Lindy Hop

What is it?
Lindy Hop is a social dance. Partners are connected smoothly and gently to each other, while relating closely to the music, in feeling, improvisation and phrasing. The Lindy Hop incorporates African rhythms and styling, European partnering elements, and is done to American music: swing jazz and jump blues. It is an 8 count dance based partly on the Breakaway and the Charleston, with influences from Jazz dances, as well as other previous dances. Considered to be the first official swing dance.

Two main styles of Lindy Hop developed during the swing era: Frankie Manning's "Savoy Style" and Dean Collins' "Hollywood Style" (aka Smooth Lindy). During the 40's and 50's and later, other styles of swing dance would evolve out of Lindy Hop, including West Coast Swing, East Coast Swing, Rockabilly Swing, Boogie Woogie, Ballroom Jive, Shag, Bop, Balboa, Imperial, Whip and Push.

Some of its History
Lindy Hop's birthplace was the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem. On a dance floor big enough to hold 4000 people, Lindy Hoppers competed in massive dance contests every week as two big bands (one on each end of the dance floor)  played. The very best dancers formed a dance troupe called Whitey's Lindy Hoppers who performed shows until World War II.

On July 4, 1928, the 18th day of a dance marathon at the Marathon Casino, the NYC Board Of Health finally closed down the event. Four of the original 80 couples were left standing. Savoy star "Shorty" George Snowden (number "7") and his partner shared the prize with the other three couples.

Earlier, with the event in full swing, people could post a small cash prize with the MC for a brief mini-contest among the survivors. This was the backdrop for Shorty's spontaneous throw-out breakaway and a flash footwork improv, capturing media attention. "What are you doing with your feet?" asked the Fox Movie Tone News interviewer. "The Lindy Hop," replied Shorty George -- Charles A. Lindbergh had recently "hopped" the Atlantic landing on May 21, 1927.

Lindy Hop, later known as Jitterbug, is the authentic Afro-Euro-American Swing dance. It is an unabashedly joyful dance, with a solid, flowing style that closely reflects its music -- from the late 20's hot Jazz to the early 40's Big Band swing. Just as Jazz combines European and African musical origins, Lindy Hop draws on African and European dance traditions. The embracing hold, and the turns from Europe; the solid, earthy body posture from Africa, with an American-created partner breakaway. The dance evolved along with the new swing music, based on earlier dances such as the Charleston, by black people in Harlem, NY.

Dance contests became more and more "attention getting". In the 1930's a dancer named Frankie Manning added the first air step (lifts/ flips) into the Lindy. These and other air steps, or Aerials, had been done for years in other dances through many exhibitions by professional club entertainers, but supposedly had not yet been done in the Lindy.

Films such as Hellzapoppin and Day at the Races, as well as Malcolm X and Swingkids show seemingly reckless aerials, often done at very fast musical tempos. Far from being just acrobatic antics, aerials are in fact smooth, extreamly precise, and in synch with the music. They require a superb degree of expertise and are not usually danced socially, but for performance, if only inside a protective ring of spectators (called a Jam Circle). Aerials are impressive and spectacular, so that's what you see in the movies.

Savoy style Lindy Hop, as taught by Frankie Manning, Ryan Francois, and Steven Mitchell, has the lightest, gentlest, and smoothest connection of all the common Swing dances. It is solid, low, relaxed and energetic.

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