Slipping Away

Sometimes I feel like I’m fighting an irresistible tide. I’m promoting wall-mounted telephones with curly cords; coming out in favor of quill pens in the era of the word processor. The world moves by, time grinds the slow under its wheels, and things slowly become extinct just when I’ve realized their value.

Dancing has acquainted me with the pangs of seeing dear things rudely pushed aside. It started with realizing how many great venues have been replaced by parking garages or dull modernist boxes of concrete and glass. Houses of joy replaced by storehouses for machines we were told would deliver the American dream; prisons for people slaving away to earn the cash they’re told measures their success. The simple things, the pleasures that could be taken for granted, slowly get mowed down.

The latest possible example of this is the Raleigh Community Center. On Saturday we had an opportunity to make the hour-and-fifteen minute drive out into the cornfields east of Indianapolis to the tiny town of Raleigh. The Community Center isn’t grand, just a concrete block building with a great dance floor and a small stage for the house band. It also has been the center of the small farming community since 1944 (at least they’ve been having a Saturday night dance for that long). Just think how many first encounters have taken place during those sixty seven years. How many relationships have started with a waltz across that floor? How many last dances? How many ships have passed on that hardwood? So, I felt good going there on Saturday. I felt we were doing what I like best, honoring the past while keeping up with the present. So you can imagine now I felt when I heard the place might be closing down.

The reasons are the same as the reasons companies close down – money. Guests feel the pressure of the bad economy as much as businesses and that means fewer show up. Also there’s the seasonal sag in attendance – during the summer fewer people dance, they go camping and do things that don’t involve sweating. The thing is, when you don’t support a thing it doesn’t stay around. Think of the hundreds of small dance halls that have been bulldozed and paved under. Think of the drive-in theatres that used to be the setting for cinematic and romantic tension. Think of all those places and things that only exist in nostalgic memories now.

I guess I’m writing this as a kind of open letter to people out there who love dancing like we do. This is about priorities. You save what you love and if you love the classic dance venues in your community, support them. It isn’t all about money. You can volunteer. You can spread the word. You can think of your favorite venue when you have an event. You can introduce new people to dance and take them to the venues that mean a lot to you. There’s no guarantee that any of this will save a venue like the Raleigh Community Center – but if it doesn’t, at least you’ll be able to say you tried.

White Space

French composer Claude Debussy said, “Music is the space between the notes.” And if you listen to his music you know exactly what this means. Debussy is the master, in my humble opinion, of this concept. The “unused space” within his music is deliberate without seeming so, beautiful, and haunting. He leaves notes hanging, drifting away like a cloud into nothingness. It leaves me wanting, aching, for that next phrase, balanced on the edge of a cliff, and then…there it is.

I like to think about this concept in dance. When I first started I was concerned about steps, technique, “getting” the leads, and not falling on my butt. As Gary and I have expanded and grown into our own personal style, we've experimented with the concept of white space.

White space isn’t exactly timing differences…although I believe these are interesting too…white space is what Debussy said, the space between. In dance, that would be between steps. It’s hard to explain. For me it could be holding a step until the very last moment, and then making a snap turn. It’s sinking down into a drop…holding it…and oozing back up slowly, again just in time for that next step. Sometimes it’s a full stop with a finger snap. Or a slow sway that ends at my fingertips. Sometimes I do it all by myself. Other times I match what Gary’s doing.

But we don’t often mimic each other, and that’s OK. Feeling those musical spaces is individual. Even Debussy, while creating a stop within a major theme might carry on with a background melody. When Gary and I do stop at the exact same place it’s powerful, but it can’t be forced.

But then, dancing should never be forced.

I know I’m a worn out record on these two, but watch Tess and Miles in this clip. It’s easy to get lost in their fabulous moves, exquisite stylings , and innovative chorography, so watch it twice…or more. Note their white spaces. It’s a beautiful thing.

Dance of Love

About six months ago we met a charming couple at the Indianapolis Roof, Bev and Jack. Over the months we all sat at the same table and in between dances got to know each other. From the way they danced and spoke with one another we assumed they’d been married for years…the fondness for each other was evident in every word, gesture, and dance move.

So we were quite surprised to find their love was fairly recent. After a number of personal and physical hardships, they found one another on the dance floor. We were honored when they asked us to come to their wedding reception.

It was held in a renovated old building in Terre Haute, Indiana, the Ohio Building. Lovely spot. We had a fabulous time. Seeing Jack and Bev dance together was wonderful. Seeing two people in love…even better.

Here they are. This is Bev’s salsa dress. She had a waltz dress too. Exactly what I would have done for my wedding had I danced back then. :-)




"Please send me your last pair of shoes, worn out with dancing as you mentioned in your letter, so that I might have something to press against my heart."

~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The Spice

Gary and I dance in lots of different venues; we like variety in all things: music, dance styles, environment, people, you name it. Some venues we attend specialize in a particular kind of dance and music, such as Latin, swing, or blues.

We experienced this at a new venue we tried this week, Smee’s in Indianapolis. Smee’s is a local restaurant with great food and atmosphere. They have an adjoining room with a nice wood dance floor that they allow one of the west coast swing clubs in town to use for free, hoping dancers will eat and drink at their establishment, which we did.

The music started promptly at 7 o’clock. The selection was good… slow and funky. Perfect for a slower version of WCS. We danced a rumba or two, a cha-cha, and ECS, but really, the music was better suited for bluesy WCS. All of it.

We love WCS and it’s one of our fave dances, but after an hour or so we were jonesing for some real Latin, a snappy ECS number, or faster WCS music. Even our beloved Terry Lee mixes up the ‘billy with different rhythms and tempos.

I’m not saying the Smee group should change…the dancers seemed perfectly happy doing WCS all night and that’s cool. What Gary and I realized is that we will always want variety in our dancing…no matter how much we love a dance we don’t want to do it all night, even if we know a million moves.

The great thing about watching specialty dancers is they know tons of moves in that dance. We picked up a few. There were some really good dancers there, albeit the styles didn't vary that much.

And that is a downside to being free birds; since our dancing doesn't conform to any set of dancing rules or style we tend to stick out. I heard one man say after we did a rumba that ballroom dancing is for old people. Which I found hilarious. Us? Ballroom dancers?

But that's OK. For us, dancing lots of different dances really is the spice that keeps us trying new things and new venues.

And I'm still giggling over the ballroom comment. Too funny.