I just got home from the "Swing and Soul" party weekend in Atlanta Georgia. It was basically a three-day celebration of the sounds of Motown, with 300-some lindy hoppers from all over the United States dancing their hearts out to great music all day and night. I’ve always loved soul music, from Marvin to Diana…
Category: Dancing / Music
My new Aris Allens: yes, I am a lindy hop rockstar
The choice of shoe for a serious lindy hopper is an important one. A lindy hopper is looking for the right balance of comfort, style, and durability to get their swing on. Fads come and go in the lindy hop world, but for the past few years, the Aris Allen has reigned supreme as "THE"…
Lincoln Center offers jazz education videos online
Jazz at Lincoln Center announces that they are now offering a limited selection of online videos of some of their jazz education classes for those who can not attend their programs in person. Not only can you watch the recorded lectures, you can see concert performances and commentary on those performances, all carefully tagged and…
PMT B-boys (and B-girl) Represent!
I’m happy to report that my breakdance group killed it during our final performance this evening as part of the PMT Fall Dance Showcase. We nailed a long, difficult routine, with multiple formations, duets, solos and lots of group work. And most importantly, I didn’t fuck up my part. Our teacher Pavan was estatic and…
The b-boy devil, Mr. Miyagi and pre-show jitters
So tonight is the first of two shows by the breakdance performance class that I’m in. It’s a complicated, six minute piece with difficult tricks and freezes throughout. The Thursday night show is sold out, and we’re first on the bill. We’re understandably concerned and nervous about executing it perfectly. So last night was not…
Dancing for diabetes research at the Waldorf
I just got home from an amazing night of fine dining, music and dancing at the swellegant Waldorf Astoria Hotel. It all started a few weeks ago when my friend and fellow lindy hopper Lauren asked me if I wanted to volunteer to be a dancer for this classy fundraiser in November. I’m always happy…
Reminder: My breakdance performance next week!
Just a quick reminder that tickets are almost sold out for several of the shows that are part of the PMT Dance Studio‘s Fall Showcase. I’ll be performing a breakdance routine with six other b-boys and girls on Thursday, November 15 and Sunday, November 18, choreographed by our awesome instructor and world-class B-boy Pavan Thimmaiah,…
Yehoodi Talk Show #500: The Howling Monkey show
Join Spuds and Rikomatic for another exciting Yehoodi Talk Show video podcast, recorded live from my lovely Fort Green apartment. This month, we feature a bunch of cool clips, including lindy hoppers on "Dancing with the Stars," an adolescent jazz diva, some badass footage from the Ultimate Lindy Hop Showdown, and Jojo Jackson’s new solo…
I’m headed to the “Swing and Soul” Weekend, December 7-9 in Atlanta!
I just booked my tickets for the "Swing and Soul" dance weekend from December 7-9 in Atlanta Georgia. I love the event description: This will be a weekend dedicated to that energy that we call Soul. You’ll find it in the music we play, lots of classic 60’s soul from hitmakers like Motown and Stax,…
Why social dancing is like improv (thanks, Stephen Cobert!)
I have known from conversations with improvisers like Frankyboy and others that there was some implicit connection between improv and social dancing. But I never really got it until yesterday when I read, of all things, a 2006 commencement speech given by Stephen Cobert at Knox College: When I was starting out in Chicago, doing…