[HN Gopher] Savoy Style vs. Hollywood Style: A Fight to the Deat...
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Savoy Style vs. Hollywood Style: A Fight to the Death (Hopefully?)
(2011)
Author : Tomte
Score : 34 points
Date : 2025-01-03 16:31 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (swungover.wordpress.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (swungover.wordpress.com)
| nordsieck wrote:
| A few examples as illustration:
|
| Sylvia Sykes dancing Lindy Hop[1].
|
| An example of Savoy style Lindy Hop[2].
|
| An example of Sylvia Sykes dancing West Coast Swing[3], a swing
| dance that was heavily influenced[4] by Hollywood style. For the
| keen eyed among you, she does a bit of Lindy and a bit of Balboa
| in the midst of the dance.
|
| ---
|
| 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92xjd8f5Zes
|
| 2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmvKrPUo97E
|
| 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psOWt0oyx9k
|
| 1. I've heard many purported histories of WCS, some from people
| who were there as the dance was forming. It's difficult to know
| exactly what is true.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| About 20 years ago I took a few courses in beginner's swing at
| the local community center that was co-taught by Sylvia Sykes.
| Had no clue she was well known in the swing dance community
| until much later.
| joshuamorton wrote:
| It's extremely funny to watch these vs. modern WCS champions
| (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nuessx9D23c), which has almost
| none of the actual WCS basic you'd expect and see a lot of in
| (3).
|
| Compare to lindy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cN3NkAfi3x4),
| which even now is much more similar to its roots, pre-revival
| lindy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-mT0wowIn4.
| jameshart wrote:
| Swing dance is second nature to us dance aficionados so it's easy
| to forget that the average person probably only knows the general
| difference between Hollywood and Savoy style Lindy-Hop.
|
| And West Coast Swing, of course.
|
| https://xkcd.com/2501/
| NovemberWhiskey wrote:
| > _it's easy to forget that the average person probably only
| knows the general difference between Hollywood and Savoy style
| Lindy-Hop_
|
| You might be assuming too much, says the guy who read that
| article without any idea at all what it was actually about.
| bradlys wrote:
| It's a joke.
| aaroninsf wrote:
| C.f. the linked xkcd
| 542354234235 wrote:
| How could anyone consider themselves a well-rounded adult
| without a basic understanding of the Swing dance?
| ifyouwantto wrote:
| I'm solidly middle-aged and I'm reasonably certain I've never
| even known anybody who could do a name-able dance of any
| kind, aside from briefly and not-very-well mimicking meme
| dances. Earliest I recall was the Macarena. I don't even know
| anyone who could convincingly do the Carlton.
|
| My best guess from the headline would have been this was
| about food.
|
| The only time I've ever been taught a dance, or even been
| present when anyone was learning a dance in anything
| resembling a serious fashion, was when they taught us the
| Minuet in 1st grade for some unfathomable reason.
|
| I am not at all confident I could describe or recognize Swing
| at all, versus any remotely-similar dance (like, if you
| showed me swing on one video and someone doing the stanky leg
| on another, I could guess that correctly, but make it much
| harder and my odds will be reduced to chance)
|
| I'm fairly sure the above is more-or-less the case for a
| large majority of adults I've ever known. The exceptions are
| a handful who did ballet as young kids.
|
| Maybe there are strong regional effects at play? Or something
| SES/class related. I also don't know anybody who did the
| hardcore college-prep thing that lots of folks on HN take as
| a given for any college-bound kids, though nearly everyone in
| my circle did attend college. I even know a couple who went
| Ivy, but they didn't do that. Maybe that sort of thing is
| more likely among (though I don't mean exclusive to!) the set
| who're pushed to collect activities as a kid and carry that
| on into college and young adulthood.
|
| [edit] I don't mean to imply dance is bad, in fact it'd be
| sorta neat to be decent at dancing, it has just not been my
| experience that it's _at all_ a common skill--I know a lot
| more people who can play at least one instrument sort-of OK
| than people who can dance, like, at all. Actually I know more
| people who can play several instruments decently than who can
| dance at all. And I don't run in musician-heavy circles.
| riffraff wrote:
| > Maybe there are strong regional effects at play?
|
| 100% there are, plus age/cohort effcts. I grew up in
| central Italy and didn't know anyone who knew any dance,
| but by middle age caribbean dances (mostly salsa and
| bachata) became quite popular and every group of friends
| had a few folks taking classes and going to dance. There
| might have been a moment in time lambada was popular?.
|
| When I moved to Hungary it turned out everyone had learned
| waltz in school or something (tho nobody would go out to
| dance it).
| groby_b wrote:
| I was all "did he mean 'convincingly do the Charleston'",
| and thought that was an odd choice. Then I googled :)
|
| But that aside: It's kinda sad a lot of folks don't really
| learn to dance any more. It's a great way to socialize (and
| closely get to know mostly members of the relevant sex, if
| that's your kinda thing ;)
|
| The Swing community is still relatively strong, the
| ballroom community is somewhat smaller but at least
| somewhat alive, but social dancing as a general way to get
| together is almost non-existent outside of that.
|
| Highly recommended. (Though, skip most dance schools. If
| I've ever seen a money-extraction-scheme, it's ballroom
| dance schools in the US)
| bradlys wrote:
| It's unfortunate that these articles and discussions written by
| Americans about the dance are mostly going to be lost to the
| ether in the next ten years. As this dance and some others are
| mostly on their last breath in the US. Pre-covid things had
| slowed down a lot but covid killed almost every college dance
| club out there. It's uncommon to see anyone under 25 at these
| dances. The cost of dances/events skyrocketed as well. Young
| people who had no money were the life blood of any scene - the
| future organizers, instructors, DJs, and so on. It was rare to
| see people who started after 30 becoming organizers. Now, it's
| harder to even see people under 30 at a dance in the US and most
| organizers/DJs/teachers started over ten or even twenty years
| ago. It looks like there are more people who used to dance than
| future dancers.
|
| I'm not optimistic about the future of social dancing and that's
| why I've mostly given up on it after 15 years and doing 10
| different styles.
| inkcapmushroom wrote:
| There was one swing dance revival already, no reason there
| couldn't be another one. There's so much more information
| online about it now then people had when trying to reconstruct
| the dance style in the 90's as well, so even if it does die in
| our lifetime maybe there will be a 2120's swing dance revival
| as well. :)
| motohagiography wrote:
| appears I learned Savoy without knowing it owing to the emphasis
| on charlston, circularity, swingouts, and being more down low. I
| didn't think about why I stopped dancing.
|
| one of my favorite stories to tell about dancing in those days
| was going out to see a friend in LA and ending up at the Derby, a
| swing dance bar that was in a couple of movies and was central in
| the 90s swing revival. a girl we were with had just arrived in
| town from colorado to pursue her acting, she was an amazing
| dancer (to me) and one of those rare people who, with just a
| glance, could leave you completely charmed and happy to have met
| them. we never met again. some years later I saw her in a preview
| as she had landed a supporting character part in an indie movie
| that was showing at the toronto film fest or something. It was
| called Junebug. she became pretty famous, and knowing nothing
| about her at all- but just after dancing lindy hop in passing
| with her that one night, I always think she earned it.
|
| Anyway, dancing really connected people. I hope it becomes a
| thing again. it was a source of serendipity that's missing these
| days and it's funny to think about what became a part of the
| story of your life.
| Mistletoe wrote:
| What's her name?
| mbb70 wrote:
| Sounds like Amy Adams, 'pretty famous' would be an
| understatement
| kibwen wrote:
| Your regular reminder that every topic of human interest is an
| infinitely deep fractal of complexity.
| fsckboy wrote:
| not knowing what this article was talking about about, I searched
| youtube, nope. So I ddg'ed (and the first thing to come up was
| TFA eyeroll.gif) but luckily there was also this:
|
| Hollywood Style and Savoy Style
|
| In the '90s two new swing styles emerged in California that for a
| while were strong rivals with each other, the Savoy Style which
| can be traced back to the '80's revival of interest in lindy, and
| the 'Hollywood Style' which Erik Robison and Sylvia Skylar from
| Los Angeles put together in 1997. The latter combined west coast
| swing techniques with '40s dance stylings, most specifically Jean
| Veloz (who is featured in the 1940's short 'Groovie Movie' along
| with a number of major feature films), and "a look" derived from
| the dance sequences of various 1940's and 50's Hollywood films.
|
| Despite the name a sizeable proportion of the LA swing dance
| scene continued to adhere to the basic Dean Collins technique...
|
| they have some more to say if you want to look
|
| http://www.howtojive.com/intro-hollywood.htm
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