BALBOA - This information is from the Home of Balboa International. The Balboa is a complete and very versatile dance most often seen where swing, jazz or Dixieland music is being played. It can be performed to exceedingly slow music (30 beats per minute), extraordinarily fast music (over 300 beats per minute), or anywhere in between. According to Jonathan & Sylvia from Santa Barbara, CA. (the Balboa capitol of the world), the Balboa really isn’t a style of swing at all. It is danced almost exclusively in closed dance position and most closely resembles a dance the natives of 1930’s Chicago called the “Shag”. The Balboa has an eight count basic but the rhythm pattern isn’t like traditional single swing’s “slow, slow, quick, quick”. The Balboa originated in a large ballroom on Balboa Island in southern California. According to Sylvia, “It looks like cartoon dancing, close together, with lots of footwork, although the feet hardly leave the floor. The upper body remains still and the dance doesn’t travel much around the room. You could dance to very fast music [190 to 250 beats per minute!] while being dressed up. At one time it was popular up and down the west coast, from Seattle to southern California. Incidentally, the Balboa is the dance done by the popular cartoon character "Popeye."

There are four slightly different versions of this particular dance, which is basically indigenous to Southern California. One version originally referred to as "Swing Bal" was developed and danced in the 1930's in and around Los Angeles while at the same time the second version called "Bal" or Balboa" emanated from and was actually named for the locale of Balboa, in particular the Rendezvous Ballroom on the Balboa peninsula, and spread in popularity to the Long Beach and Orange County area. The third version, the "Triple Step Bal," is most useful when an extremely slow number is played and the fourth version, the "One-Step," is utilized when the beat is too fast for any other dance. Although they employ a similar basic step pattern, there is a difference in those basic patterns, necessitating a definite change in the overall technique. Though each version of the "Bal" allows for ad-lib step patterns relative to its own "basic step pattern," these ad-lib steps cannot be applied from one "basic step pattern" to the other; so, in effect, dancers changing from one basic step pattern to another go into another dance.

BEACH BOP (also known as JAMAICA) - The Beach Bop is popular from Memphis, Tennessee south to the southern tip of Florida. The dance is a six-count basic related to the jitterbug with almost no eight-count variations. The step is a kind of shuffle triple with a push and pull on the ball change that leads into the turns. The music is typically slow with preference given to rhythm and blues and beach music from the 1950’s. Some clubs like 60’s music, and some don’t. Those that don’t describe 60’s music as “lollipop music”. The dance is smooth with a preference given to showing off the woman. The dance partners do their turns in tandem, remaining squarely face-to-face most of the time, not turning away from each other.

The beach boppers are a party crowd. They don’t tend to have contests (nearly every other style of dance has regional and sometimes national competitions), but they do enjoy a special group dance called a “jam session.” In a Jam one couple dances in the center of a circle and, after a short time, any man or woman from the circle can cut in on the appropriate partner. A single round of the jam session can last six or seven songs without a break. One "lindy" variation of the bop is called the “Jamaica”. Barbara Horridge of the New Orleans Jamaica Dance Club recounted how the dance became popular in the 1950’s in the Jamaica Lounge on Magazine Street where the city’s good dancers tended to hang out. Alice Palmer of the west bank of the Mississippi (the clubs are identified as west and east bank clubs—Barbara’s club is on the east bank) says the Jamaica is an east coast circular-style dance which uses Dallas push tempo music. Jamaica dancers don’t drink much. Which is to say that although nightclubs have teachers teaching the Jamaica in the early evening hours, once the bands begin to play most of the floor space is given over to tables. There are perhaps 1500 people belonging to Jamaica dance clubs in the New Orleans-Metararie area.

BOOGIE-WOOGIE - A piano style featuring percussive ostinato accompaniments. These steadily repeated bass patterns, one or two bars long, delineate the 12 bar blues progression. Melodies range from repeated figures, reinforcing the explicit beat (including tremolos, riffs, rapid triplets) to polyrhythmic improvisations.

CAROLINA SHAG (also known as FLORIDA BEACH BOP and NEW ORLEANS JAMAICA) - In Atlanta, Georgia, the Carolina Shag dominates the swing dance scene. According to Ace Asip of the North Atlanta Beach Club, the Carolina Shag originated in Myrtle Beach, North Carolina. It is a smooth dance done to medium and slow music. The upper body and hips hardly move as the legs do convoluted kicks and fancy footwork. The man is the center of attention (sometimes lending the appellate “peacock dancing” to the Shag) and the woman’s steps are either mirror steps of the man’s or a sort of marking time while he does spins and other wildness. Traditionally the music was rhythm and blues, mostly from the 1950’s. But some Shag dancers have branched out into music from the 1960’s to the present, that is, any type of contemporary music that is medium or slow tempo with a back beat.

One notable difference about Shag and beach bop dancers (and Dallas push dancers as well) is that they like to party while they dance. This makes them a welcome crowd out at nightclubs and bars featuring music. In fact, the Shag dancers and beach boppers actually have nightclub owners vying to set up nights especially for members of the dance clubs.

COUNTRY SWING - There are large numbers of people across the country who enjoy and love country swing dancing, also called western swing and country western swing. Country western dancing includes several American and Latin American dances (two-step [foxtrot], swing, shuffle, cha-cha) as well as several European dances (waltz, polka, schottische). Country western dancing is also unique in that it seems to be spreading nationally without much variation in style and steps.

EAST COAST SWING - See listing for SWING.

HOUSTON WHIP (also known as DALLAS PUSH) - Moving further east to Texas, we encounter the “Dallas push” and the “Houston whip”. Terry Rippa of the Dallas Push club describes the Push as a dance which uses lots of turns and spins. “It is a smooth provocative dance,” he says, most often done to rhythm and blues music. Barry Durand, a country western swing dancer, explained that the Dallas Push and the Houston Whip have a double rock step on the end of the slot, rather than the syncopations common to West Coast Swing. Terry noted that the Push is a barroom dance, not a ballroom dance. Most Push dancing in Dallas is done out at nightclubs, rather than in private dance halls. Mario Robau of the Houston Whip Club is a leading exponent of the Whip, a slotted variant where the woman does a circular body undulation at the end of the slot. Both the Whip and the Push are done to medium tempo rhythm and blues music, much the same as the Carolina Shag.

HUSTLE - The basic steps in Hustle are 6-count patterns and they use all three rhythm units-single, double, and triple rhythm (a rhythm unit being two beats of music). Different parts of the country had their own variations of Hustle, and this non-standardization may have been what led to its decline in popularity by the end of the 1980's. All the while Hustle dancing was flour-flourishing so was swing dancing, especially West Coast Swing. Dancers used the new music which was great for West Coast Swing and more and more dance contests were won with swing moves. The New York Hustle is to the hustle dancer what the Lindy was to the swing dancer 50 years before. The song "The Hustle" by Van McCoy in 1976, followed by the movie Saturday Night Fever with John Travolta in 1977 really set off the popularity of Hustle dancing. Dance studios also promoted Hustle dancing and helped to create new variations such as the Rope Hustle, American Hustle, Triple Hustle, Disco Swing, Latin Hustle, Street Hustle, Sling Hustle and Line dances.

JITTERBUG - Originally, jive slang for an alcoholic in the extreme throes of delirium tremens (DT's). The word was used by the established press in a pejorative way to express disregard for persons dancing the Lindy Hop. Like other attempts to suppress new movements with derision (e.g. "Beatnik", "Hippie", "Gangsta") the term "jitterbug" was adopted by those who it was intended to dissuade. The word came to refer not only to the persons who performed Lindy Hop but also became synonymous with the dance.

JITTERBUG STROLL - The Jitterbug Stroll is a popular swing line dance, enjoyed by many today. Done to many swing tunes, Steven Mitchell has written and recorded "Jitterbug Stroll" specifically for this dance, with Steve leading the dance on the CD track.

LINDY HOP - A social dance of the US, originating in the late 1920's in New York City and at first associated with the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem. Malcolm X danced the Lindy Hop in his younger days, and all of the greatest big bands of the time played at the Savoy and other ballrooms in Harlem. It was danced to music (principally Swing) in fast duple meter ("8 to the bar") and was characterized especially by "breakaways" in which partners in a couple separated and improvised steps individually. It incorporated movements in which partners swung one another around and sometimes took on an acrobatic character. Known from the 1930s as "Jitterbug", it was widely danced until the late 1950s when prevailing taste in music shifted to a six beat format (the "Motown" beat). The Lindy Hop owes much to Charleston, Jazz and Tap steps, Ballet, and complex movements from Vienese Waltz. In 1943, Life Magazine characterized Lindy Hop as "America's National Folk Dance."

As the dance spread from Harlem throughout the US, it mutated into variations that survive today including Jive, Bop, Shag, Balboa, and the Imperial. A close relative of Lindy Hop is "DC Hand Dancing", a form unique to the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. It is said that a "downtown" reporter saw the dance being performed in 1927 and asked whether it had a name; "Shorty" George Snowden, a Lindy pioneer, saw an opportunity and said that the dancers were celebrating Charles Lindbergh's flight across the Atlantic with "Lindy's Hop. In the 1990's, Swing and Lindy Hop has been embraced again, thanks in part to movies like "Swingers", "Strictly Ballroom", "Malcom X" and others. The Gap Swing Kids commercial on TV is the latest example of mainstream publicity for Swing and Lindy Hop, now being embraced by teenagers and young adults.

MADISON - The Madison is a popular swing line dance that originated in the 1950's. The dance debuted in the movie "Hairspray" and may be seen when renting the video. The music for the Madison is available on the "Hairspray" soundtrack CD.

SHIM SHAM - The Shim Sham Shimmy ("Shim Sham" for short) is a popular swing line dance that originated back in the 1930's. The dance is divided into 10 musical phrases with specific steps; the Shim Sham, the Cross Over, the Tacky Anne, and the Half-Break. These steps are repeated, except that instead of breaking at the end, you freeze for a full count of eight. Boogie Back, Boogie Forward, and Shorty George steps follow, after which you grab the nearest person and dance until the song is finished. The Bill Elliott Swing Orchestra has written and recorded "The Shim Sham Song" specifically for this dance.

ST. LOUIS SHAG (also known as IMPERIAL SWING) - Two unique styles of dance not seen anywhere else in the country are the St. Louis Shag and the Imperial Swing. Speaking with Sherry Lawson (described by a Californian as the “Queen of the St. Louis Shag”) she described the St. Louis Shag as “a dance with a bouncy step that swivels in and out very much like the Charleston. It has patterns with kicks and jumps, patterns that are traditional, dating back more than twenty-five years.” The St. Louis Shag, like the Balboa, is described as a non-swing dance. Also like the Balboa, the Shag is done to very fast music: 165 beats per minute and faster.

The other related dance native to St. Louis is called Imperial Swing. So called because it was nurtured in the Imperial Dance Club on Florescent Street in St. Louis, it is a variant of east coast swing with a six-count step which includes eight-count steps similar to the Lindy.

SWING (also widely known as EAST COAST SWING) - A popular jazz-oriented big band jazz style that flourished in the 1930s. Featured are combinations such as five saxophones, four trumpets, four trombones, and often a vocalist. Piano, guitar, string bass and drums smoothly accentuate each beat in 4/4 while a "swinging" rhythmic pattern is played on the ride cymbal. Compositions are based on popular songs (especially 32 bar AABA forms) and 12 bar blues. The repertory ranges from complex entirely written arrangements to impromptu versions in which simple riffs provide thematic material and accompaniment to improvisations. Swing Dancing, also known as "East Coast Swing" and "Jitterbug" (see below) is a dance that originated in the 1930's, and includes 6-count steps. It may be danced to a variety of music, including Big Band swing, R&B, Rockabilly and early 50's Rock n Roll.

WEST COAST SWING - Described as “the Cadillac of swing” by Robert Bryant of the US Swing Dance Council, the California versions of West Coast Swing stay in a slot and has the girl moving from one end of the slot to the other. Annie Hirsch, who with Jack Carey, represents the golden days of West Coast Swing, mentioned Dean Collins as a leading figure in establishing the West Coast Swing. It was in the 1940’s that Dean Collins and several others were the West Coast version of Whitey’s Lindy Hoppers—the best of the best.

According to Annie the dance remains pretty much the same since it's creation sometime in the 40’s. Skippy Blair, another dancer involved with West Coast Swing in it’s formative years says it was first called Western Swing and then came to be called West Coast Swing to differentiate it from country-western swing dancing. Both Annie and Skippy agree that the big difference between West Coast Swing then and now is that now both partners dance more upright to slower music, allowing time for interesting footwork variations called “syncopations.” The syncopations may take several beats when the woman goes to the end of the slot and are the primary difference between the California and mid-west variants of West Coast Swing.

As far as the music — well it varies and the only thing most people seem to agree on is that it is best danced to a medium tempo. Some dancers like rhythm and blues, some like contemporary rock, some like oldies from the 40’s, 50’s and 60’s.

The basic West Coast Swing dance steps consists of 6-beat and 8-beat patterns executed in a slot area on the dance floor. Due partly to the work of the U.S. Open Swing Dance Championships and the now-defunct United States Swing Dance Council, west coast swing has risen in popularity in recent years. There are West Coast Swing clubs in over half of the states. Some of them have their dance as a state dance. On January 1, 1989, West Coast Swing became California's official state dance.

ZOOT - A Zoot Suit is basically an extravagent suit. They tend to have balloon pants that tend to also be high-waisted. They also have very long coats that have much shoulder padding. The term "Zoot" is a generic term that is now used for fashion worn by swing enthusiasts. The word is derived from "zuta", Spanish for "suit" (of clothes). Wealthy Harlemites traveled to Cuba, Mexico, and Brazil and brought back Latin formal wear characterized by billowing high waisted trousers, long frock coats and broad-brimmed hats. The pants were ideal for performing the kicks and jumps involved in Lindy Hop, and the fashion trend evolved to feature extremes in both dimension and color. The expressiveness and color of the music was matched in zoot fashion. French designers continued to mine Zoot for years and the influence is still known by the couturier term "zazou."

Thanks to Men's Vintage Fashions by Carol Nolan and Zoots by Suavecito for the following information

ZOOT SUIT RIOTS - Set in the environment of ethnic and racial paranoia that defined the early 1940's in Los Angeles, California, the "Zoot Suit Riots" (though they are now more often referred to as the "sailor riots") occurred. On the night of June 3, 1943, eleven sailors on shore leave stated that they were attacked by a group of Mexican pachucos. In response to this, a group of over 200 uniformed sailors chartered 20 cabs and charged into the heart of the Mexican American community in East Los Angeles. Any zoot suiter was fair game. On this and the following nights, many a zoot suiter was beaten by this mob and stripped of their clothes, their zoot suits, on the spot. Nine sailors were arrested during these disturbances, but not one was charged with any crime. In fact, the servicemen were portrayed in the local press as heroes stemming the tide of the "Mexican Crime Wave." Finally, at midnight on June 7th, the military authorities moved to stop the rioting of their personnel, and Los Angeles was declared off limits for all military personnel.

Why did all of this happen and what was their rationale behind the riots? The sailors beat up the latinos because they felt that everyone who possibly could enlist in the armed services should. The sailors felt the folks who were not enlisted were not serving their country. Also, the latinos were making their zoot suits with huge amounts of fabric, a precious commodity that was rationed during World War II. The sailors felt that by using so much fabric in a pair of trousers was a blatant and selfish misuse of resources that should have been channeled toward the war effort. On the other hand, the zoot suiters who couldn't serve the US forces couldn't enlist, so they stayed home and worked hard to support the war effort. The fabric they used was from "underground" sources, and among their community, it became a status symbol to see who could sew the most fabric into their zoot trousers.

For more information, check out the book "The Zoot Suit Riots: The Psychology of Symbolic Annihilation".

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