Review: Lindy Focus VII

I love Lindy Focus. Every fall I look for their announcements and anticipate a wonderful time with dear friends and acquaintances from all over the South East (and increasingly from beyond). I love the dances, the classes, the music, and the organizers.

This was my 5th year attending, and for the first unfortunate time, this was the first year that did not exceed my experience of the previous year. I still thoroughly enjoyed myself; I had fantastic dances, “sat” in on some fascinating classes, and danced to fabulous music. I missed the awesome distinctively southern atmosphere of past years though.

The biggest contributing factor, I think, was the teacher lineup. For the first time Lindy Focus became a “Rockstar” event. The teachers read like a who’s who of the hottest names in Lindy Hop right now. This is a big departure from all previous years when South East regional instructors dominated the lineup with a few from outside the region. That resulted in a big difference at the dances as the Rockstars were (typically) noticeably absent from the dances most of the week and when they were present most were quite exclusive with their dancing (except for the New Year’s dance).

There were some notable exceptions. I was very impressed with Ursula Lederberger whom I watched dance with students nonstop the whole week, and Evita Arce, Bill Borgita, Laura Glaess, Mike Roberts, David Madison, and Andrew Sutton were all generous and gracious with their time.

Something that I had always loved about Lindy Focus being a regional event was that the barrier between students and instructors was minimal by nature of the regional-ness (to coin my own adjective) of the instructors. I was sad that was missing from year. (A brief aside, this is also one of my favorite aspects of Swingout New Hampshire, that the instructors are present and social with the students all week)

I only took a few classes, some were excellent, one I was quite disappointed by. The excellent ones were the two performance classes taught by Nathan and Evita. The class was made of a diverse mixture of levels, and was taught beautifully. I have never before seen a performance class of such caliber. Nathan and Evita are masters of craft of teaching choreography. They created a group routine that masterfully showed off the group, diminished the weakness of the dancing of some members (without resorting to “hiding” them), and allowed the attention to be drawn to the stonger dancers without “showcasing” them). In every sense it was a group performance rather than a group performing individual choreography.

The other choreography class I took was the Tranky Doo taught by Aba Browning and Bobby White. This was a tough class for them to teach, it was the end of the long week and was a 90 minute class. As the time wound down the energy wallowed. It was far from an ideal setting for teaching, especially individual choreography. With that in mind, the class wasn’t bad. It started very strong and they were able to pull it all together in the end, and they never “lost” the class, but it was a struggle.

I also jumped in a the class that Marty and Kelly taught the 4b group (the advanced performance dancers). I had high expectations for this class and it just didn’t live up to what I hoped for. It wasn’t a bad class, it just wasn’t really good. The explanations were vague, it felt hodgepodge with little conviction, or passion, more like a toss off class that they didn’t really care about and put together at the last minute.

The last class I literally sat in on, it was an elective taught by Gina Helfrich and Evin Galang (little known fact, Evin and – at the time Noel, now Noah – were my very first ever teachers). I wish I had been there for the full class, they were teaching some stuff I haven’t seen taught in along while and I think is sadly missing from current Lindy Hop repertoire.

The final weakness of Lindy Focus VII I’ll mention was the bands. None of the bands were bad, all of them were excellent on their own. The problem I had is that they were all cut from the same cloth (except for Crysta Bell and the Jons). Everything was small band, bouncy music, that only barely feels like Lindy Hop. If it weren’t for the DJs (who were extraordinarily picked and planned by Rob Moreland) there wouldn’t have been any big bands – no Basie, no Ellington, no Ella, no anything remotely like that. But the DJ’s delivered, and kept the floor dancing far more than you nearly ever see when the band goes on break.

So what were the things I loved about Lindy Focus VII?

• The DJ’s
• Nathan and Evita’s class
• The New Year’s Eve Show (Nathan and Evita, Mike and Laura, the one man dance, the girls routine, Andrew and Karen’s routine)
• The Boilermaker Jazz Band
• Mark Kapner, Sarah Munsell, Megan Adair performance
• Tremendous competitions
• Michael and Jaya

The vision continues to evolve for Lindy Focus. Michael and Jaya should be proud of their product, it is an excellently run event that delivers everything they promise. The differences I had with this year’s version are merely preferences and I’m excited to see what they will try next year. I’ll be there again most likely, and I hope to dance with you there.

Harvest Moon Melee, Conclusions

Saturday night competitions at HMM 2007 included the Lindy Hop Jam, Social Dance (Jack and Jill) Finals, and Non Swing. The non-swing was most definitely the highlight event of the weekend. Hilarity was the m.o. and many a team brought that to the table.

The Lindy Hop Jam was the redux version of the Charleston Jam from Friday night, albeit with more appropriate music. As with the Lindy Hop, there were some very impressive moments. I fondly recall the team antics of OCD, Big George, and especially the Tiny Bunch. After Battle of the Cities I had intended to orchestrate some group play, but completely forgot until the nights of. ah well.

The Social Dance Finals were typical Jack and Jill jam style Finals, the exception being that the couple from prelims were judged and qualified for finals as a couple. The dancing was good and tight, and a who’s who of Atlanta and especially Big George. If I recall right, of 7 couples, 4 had a Big George member and there were 6 total Atlanta representatives.

I most impressed, throughout the whole weekend, with how the non-swing was accomplished. Each team randomly drew a genre of music (a la So You Think You Can Dance). The first round was preceded with 50 minutes of time to work on things, then performance. The second round music was drawn at the conclusion of the first round, and teams had approximately 5 minutes to prepare for that. Creativity was certainly the name of the game, especially for round two as there was hardly any time to put something together – it was nearly contact improv.

The scoring of the weekend went thusly. Teams were given relative placement for each event by the judges. Those placements were then grouped together for the weekend, as relative placements as if each contest had been a judge. And viola – the winners:1st  Big George Savoy Bouncers,  2nd Tiny Bunch, 3rd Swing Blade(s of Glory). We (SBG) were quite surprised and thrilled to have placed at all. We had three goals going into HMM. 1) Have fun 2) Avoid Injuries 3) Place higher than last. We accomplished 1 and 2 as well.

Harvest Moon Melee, day 1

It’s the break between classes and the evening dance, the completion of the first 24 hours of the Harvest Moon Melee in Nashville, TN.  The one thing I hate about competition centered weekends is the lack of social dance time, because even when it’s time for social dancing, many of the competitors are actually working out final details for the upcoming comps, or busy nursing the bruised egos from the previous competition.

Last night was tons of fun, apart from the not enough social dancing time (which for me is also attributable for an hour at Waffle House and then an “early” trip home from the late night).   The evening opened with the Showcase (team routine) division. There are 7 teams here: Big George Savoy Bouncers (Atlanta, GA), Knoxvillians – though they insisted on the pronunciation of Knoxvillains (Knoxville, TN), Swing Blade(s of Glory) – the location of the parentheses is paramount (Nashville, TN), Whitey’s Cindy Loppers – which I think is the best name here (Nashville, TN), Orlando City Dippers – OCD… hehehe (Orlando, FL),  Tiny Bunch (Atlanta, GA), and last but not least – Stomp House (Raleigh, NC).

I’ll get into to routines more once they are posted on YouTube, but everybody brought “IT”! They were all great and they all displayed their teams quite well. Whitey’s Cindy Loppers was by far the most fun and entertaining with their review of the 80’s.

After the Showcase was the Charleston Jam, which unfortunately didn’t really get to truly jamming tempos until near the end. The fault I really found with the tempos was not simply because the songs were slower and so really rocking out was difficult, but because there were so few round in which to dance. On our team for one, not everyone even got to dance because there just weren’t enough rotations because the songs were so slow that a half hour went by with not enough 8 counts. This is not to say that there weren’t poignant moments, there were some spectacular dances during this jam.

The final event of the evening was the Sudden Death Social Dance Competition Challenge. I really liked how the organizers pulled this one off. They did it Jack and Jill style in that partners were randomly paired. All the competitors got a number in their packet. You danced with the other person who got the same number, and each number was given a heat to dance in. Last night was only the prelims and it was 4 heats of 3 songs danced all skate (I wouldn’t want to be the judges). Finals will be tonight and will be jam style.

Classes today were great. I taught a beginning class with a helper (Kristy White) who I’d never gotten to teach with before. It was quite fun and the class went well. Then I jumped in on the performance track and was able to catch a class with Bobby and Kate who are always terrific and have great material. The last class was aerials with Jill and Kerry and that also went quite well.

Review: Michael Gamble

I have had the absolute pleasure of watching Michael develop as both a Lindy Hopper and an instructor over the past few years. Sugar Foot Stomp was the first weekend I’ve taken a class from just him (solo Charleston/Jazz) and it was a wonderful class.

Michael has a way of explaining things that really makes sense to me, and seemed to make sense to the rest of the class. Solo dancing in freestyle leaves me feeling very awkward, regardless of whether it is Jazz or Charleston. My so experience consists of exactly: the Shim Sham, Big Apple, the Madison, and various Steven Mitchell routines over 6 years. The result is that while I may know a ton of great stuff, I’ve been pressed beyond my skill level by Steven, and barely learned the fundamentals of solo movement from the Shim Sham etc.

My biggest complaint about my awkwardness is that I either get stuck doing the same thing over and over and can’t escape, or can’t figure out how to get from where I am into what I know can be done. Michael’s class took me some very large steps in that direction.

To relive the class in this post would make it seem too simplistic. But simplistic is why this class worked; the cookie were put on the bottom shelf for the students to eat from, BUT the cookies weren’t spoon fed. He paced the class and the topics covered were perfect for learning at your own pace, which is exactly why his class was so successful. He left room for me to ask questions of my own dancing and rather than providing the answers he really did give me the tools to go out and and find the answer I needed. I am so glad I took his class. For me, even as great as Chad and Midori were, Michael’s solo class was worth the trip to Asheville by itself.

Tags: Solo, Charleston, Jazz, Michael Gamble, Sugar Foot Stomp, Shim Sham, Big Apple, the Madison, Steven Mitchell, dance routine

Review: Midori & Chad at Sugar Foot Stomp

Sugar Foot Stomp (which I’ll review later this week) was a weekend of workshops on old school dancing by Midori & Chad. And by old school I’m not joking, the focus of the weekend was Peabody on Saturday and 20’s Charleston (partnered) on Sunday.

In brief, I LOVED Chad and Midori. The just plain did it for me, and I’m not 100% certain that I know what all it was. In fact, thinking over the classes I took (which were the best classes I’ve taken in a long while) I can’t think of one thing I would have done differently, I can’t remember anything I wish they hadn’t done, and I can remember all kinds of things I took note of to make sure that I insert into my own teaching. And their little baby is pretty cute to, all thin blond baby hair sticking up everywhere. Apparently he refused to leave the dance Saturday night until about 1. His parents had a tough time dragging him from that party.

Unfortunately I missed all but the review class for the Peabody on Saturday, but I really wish I hadn’t missed it. I did catch everything they did in the Charleston though, and I’m so glad I did. Nothing that they did was particularly difficult, but most of it (I’d say 75%) was “new” to me, in that I hadn’t ever seen it in a class or happened to work it out on my own.

There are some tangibles I do remember from the weekend that I can mention. With the classes the pacing seemed near perfect. Even as an advanced dancer I didn’t find myself bored; their introduction, breakdown, buildup, and put together kept the class flowing nicely, and enabled the lesser experienced dancers to keep up for the most part. Part of the pacing (and my lack of boredom) could be due to their energy. Again, they seemed to be perfect. They had just enough energy to keep me engaged and intense enough to work on the material, but not so much that they wore me out or annoyed me.

The pacing was quite good and the material was excellent. I thought they planned the class flow very well and really seemed to stick to their plan. That they are professionals and long time pro’s at that really shown through their class execution.

They were also fun, and seemed like they are very fun people to be around; disarmingly humorous and no small amount of charm. I didn’t pick up a hint of arrogance from either, I witnessed them mingling and not just hobnobbing, they both sought out struggling individuals to help during practice it yourself times in the classes, and they never displayed any disappointment or annoyance at the class levels, even when very rudimentary questions were asked of them.

If they make their way down south again, I probably won’t hesitate to jump at the chance to learn from them again. Thank you Michael and Jaya for bringing them in! Heck, I might even just hire them myself some day.

Tags: Chadand Midori, Fasca, Sugar Foot Stomp, Peabody, 20s Charleston, Swing Dancing