Dancing Time

Otago Witness, Issue 3833, 30 August 1927, Page 6

Dancing Time

THE CHARLESTON BLUES.

THE CHARLESTON DANCED TO MUSIC IN BLUES TIME.

By

Maxwell Stewart,

, World’s Champion Ballroom Dancer, 1924-25-26.

(Copyright.—For the Otago Witness.)

XXIII. We are getting steadily back to the slow time, via the Charleston Blues. This is a more natural transition than to drop the Charleston out altogether and just do the old Blues stops, as some people have tried. Besides, the Blues steps are rather difficult, and many of us have forgotten them.

There is nothing original in the Charleston Blues. It is just the Charleston danced to music in Blues time ; at about 42 bars to the minute. The time of the Charleston proper has not been affected by this move. It is still usually done at about 52 bars, and this remains the competition pace. Some dance bands continue the short-sighted policy of playing at 60 and over, but some day they will wake up to realise that they have driven all but the rowdier element as far away from them as it is possible to get, for serious dancers have crown out of the desire for a galloping Charleston. Luckily the galloping bands are balanced by one or two of the best combinations in London which have a habit of setting dance fashions. It is because these bands are interspersing a 42-bar time fairly freely in their programmes that I think the practice will spread. Naturally Charleston steps danced at 42 undergo a modification process. Thev do not lose anything of their essential character, but the staccato element almost disappears. Every movement becomes smoother, and it is possible to make more progress. One or "two distinctive variations have made their appearance to satisfy the new needs. There is. of course, an occasional Black Bottom effect in the Blues time; but more usual are the Twinkle, single and double, and a sort of hesitation effect like a decorte. It is worth while describing these two.

In the Twinkle the man takes a step forward with the right foot from the closed position, and then, bringing the left foot up to the right on the half beat, he steps back with the right on two. This is the Single Twinkle. The Double Twinkle begins with the same steps and continues from where the Single Twinkle left off with the left foot forward and the weight on the right foot. The forward foot is brought backwards to the closed position. On the half beat the weightis changed on to the right foot with a slight backward slide step on this foot, and the dancer leads off again with his left foot on two. This gives a very neat effect. For Single and Double Twinkle the lady's steps are the reverse of her partner’s. It should be noticed that the foot-changing is done in double time. The Hesitation step differs slightly for the man and his partner. The man steps forward with the right from the close, while the girl steps back with the left and maintains the weight on this foot. The man now pauses while his partner swings her right foot back, either behind the left or to the close position, and swiftly takes it forward again across her left foot while the weight still remains on the left. While she performs this last movement, the man rocks the weight from right back on to the left foot, and then both dancers come to the close position together, the man drawing his right foot back to his left, and the girl with her weight on the right foot carries her left 4 ~,4 (rir] is now on the man's right-hand side in

■ o-, i’io'i similar to that in the Feather. The dancers go from this into the walk.

I think the Charleston Blues are paving the way for a return to the “ oldfashioned ” foxtrot.