Finally finished my outfit for the MermaId Parade tomorrow! For those that don’t know, Saturday, June 21, is the 26th annual Coney Island Mermaid Parade, the nation’s largest art parade and the my absolutely favorite part of summer in New York City. As has been tradition for the past years, the lindy hoppers participate as…
Category: New York
Room available in my awesome Fort Greene apartment
Just a reminder that I am still seeking a roommate to share my lovely two-bedroom apartment in Fort Greene, Brooklyn starting on July 1st. Tell them what they get, Don Pardo! A goodly sized furnished, two-bedroom pad in a modern apartment complex Full kitchen with gas range, oven, dishwasher Access to several major subway lines…
Global Kids teen Sabienne featured in NY Daily News!
The New York Daily News has a sweet article about five New York teens who beat the odds by graduating. The story features Global Kids teen leader Sabienne Brutus! In 2005, the High School for Global Citizenship student and her siblings moved to Crown Heights from Haiti to escape the country’s political instability and to…
Twitter as an Event Organizer’s Tool: Our Experience with the Frankie 95 Birthday Festival
About a month ago my friend David sent me an email asking about how we could use the micro-blogging service Twitter to help spread the word and coordinate a swing dance festival that we were helping organize. We started brainstorming and decided to try it out. As it turns out, Twitter is a pretty effective…
The Global Shim Sham compilation video: a labor of lindy love involving 5,000+ dancers from around the world
This video is the result of several months of effort involving an estimated 5,000 dancers in over 22 countries: the Global Shim Sham. This was produced by a dedicated team of volunteers for the Frankie Manning 95th Birthday Festival, and shown to an appreciative audience of about 2,000 people on Saturday, May 23. Read on…
Fantastic photos from Frankie 95 Festival on Getty Images
In all of the hubbub, I forgot to announce that the prestigious Getty Images stock photography service has put up several beautiful photos from the Frankie 95 Birthday Festival, mostly from the memorial service and the dance in Central Park on Friday, May 22. Check out the entire set here. One of them has already…
Gripping documentary about the International Criminal Court premieres in New York June 12 & 13!
I got the exciting news that June 12 and 13 is the New York premiere of The Reckoning: The Battle for the International Criminal Court for the opening night of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival. There will be two screenings: Friday, June 12, 7:00pm: Filmmakers and ICC Deputy Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda present for Q&A…
Frankie 95 Festival Day 5: Chazz dances for his dad, Battle of the bones, Big Apple Lindy Hoppers! We love you, Frankie!
Tonight was the final night of the Frankie 95 Birthday Festival, and what a lovely way to end an incredible five days of celebration! Here's Chazz Young, Frankie Manning's son, dancing on behalf of his dad with 95 follows. Continuing the tradition started at Frankie's 80th birthday of having Frankie dance with one follower for…
Everything Remains Raw: Moncel Durden on the links between lindy hop and hip hop dance
I managed to catch the film preview and talk with filmmaker / dancer / historian Moncel Durden about his work-in-progress "Everything Remains Raw: Hip-Hop's Folkloric Lineage." Here Moncel talks the importance of dancers knowing the roots of the movements that they do. As lindy hoppers, it was great to see how Moncel was able to…
Frankie 95 Festival Day 4: Tribute Show, Campus Five, Boilermakers (video)
Here's a sweet video snippet: about 1,000 people at 4am still swinging hard at the close of Day Four of the Frankie 95 Birthday Festival. The highlight of the day was an all-star dance tribute show for Frankie Manning, demonstrating various parts of his career, from the Savoy Ballroom to the Herrang Dance Camp. Afterwards,…