Swing Dance in Charleston, SC
What is Swing Dance?
A Very Brief and Incomplete History of Swing Dancing in America.
Swing dancing is a variety of different dances that popped up all over the country in the early 20th century. They include dances like the Lindy Hop, Collegiate Shag, Balboa, Big Apple, Truckin', Charleston, and many many more. These dances all evolved around the same time to the swinging jazz music of the 1920's, 30's, and 40's. Each of these dances can be done to the same music and at bigger events, you will see them each being performed by different couples to the same songs!
The primary type of dancing you will see at most swing dance events in the modern era will be some style of Lindy Hop. Our lessons specifically will primarily teach Lindy Hop, but we do offer lessons in other styles when the interest is there!
Leon James and Willa Mae Ricker (Life Magazine Issue August 23, 1943)
Lindy Hop
Lindy Hop is the primary style of dance we teach at Holy City Swing. It developed in the 1930's in the Harlem neighborhoods of New York before spreading around the country. Black dancers honed their skills at Ballrooms around Harlem and took their steps to the big screen where they amazed America and the world with their impressive dancing! Check out the most famous Lindy Hop scene from a movie called Hellzapoppin below. This scene really shows how athletic and impressive Lindy Hop can be.
Swing's Decline and Revival
As swing music fell out of fashion in the late 1940's to be replaced by bepop and Rock and Roll, swing and partnered dancing declined in popularity as well. While some still continued dancing in Harlem and California through the years, the majority of America moved on to dances like the Twist and the Locomotion. However, in the 1980s some youths in several places around the world started seeing these old dancing scenes from films like Hellzapoppin and tracked down the original Harlem dancers. With the Neo-Swing craze in the late 1990s adding fuel to the fire and sparking popular interest in swing dancing again, the swing dancing world has been steadily growing again! It is now possible to find swing dancing spots in almost every major and minor city in the US and Europe, and many throughout the world!