This document contains a description of what is taught to Boogie-Woogie coaches in Finland.
- Boogie-woogie is a music that was popular since 1937.
- Boogie-Woogie is a dance for couples based on free leading. The basic step is based on the traditional 1,5 bars basic (two
walk steps and two chasse steps), but it does not have a compulsory
basic step or rules that would limit the dance performance. Improvisation is allowed.
- Boogie-woogie is the style of the 50's.
The dance Boogie-Woogie has a certain completely free "let-it-go" feeling.
There are still some limiting factors that have to be taken into account:
- Music - the dancing must go to the music. The dance is an interpretation of the music.
- Esthetics - instructions to the judges
- Tradition - based on the style and tradition of the 50's
- Taste - your own taste or the taste of the judges of what looks good.
- Rules - restricts the acrobatics to become a base of judging
- Profile - the style of the dance (free leading, danced by a couple)
- Basics - no kicks, large moves etc.
Basic technique
The basic idea of the basic step can be described as follow:
- The elements of the basic step are quick quick slow slow.
- The duration of the basic step is 1,5 bars.
The elements can be filled with various steps. The most used step could be called a basic step
step, step, chasse, chasse
where a chasse is a triple step
The basic step is just a general suggestion. You don't have to dance it all the time. Variations with the rhythm are allowed.
The "quicks" are walking steps. The "slows" can be danced as slows or you can fill them (eg. with triple steps).
Example: start moving on the last slow, take two walking steps and two triple steps.
1 - 2 - 3 a 4 5 a 6.
The timing of a triple step is "three-a-four" the middle "a" should not
be made too long. The step "three" is slightly extended.
The heel hits the floor on every step. For good visibility it is important
to use your knees to a great extent as there are no kicks in BW.
The knee should not be locked. The body above the hip should be steady.
The hip should also be steady, not moved from side to side like in jive.
As an exeption the ladys hip in slow music does move in the rhythm of her knees.
Usually Boogie-Woogie is danced in open positions. Most often with only one hand leading the partner.
Movements
In Boogie-Woogie you dance in only two directions:
- in the main dance direction
- perpendicular (90 degrees) to the main dance direction
This causes the dance to have its characteristic fast movement.
Especially for the girl. And it is also partially the reason why the
walking steps are usually taken in the dance direction so that a fast
movement can be maintained.
Turns
You can turn on all steps. The directions of the chasses are not
important. So it is not important to dance the chasse in the dance direction
in change of place.
Here is a good basic-step check-list for the dancer when dancing Boogie-Woogie.
- 1. Posture
- 2. Timing [3 a 4]
- 3. Usage of feet (relaxed, knees)
- 4. Upper body (relaxed, not jumping)
- 5. Hip (steady, not tilted from side to side like in jive)
- 6. Step (soft)
- 7. Bounce
Leading and following
The dance is improvised and is not based on a pre-defined choreography.
The movement of the girl depends on where the boy leads her.
The Lindy-Hop was based on two bars. When the movement in Boogie-Woogie
was shortened to 6 beats, there was a greater need for movement as the
time was shorter.
In Lindy the rock step was a "swing-out" step at the end of the movement.
When the swing-out was left out we have to move with the quick-quick steps.
You are allowed to move on any other basic step as well.
From the point of leading and following it is important to observe the
balance of the partner.
Dancing without a choreography is a good way to develope a good skill of
leading. If the couple just dances figures then the leading is not developed
as fast.
The girl is responsible of supporting the weight of her own arm. She is
not supposed to let the arm hang.
The timing of the signal from the boy is important. After the signal that
something is happening comes the direction and the power of the movement.
You are not supposed to pull the girl. She is supposed to use her own
feet to generate some movement.
All hand movements are not leading. The boy can lift the hand of the girl
like in the figure "grease". If the signal is lacking then the girl should
not interpret it as leading.
In leading and following you should have a flexible rubberband feeling
both in your arms and in the movement between your bodies.
An essential part is moving of the weight of the body, starting your own
body movement and stopping it.
With the hand you direct the movement of the girl. Example: if you want the
girl beside you then pull to the direction you want the girl to move to.
If you want to end a walk to a change of place:
The boy takes two walking steps after the walk. These belong to the
change of place. The girl recognises the change because the boy
takes the steps to the side and the dancing distance of the couple changes.
In spin you can lead the girl to a counter-move. This is best to lead
her to a counter-move for the counter-move first.
Starting to move
- "hang around" in music.
- Do not stand in a dance position and wait for the music to begin.
- Hanging around should stop on the count of three and the count of four should be the entry step.
In Boogie-Woogie you do the weight shift on the count of four.
The first dance movement is made on the beat preceeding beat one.
There is no rule of how to start but you have to have some preceeding
move before beat one. A weight shift is usually more reliable than
hand marks.
After a break you should start
- with a chassee step if you do not intend to move
- with two steps if you intend to walk
This is not the ultimate truth it is more like a recommendation.
After all, the boy can do what he wishes. Later it will help the
girl to know how the boy likes to dance.
If a couple makes a mistake then the boy continues to dance and the girl
cathes up. If the boy is completely lost then we have a problem.
Good breaks are usually short, 2 to 4 beats in duration.
Make use of your mistakes. If you make a mistake try to dance back again.
It is very difficult to practice recovery from mistakes, so every time
you get lost try to make the recovery as good as possible.
Stopping a dance and restarting breaks the overall performance.
In a real situation stopping a dance is out of the question.
Figures
Basic figures
These basic figures should be taught in the basic class:
- Basic step
- Link - a figure where you come close to your partner with the steps 1 - 2 and move apart with 3a4 5a6.
- Change of place - move on the quicks
- Italian change of place - the boy should leave his hand at the hip from where the girl catches it again after the turn.
- Throwaway - like change of place where you pass the girl. Nobody goes under anybodys arm.
- To the side and back (like in Rock 'n' Roll)
- American spin
- Walks
- Pull
- Counterclockwise spin - spin on the count of 2 counterclockwise in front of the boy
- Turn together - make a 360 degree turn facing each other
- Stop and go - like in jive, but the girl turns counterclockwise when coming out
- Running - change of place, follow the girl with a chasse, step front, step right and turn 180 degrees, chasse to the opposite direction
- U-turn - the boy goes completely around the girl. The right hand of the boy comes on the hip of the girl on the stop. The right hand of the girl is lifted to the right side of the girls face.
- Walzt-turn
- Roll with a turn to right
Basic dance figures
Change of place, lift up your knee out like in Rock 'n' Roll, heel in,
knee out, heel in, knee out - break, jump together (ta-dam).
More difficult dance figures
Rondel - change of place, quick quick, step 45 degrees right of dance direction,
let the other foot sweep a large arc for 4 beats.
Trick figures
Basic step 3 a 4, 5 a 6, 1 2 (the boy moves to an open position), step 3,
make the trick together, throw the girl out.
Open figures
The dance program
The essential thing is to dance the whole piece of music from start to the
end. You can test the level of your performance of your program during
practice well enough for social dancing. But for competitions the only
place to evaluate the performance is in the competition.
The program is dictated by the music. You can decide about the beginning
and the end. You can also decide to do something special somewhere in
the program.
A classical end-figure is where the girl sits on the boys knee.
Just changing places does not taste good in the long run. Experienced
dancers like to use a large amount of figures.
Spices
The style of the basic step will vary from one teacher to the other.
It is your own responsibility to pick the spices you desire to your
own basic technique.
Variations
The richness of dancing is based on variations. Even simple figures
and basic techniques can be made more interesting by variations.
You can make variations on
- figures - grips, directions, combinations
- basic technique - qq, s, different walks
- rhythm - duration of a figure or change of the basic technique.
Some examples of variations of rhythm
- 3 a 4 5 a 6 feet apart (ta-dam) and back together (ta-dam)
- 3 a 4 5 a 6 twist-steps forward
- 3 a 4 5 a 6 2 hullygullys on the inner edge of the feet.
Make them downward in the V-direction
- 3 a 4 kick a 6 1 2
- slow slow quick quick
- do the slows by swinging your hips in a downward arc
- do the slows by moving the foot to the side and sliding the other
foot towards it
Interpretation of music
In Boogie-Woogie this is the
most important thing.
Make variations of grips, use breaks and change figures.
The thins you should interpret are:
- breaks
- series of rhythm or characteristic places where instruments are used
- phrases and the changes of them
- the nature of the music
Improvisation is an essential part of interpretation. The boy desides
when he will lead the improvisation and when the girl will lead it.
The boy is responsible to decide when the improvisation starts and when
it ends. It is also important to learn how to save the dance after
failed improvisations.
Performance
It is important to dance to the music and dance so that it feels good.
Performing is to dance in such a way that also the audience can see
that the dance feels good.
Public performances should look good.
A common mistake is to make so small movements that you cannot see anything
going on if you look at the couple from 50 meters away.
Music
The boogie-woogie music has 4 beats to a bar. The emphasis is on the
beats 2 and 4.
1/4 1/4 3/16 1/16 1/4 3/16 1/16 1/4
1 2 3 a 4 5 a 6
It is more accurate to measure the time for 8 bars than to calculate the
beats for 15 seconds.
In swing-music the phrase is 8 bars. In boogie-woogie the phrase is
12 bars.
Competitions
Classes:
- juniors - 18
- general 14 -38
- seniors 34 -
The slow round is danced to 30 - 34 bars/minute. The duration is 1 minute.
Currently there is a lot pressure from the dancers and judges to extend
this time to 1:30 as one minute is much too short for doing a good
interpretation of the music.
The fast round is danced to 50-54 bars/minute. The duration is 1:30.
The couple cannot have its own music. In the finale a couple can
choose its music from alternatives presented by the organizer.
The slow round is danced in the finals only.
In the preliminary round you can have 3 couples, in the semifinals
2 couples and in the finals one couple on the floor.
The judges give points to the couples using these limits:
- foot technique 0 - 10 points
- dance figures 0 - 10 points
- performance and interpretation of music 0 - 10 points
Subtractions: for each mistake in rhythm -2 points.
History and situation today
Tango came to Finland in 1913. On the recreational scene tango, one-step
and two-step were popular. In 1920 they standardised the dances.
Lindy-hop was born in 1926-1927. The dances are usually born to popular
music. The name Lindy-hop was connected to thois dance in the festivities
of the trans-Atlantic flight of Charles Lindberg on May 13th in 1927.
Lindy was danced in New York Harlem from morning to evening mainly by the
black population. As music they used swing.
Lindy came to the west coast in the 1930. And small teams were created
for performing Lindy on stage in restaurants.
Frank Manning was a member in a group called Whitey's Lindy Hoppers.
Frank was also teaching Lindy to another dancer who later moved to
teach Lindy to the west coast and also designed the choreography to
the movie Rock around the clock.
1936 they started to dance "air-step" figures. Nowadays they use the term
aerials instead of acrobatics. Foot-technique is likewise called
floor step.
During the war the dance came to Europe with entertaining groups and
US soldiers.
1938 boogie-woogie was born as a way to play the piano.
It was played by loggers in trains and cabins.
The term boogie-woogie ment laying around together.
After the war the dance came to Finland in 1945. It was then called jive.
The word jive means cheating like in "You are just jiving".
Bill Haley was recording already in 1951-52. But in 1956 the movie
Rock around the clock brought the real rock-boom.
The competitive dancing in Finland was as active as it is today.
In 1961 the twist came and the rock died away.
The twist was no longer a dance for couples. It was more like the
hip-hop today. The Beatles-hysteria in 1963 made twist music rare
and the twist died away.
After this people went to concerts to listen to music.
In France and Germany they still danced Boogie-Woogie in the 1970's.
But the name was then Rock 'n' Roll.
The Germans started to standardise the kicks of Rock 'n' Roll
and the active competitions made the new style popular.
The Boogie-Woogie competitions begun in 1984. The activity has
concentrated to individual countries mainly in Italy and countries
close to Germany.
In Finland Boogie-Woogie started in 1992. The main source for information
has been videos from Germany, Eurosport and training camps in Sweden.
So far we have attended 3 camps in Sweden. The dance is concentrated
to the Helsinki area but there is some activities in 4 other areas
in Finland also. The first competition in Boogie-Woogie was held
last month.
So far we have about 10 competing couples and 80 social-dancing couples.
We have three international Rock 'n' Roll judges that have taken part
in the WRRC Boogie-Woogie judge seminars. We have no
national judge education or examinations yet.
Arranging of a basic course
- Excersises
- Change of couples
- Warm-ups, stretching, foot-technique and body exercises.
Start by a light warming up (to the music!!). Then some light
stretches.
Attitude: if the teacher is 10 minutes late then everybody should already
be dancing. Teach everybody where the tape-recorder is.
The purpose of the excersises is to find the different parts of your body.
Once you have found them you can use them in your dance.
Last modified 28th of February, 1995 by
Karri Kaksonen
