The Swing Book (13 page)

3. Communicate Clearly with a Strong Lead.
Once you make that split-second decision on what move you’re going to do, you then have to inform your partner. The way you tell her, however, is with actions, not words. Most steps have specific signals associated with them, known as leads. These precise signals are generally simple pushes, pulls, and touches. For instance, in one simple move starting in closed, you simply put your hand at your partner’s waist and gently push her out into open position, just before the beat on which you want her to move. (For an idea of how all this works, you might want to watch a leader on the dance floor, but the key is to pay attention to what he does with his hands, not his feet.) Good leading isn’t wishy-washy, nor is it aggressive. The more firm and clear you are, the faster she’ll pick up on your intention. The more light and sensitive you are, the more she’ll enjoy your dance together.

4. Be Alert to Your Surroundings.
You control where the two of you move on the dance floor, so you have to be especially aware of where you are in relation to other couples. Look for spaces between other dancers where you can swing her out. Change direction, freeze, or do a turn if another couple is heading right at you. Remember, your partner is putting herself in your hands. “I know certain partners I could dance with with my eyes closed because they would protect me,” says Fredda Seidenbaum. What you want to avoid at all costs is your partner’s getting kicked or jostled. You’d rather be dancing a second dance with her than running to find an ice pack, right?

5. Finally, Make It a Thrill.
This is the cardinal rule. If it’s a thrill for her, you’re guaranteed to enjoy yourself too. “Treat her like she is the queen,” says Manning, “and you are just a jester in her court.”

Here’s an easy one: follow. Just let go and listen to what your partner is communicating to you. Of course, you need to know your steps, but if something new comes at you, the best advice is simply to go with the flow. “If you are a good follower, you can get through any dance with some degree of success,” says Debra Sternberg.

1. Listen to the Lead
. It may feel odd at first to let a man tell you what to do. But give in, it’s just a three-minute dance after all. Being a good follower means not worrying about what comes next. You simply pick up and respond to your partner’s signals. If you feel uncomfortable being led, be aware of it and be patient with yourself. Champion Lindy Hopper Jenny Thomas recalls that she fought being a follower for almost a year when she was first learning the dance. Before she became partners with Ryan Francois, she had been a professional tap dancer but never a social dancer. “I had been trained to think, ‘Oh yeah, I know what comes next.’ Ryan would trip me up. For about a year, any time I recognized a step, he would change it halfway through and say, ‘Don’t anticipate the next move.’ I used to hate it. He’d actually trip me up in front of people on a social dance floor. And it’s actually made me a much better follower. I just think if you can let the lead take you on a ride, it’s so much more enjoyable.”

2. Don’t Backseat Drive.
On the dance floor this is known as back-leading. Don’t do it.

3. Don’t Be Stiff.
But don’t be a rag doll either. “We always give the equal and opposite movement of what the leader gives,” say Paul Overton’s partner, teacher Sharon Ashe.

Whether you’re the leader or the follower, you both want to be constantly sensitive to each other. Dancing is about what’s best for both of you. So don’t forge ahead and forget what’s going on with the other person. “In a jazz band when a soloist goes on a riff, they don’t just go off on their own. It relates back to what the band is doing,” says Ashe. “So even though I might improvise with my feet, I want to relate it back to the song and to my partner.” Just take a second and watch a few couples on the dance floor. It’s easy to spot the pairs that aren’t on the same page. They’re the couple letting fly with the most amazing moves, but they never even look in each other’s eyes. “They’re dancing at each other, not with each other,” says Sternberg. Nothing’s less fun than having partners, “who are doing their own moves,” adds Ashe. “They are doing the same thing they always do. They are being cool. Or they are grandstanding.”

By contrast, a couple can be doing the simplest of moves and if the communication is intense, they will be far more pleasurable to watch than a couple that’s just going through the motions, however elaborate those may be.

Whether you do Savoy Lindy Hop or one of the more smooth styles, you’ll still want to put your own distinct stamp on the dance. “Everybody should do the Lindy in their own style,” says New York instructor Margaret Batiuchok. “Each person who does it dances differently and has their own way of moving.”

The shape of your body will help determine how you dance. Shorty George Snowden created moves that played up his small stature. By contrast, says Ryan Francois, “I’m a long-limbed, tall athletic guy. I like to use my legs and stretch out.” The Flyin’ Lindy Hoppers gravitated toward more athletic moves, according to Tammy Finocchiaro, “because we’re short, stocky people. We adjusted the image to fit our bodies.”

Beyond that, the most important consideration is bringing your own personality to the dance. “Some people are more comical, some have a little more hip-hop style,” says Overton. “There are people who do a little more upright style. Different personalities start to emerge. More bouncy or less bouncy. You change your style all the time.” You may bring humor to it. Or grace and beauty. Or simply whatever feelings you happen to be having that night. The Lindy is your own way of expressing yourself.

When you first start learning the Lindy, you want to take what you know from the classroom into a real social dance situation as soon as you can. Getting yourself out on a club’s dance floor, however, can be an intimidating experience. Everyone is hopping and flying around with abandon and looking as good, to you at least, as world-class champions. But don’t let it get to you. To work up the nerve to head out there, you can start out by attending the practice dances that most studios sponsor at least once a week. When you go to a real nightclub, it helps to show up with another beginner. It can also be more inspiring to go see a real band, instead of attending a DJ’d swing night. “When you dance to live music, you tend to dance better,” says Manning. Finally, don’t feel the need to show off on the dance floor. Swing dancing isn’t about performing. Nor does it require attitude. Go in with the spirit that it’s OK to mess up, have two left feet, and make a fool of yourself. Give yourself the space to be a beginner and don’t be hard on yourself. “What we teach people is that every mistake is just a new move,” says the Arizona Lindy Hop Society’s Steve Conrad. “That’s the freedom of the dance.”

Once you know the basics, you can then start adding variation after variation after variation. The improvisational nature of the dance means that there are endless new moves you can introduce all the time. “Social dancing is about having all these little pieces of a puzzle and you create new pictures every time you’re out on the dance floor. It looks different, it feels different, it is different. You put it together your own way,” says Elena Iannucci. In class, of course, you’ll learn lots of moves in particular sequences. Certainly, many moves work naturally in sequence, like an underarm turn followed by a turn in which both partners go under the raised arms. But don’t get too hung up on set patterns. Listen to the music and do what feels right at the time. “You shouldn’t learn a move and throw it in on any swingout,” says Sylvia Skylar. “People should do the styling based on what they are hearing.”

Be aware, the information on different moves provided here is meant merely as a look at the options you’ll have, not as a set of directives of what you should do. It is by no means exhaustive. Also, some teachers may have other names for these moves. “There’s no set-in-stone definition for a lot of this stuff,” says Sternberg. Gladly, you can depend on your follower to understand your body signals, not what you happen to call a move. Relying on the international language of dance is always the best policy.

Followers, here’s where you work that skirt! While the idea behind them is simple—one or both partners turn beneath the pair’s raised arms—there are more varieties of turns than you’d imagine. There are underarm turns to right or left; tuck turns (in which the follower is pulled in close before then being swung out); “she goes, he goes” turns, which are just what they sound like; ones like the Texas Tommy where the partners change hands; and turns where one partner releases hands and does a double free spin. But for most turns, you’ll want to remember these guidelines: Be careful moving past each other so you don’t end up with an arm in the face. Keeping eye contact with your partner will help you spot as you turn. On many turns, you’ll want to end up in the same place where your partner just was; both partners simply switch spots. Leaders should bring the followers in toward them on the first beat of a count and turn them on the second; these should be two distinct yet smooth movements. Lastly, the secret to making a skirt move is not to just turn with your legs but to involve your whole body in the motion, from hips to ribcage.

Spin Out

Sick of doing the rock step? As an alternative, the woman can jazz up her Lindy by doing what are called swivels, in which she pivots on one or both feet and swings her hips from one side to the other. Instead of stepping backward, either partner can also step forward. (One move, called the slingshot, involves the leader’s going into a forward lunge before he sends his partner into a swingout.) Other great elements to throw into the mix include slides, where you touch your foot to the floor and slide it smoothly back, and stomp offs, where you stomp the ground like a bull and drag your foot back under you.

In the Lindy, kicking can be any which way and loose. You can kick sideways, forward, backward, up, or out, from the knees or from the hip. You can do these with your partner in what’s called a hopscotch while you turn in a circle. You can do them as part of a Charleston move (see Charleston information below). The only time it’s best not to do them is during a slow song or on a very crowded floor. “The kicks are meant for when you are dancing at speed,” says Francois. “When you are moving fast across the floor, it makes sense to take your feet to the air.” The most important rule about kicking, though, is to be considerate of other dancers. “Do not let your feet fly without checking around you first,” says Teddy Kern. “Getting kicked by a speeding Lindy Hopper can be dangerous and painful.”

Add a little more syncopation and surprise to your Lindy by stopping, waiting, and teasing for a beat or two. These can be done with a lot of dramatic flair. They can also be used to get you back on the beginning of a song’s phrase.

While they are the most romantic and chivalrous way to end a dance, dips can be done at any time during a song. Along with so-called drops, “they are used quite a bit to emphasize the music,” says Steve Conrad. “Dips are great during trumpet blasts or when saxes draw out a whole note. On the riff, you’ll drop down to the ground.” The key to both dips and drops is smoothness and connection. “The leader should stay with her all the way down,” says Conrad. “And she should usually support her own weight with at least one of her legs.” Once you learn simple dips, you can move onto advanced ones like a dip borrowed from salsa dance: “You use a lot of momentum and the girls dip down as they spin in a circle,” says Conrad.

When you’re doing a swingout, whether you’ve let go of each other’s hands or not, you’re free to do anything you like. You can do the twist or break-dance or mosh. Do the robot with as much sincerity or irony as you like. Whatever. Oftentimes, however, both partners will stay in mirror with each other and do some of the following moves traditionally associated with swingouts.

• S
  UZY
  Q: A challenging move that involves crossing one foot over the other while moving sideways along a line. You will look, says Francois with a laugh, “like a crab that’s crushing a bug underneath its shoe and then cleaning it off while holding a stance in your upper body like Babe Ruth about to bat.”
  
• T
  RUCKIN
  ’: Stepping forward and swiveling your foot in and out while holding up your index finger and shaking it.
  
• P
  ECKIN
  ’: “You walk kind of like a chicken and you peck your head forward at each other, normally to the beat,” says Conrad.
  
• S
  HORTY
  G
  EORGE
  : Invented by Shorty George Snowden, who was reputed to do it while walking between his partner Big Bea’s legs. It’s a very low to the ground move in which you do bent-knee kicks with pivots while walking forward with your arms up. “It looks like a drunk man walking and struggling to carry two pails down the street,” says Francois.
  
• BOOGIE
  B
  ACK OR
  F
  ORWARD
  : A series of kicks and steps punctuated by clapping the hands in front of you. The emphasis on the kicks is in really using your hips for the movement.