dance against each other in the final . . . wait for it . . . Showdown.
I won’t be down there this weekend, but it sounds like it’ll be the start of an exciting new era for ULHS. I’m pretty excited to hear and see how it turns out. Until then, let’s take a look back at ghosts of Liberation divisions past.
America's Best Dance Crew-1933: The Four Step Brothers
You may remember a performance by The Harlem Hot Shots on Thursday night of Frankie95. Someone uploaded the original clip and I thought it would be nice to put them together. The scene is from a 1933 short film entitled "Barber Shop Blues" featuring Claude Hopkins and His Orchestra. He was leader of one of the house bands at the Savoy Ballroom in 1931.
A Different Kind of Lead and Follow II: Electric Boogaloo
I wanted to expand on a thought in my last post where I previously pointed out the confrontational (in a friendly way) aspect of Sharon Davis and Max Pitruzzella’s dance off in the 2006 Ultimate Lindy Hop Showdown Solo Charleston Contest.
Admittedly I haven’t watched the video very closely since I first saw it a few years ago. Seeing it again recently in the context of writing my last post made quite a few things jump out at me regarding the back and forth between the two dancers.