Ballroom Dancing: The Lindy Hop, Jitterbug or East Coast Swing

Frankie Manning:
Ambassador of Lindy Hop
Temple University Press (2007)

Ballroom Dancing: The Lindy Hop
Jitterbug or East Coast Swing

History of the Dance
& Frankie Manning

Report by Peter Y. Chou
WisdomPortal.com

U.S. 3186g 33¢ postage stamp
issued February 18, 1999
honoring Jitterbug dance

Preface: For Donna Frankel's Ballroom Dance Class 004.C01: "Advanced Ballroom Dancing" at Foothill College (Friday 1:00-3:50 pm), we were assigned to attend a dance event during "Bay Area Dance Week" (Friday April 25 - Sunday May 5, 2014). I attended Experience Kathak & Odissi Indian Classical Dance Styles on Sunday, May 4, 2014, and wrote a report with 39 photos. Missed Friday May 23 dance class because I went to the "YOGA: The Art of Transformation" Exhibit at the Asian Art Museum that day. As make-up for the missed class, I'm writing a report on "The Lindy Hop" inspired by James Barron's New York Times article (May 24, 2014) "NY REGION: Comeback for the Lindy Hop". This article showed exuberant dancing with a clip from A Day at the Races (1937). I've taken screen shots of video clips from that Marx Brothers film as well as Hellzapoppin, cropped & resized in Photoshop in composing this report.

*"Comeback for the Lindy Hop" (By James Barron, New York Times, May 24, 2014)*
Video from New York Times (May 24, 2014) "Celebration of the Lindy Hop's Founder"	Video from New York Times (May 24, 2014) "Celebration of the Lindy Hop's Founder"	Film clip from Hellzapoppin' with Lindy Hop dancers (1941)

Lindy Hop, a dance with roots in the Depression-era ballrooms and clubs of Harlem, but that in recent years has had something of a global resurgence. Elliott Donnelley went to a Swedish Lindy hop camp, and met Frankie Manning, a legend among Lindy hoppers who died in 2009 at age 94. The festival in New York was named Frankie 100 because Monday would have been Mr. Manning's 100th birthday, and the events include a parade on Lenox Avenue in Harlem. He Lindied from Harlem to Hollywood when he was a young man, appearing in the 1941 comedy Hellzapoppin' in a marathon sequence that many Lindy hoppers revere as the best such performance ever filmed. He found a place on Broadway when he was in his 70s, sharing a Tony Award for best choreography in the 1989 musical Black and Blue. Later still, he was a consultant for Spike Lee's film Malcolm X and the made-for-television movie Stompin' at the Savoy. Ms. Ljunggren remembered Mr. Manning's first trip to Sweden, in 1987, to work with the dance group she was in, the Rhythm Hot Shots. "How when we were sitting there in the living room could we know this would spread all over the world?" she asked. "It was just six people wanting to learn the Lindy hop from the main guy, the one who had perfected it. What we liked about it was it was very fast and furious and technically difficult. You have to be able to lift the lady— or fly in the air, if you are the lady, and I have landed on my head many times."

Baltimore News (May 20, 1927)
"Lindbergh Hops Off For Paris"
Braving the perils of rainstorms
and fog over the North Atlantic

Origin of Lindy Hop
New York Times May 22, 1927: "Lindbergh Does It! To Paris in 33 1/2 Hours; Flies 1,000 Miles Through Snow and Sleet; Cheering French Carry Him Off Field". 25-year-old Charles A. Lindbergh made his solo flight May 20-21, 1927 from Roosevelt Field, Long Island, NY to Le Bourget Field in Paris, France. He flew the 3600 miles trans-Atlantic flight in a Ryan monoplane Spirit of St. Louis. Dance.org says Lindy Hop was so named after Lindbergh's flight to Paris in 1927, when the newspaper headline read: "LINDY HOPS THE ATLANTIC". The dance has no "hop" in it, but is smooth and solid, and while there is a constant rhythmic 8-count "pulse" that you feel in your bones, there is no hopping, bopping, or prancing in the dance. But Swing History 101 claims "Shorty" George Snowden (1904-1982), an American dancer in Harlem during the 1920s and 1930s, is credited with coining the name "Lindy Hop" for a popular partner swing dance of the day. He also brought Breakaway to the mainstream of Swing Dancing (1929), by swinging his partner from the closed to the open position.

Charles Lindbergh
May 20-21, 1927
Monoplane Mfg.
By Ryan Airlines, San Diego

Frankie Manning (1914-2009): Ambassador of the Lindy Hop
Frankie Manning Ambassador of Lindy Hop	Frankie Manning is considered one of the founding fathers of the Lindy Hop. No one has contributed more to the Lindy Hop than Frankie Manning— as a dancer, innovator and choreographer. For much of his lifetime he was an unofficial Ambassador of Lindy Hop. Originally touring as a dancer and choreographer with Whitey's Lindy Hoppers in the 30's and 40's, he helped spread the popularity of the Lindy Hop through three continents. During a dance contest in 1935, Manning & his partner, Frieda Washington, performed the first aerial in a swing dance competition against George "Shorty" Snowden and his partner, Big Bea, at the Savoy Ballroom. The airstep went flawlessly to the music and astonished over 2,000 audience members. Manning received a Tony Award for Choreography of Broadway show Black'n'Blue (1989). Bette Midler extols Frankie Manning: Ambassador of Lindy Hop (2007)— "A poet of the dance floor. This book is a must read for anyone who loves the dance."	In Celebration of Frankie Manning Book of 50 photocards

Lindy Hop Scene in A Day at the Races (1937)
On Thursday, December 26, 2013, I saw A Day at the Races (1937) starring the Marx Brothers at the Stanford Theatre. As Harpo Marx (Stuffy) was evading the police, in getting his horse Hi-Hat into the steeplechase race, he meandered into a barn where a lively Lindy Hop was in full swing. This dance sequence was noticed by Swedish Lindy hoppers and cited in Frank Barron's article "A Celebration of the Lindy Hop's Founder" (NY Times, May 24, 2014). In the Lindy Hop Film Archives, we learn that the Whitey's Lindy Hoppers dance to "All God's Chillun Got Rhythm". Whitey himself can be seen on the sidelines. He is identifiable by the streak of white in his hair. Screenshots were taken from the Lindy Hop video, cropped and resized in Photoshop for the dance photos below.

A Day at the Races Poster

Lindy Hop in film A Day at the Races

*Lindy Hop Scene in Hellzapoppin'* (1941)** Lindy Hop Film Archives tells us that this film, based on a hit Broadway play, showcases Whitey's Lindy Hoppers dancing the most famous and most spectacular Lindy Hop scene ever preserved on film. The dancing was choreographed by Frankie Manning. The music builds in excitement until, as if out of nowhere, four Lindy Hopping couples, dressed in overalls and uniforms, swing out into the cameras at a frenetic tempo. Each couple executes amazing acrobatic shines. Then the group unites for precision ensemble work filmed at an angle that emphasizes legwork and speed. The choreography and the dancing are as near to perfect Lindy Hop as you can see anywhere! The scene will take your breath away no matter how many times you see it. It is no wonder that this film was responsible for the simultaneous revival of Lindy Hop in Sweden and Britain in the 1980's. Video of the Lindy Hop sequence in Hellzapoppin. Lindy Hop steps such as Backflip and Breakaway are shown below.
Lindy Hop in film Hellzapoppin'	Lindy Hop in film Hellzapoppin'	Lindy Hop in film Hellzapoppin'