Fun with Lindy Hop

A little fun with a mock-instructional Lindy Hop film from MGM.

Back Off Zit Face

1926 ad for low self esteem, okay actually it’s for a period skin cleanser called Pompeian Massage Cream but still. I love the claim that it gives you a “clear, ruddy complexion…”. I didn’t know those two things went together. I also didn’t know that many boys are inclined toward grime. So, if you want her to save a dance for you,
de-grime before going to the ball!

Dolores and Eddie

I’ve always had a fondness for Normal Rockwell. Art snobs will tell you he’s not a good artist, insisting that there’s some difference between what’s good and what’s popular. Frankly, that sounds like differentiating between what’s good and what you think is good. Preferences are like certain bodily orifices: we’ve all got them and most of us don’t want to hear ‘em. Anyway, this isn’t the dance curmudgeon hour so back to the topic at hand.


I ran across this image from Rockwell and immediately fell in love with it. Something about the expressions, I think. They’re wearing the flat busted and tired look of two hoofers who’ve washed out too many times in too many places. Anyway, I thought I’d share.

Tick-Tick-Tick

Life's no good if you can't laugh at yourself. Stop for a moment, close your eyes, shut out all the mundane noise of your everyday life and you'll hear something. That ticking in the background – usually accompanied by the little voice that berates, complains, and protests at every opportunity – that's your life going by. A recent trip to The Roof brought this comparison to the forefront. We went to another Big Band Series event – something we always do, any chance to go to a venue like The Roof is worthwhile in itself especially if we get a chance to dance. The Twilite Nites Dance Orchestra provided the music – I'd forgotten the Nites but when their first tune started out as a swing and ended as a dirge I remembered them and the taste of vinegar filled my mouth. The Nites are (in my appraisal) famous for having difficulty maintaining a friendly relationship with tempo. Like a cheap watch, they tend to wind down quickly – usually within the span of a single song. So, needless to day, it wasn't one of my best nights and privately I was quite vocal about that fact.
Remember that ticking? It doesn't stop or slow down no matter what. You can spend a perfectly good Sunday evening moaning and swearing over the poor quality of the music, you can get angry because a bad band is making hard for you to dance, you can do all those things and the ticking just keeps going – your life's passing by, son. Looking back on the evening the majestic Spanish-themed ballroom still was just as glorious. The thunderstorm lightshow still held the same magic when the rumble died down into a Glen Miller tune. I still got to put my feet on the same boards that dancers have trod since 1927. All the wonderful things were there to be had – if you can get past that tick-tick-tick.

Am I any wiser for the experience? I hope so. Nothing will make the Nites a good band but, then again, does a bad band make a bad evening? Or maybe there's a choice involved? I'm going to believe the latter and I'm making a personal commitment to shut down my private metronome the next time I hit the dance floor. Hey, it's about having fun – isn't it?

You're So Fun!

The Yule holiday has blown past with its usual whirl of wrapping paper and festive engagements. It's always a bittersweet thing, part of me is glad for things to slow down a little - I get to go into that winter hibernation I so dearly love. Another part of me is sorry to see the season pass…hey, I like Christmas ham and getting gifts as much (or more) than the next guy!

During the spate of parties, though, I noticed something that I thought was worth bringing up. We go to several holiday dances - some swinging parties, some ballroom dances - and during one of the more ballroomy events I received what I think is a compliment. I say that I think it was a compliment because - well - I'm just not so sure. We'd just finished an EC Swing and on the way back to our table someone stopped us and remarked that we were 'fun' dancers.

Fun? Fun how? Fun like a clown? Fun like a rollercoaster? Can someone else dancing actually be…fun? In the spirit of the season I took it as a compliment but the longer I thought about it the less I was certain that it actually was intended to be one. Something about it struck me as the sort of thing you'd say to a fifth grader after they'd portrayed a potted poinsettia in the school Christmas pageant…"Gee Tommy it sure is fun to watch you act!"

Then I wonder - in this context what's the opposite of a fun dancer? A dreary dancer? A serious dancer? A stoic dancer? Should I ascribe to be less fun in my dancing? Maybe I should throw in a few good frowns or glares to let everyone know that I mean business when I plie? Maybe I should contact the Dance Curmudgeon to figure out how to be taken more seriously.

Or maybe I should just be happy with being 'fun'? I think that's my course of action because - seriously - who wants to be so wrapped up in propriety that you can't have fun? I mean, why do you dance anyway? It sure as hell doesn't pay the bills (lord, with my taste in shoes and clothes it does the opposite) and I'm not going to win any contests (I'm fine with that, trust me). Aside from getting a good cardio work out about the only thing that's left is having…fun.

So to all your serious cats out there on the dance floor - all of you who are sweating the bend of a knee or the extension of a pinky - relax and look at me. I'm having fun!

C'mon - Not So Serious!

Dance is not serious.

Blasphemy, you say? I guess I can understand that - every dance instructor from the best to the worse have those of us who take dance lessons convinced that the only measure of your ability to dance is the number of steps you know. By rights you should drill continuously and with the kind of seriousness and commitment that once was reserved for the Marines. There's a good bit of irony in the fact that Edwin Denby, a renowned dance critic, once said "There is a bit of insanity in dance that does everybody a great deal of good." The problem is that most dance instructors have become psychologists steadily trying to couch dance for one hour sessions where its idiosyncrasies can be documented, diagnosed, and suppressed with the right combination of drugs.

It's even funnier when you consider something like swing dancing. In the 30's big dance studios were busily dismissing the Lindy Hop and swing in general as an 'unfortunate collision of economic circumstance and declining morals…' Now, a little over seventy years later, all those studios (that still exist) are teaching several sorts of swing dance. The problem is they had to categorize them, name steps, map out everything, and apply their stuffy metering before they could offer lessons.

So, in honor of the sheer silliness of swing, here's a cartoon with the message - don't be so uptight about your swing!