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April 2008 - Nr. 4
Herwig Wandschneider

The ups and downs of public dancing over 250 years

Ballroom Dancing is a wonderful, gracious recreational activity and exercise and has been so for centuries. Who started it where and when? I asked Ballroom Dance Enthusiast and Teacher – Horst Kessler – for a brief relaxed summary of the history of Ball Room Dance, the kind that you and I can learn, not the "Dancing with the Stars" kind. He happily obliged and produced a series of four segments with anecdotes pertaining to the particular styles and times interspersed with his own experience.

This is the second segment in the series of four. If you missed the first, you can find it at this website address: www.echoworld.com/B08/B0803/B0803HW2.htm ...

Herwig Wandschneider

1920 – 1940s

What up to then was reserved for the Noblesse, changed now decisively. Dancing in all its forms became part of daily life, which routinely included a Saturday evening dance. Mr. Fox started the Social Foxtrot in New York City in 1920. The Anne Pennington & Tom Patricola (1926) "Black Bottom DanceFrench dance world founded the word "chassé" which is used to this day in all dance forms. The "Social Foxtrot" became the "Quickstep", when Victor Silvester’s Big Band Dance Band at the Hammersmith Palais in London/England decided in 1934 to play the Social Foxtrot faster, up to 52 beats per minute.

While the soft romantic Bolero arrived from the Dominican Republic (the more dynamic Bolero was danced in Cuba, Mexico, and Spain), the Black Bottom and Shimmy - the wildest dances so far - turned New York City completely around, and Parisians went crazy with the Charleston, adopted from its beginnings in the African-American communities of Charleston, South Carolina. Jazz and the Lindy Hop crossed the Atlantic from New York. Here in Canada, Guy Lombardo and his band (from London, Ontario) arrived on the dance scene and filled the dance halls first in Canada and later in the USA..

Kessler & Partner "Slow Waltz"The well-known Ballroom Dances - Slow Waltz or English Waltz, Tango, Slow Foxtrot, Quickstep - were standardized by Alex Moore from England in 1934. His book "Ballroom Dancing" was the Bible of International Style Ballroom Dancing. 40 countries around the world received his "Monthly Letter Service". His studio in Kingston on Thames became the Mecca of ballroom dancing. (I stayed there in 1963 for 4 weeks to learn the Syllabus (step by step instruction) in the English language. It was an unforgettable time.)

Fred Astaire & Ginger RogersOnly the USA started to develop their own style - by Arthur Murray and Fred Astaire - with many American style dances. The decade from 1930 - 1940 brought the world of dance another group of dances into the dance halls. By the end of 1930 the USA had the Charleston, Shimmy, Quickstep and Rumba-Bolero, which is 4 beats slower than the international style Rumba. With the depression people found their salvation in entertainment and dancing as a diversion from their daily troubles.

Josephine Baker (1926) in Paris "Charleston"It was also the time when big bands appeared in the dance halls such as Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and many thousand more around the world. The juke box was developed and dance marathons were held everywhere. Radio stations, with the help of dance bands, played all the different dance music such as Beguine, Conga, Jitterbug, Foxtrot, Lindy Hop etc. Fashion, hairstyles, dresses, suits and shoes changed and so had the body movements in dancing.

It was a very special era, seemingly out of step with the problems of the Great Depression. But for the millions of dancers around the world, it was all a natural drive with an abundance of enthusiasm and plenty of energy devoted to the dance floor.

Horst Kessler

  
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