Galway to Birmingham - all aboard the Swing Express!

I just shared a post about my recent trip to Galway for Lindyfest 2015 but as much as enjoyed it, my elation was also tempered by the knowledge that it was Paul and Sarah Neary's final fling as the leaders of the Galway swing scene.

They have given so much of themselves to put Galway on the map and to ensure that it is at the vanguard of the Irish swing revival, and considering Paul and Sarah's pioneering stewardship in a popular art-form I'm sure I'm not the first to draw the obvious parallels between them and another somewhat prominent power couple: Jay Z and Beyoncé.

Much like Jay Z and his Brooklyn origins, Paul also hails from a modern hipster mecca (Melbourne) that's undergone notable redevelopment from the comparatively unfashionable streets he spent his formative days hustling.

Additionally, the establishment, growth and success of Galway Swing (and now Swing Express) has followed an almost identical trajectory to that of Roc-A-Fella and its international subsidiaries. Almost identical.

But global domination can be a lonely thing, so as Paul liked it he put a ring on it: a single lady with a mutual passion from a very talented all girl ensemble who has also demonstrated phenomenal prowess as a soloist. And both have picked up a considerable number of accolades along the way

Paul started Galway Swing 12 years ago and it was there that he met Sarah who has since become his right hand woman and better half and together they have nurtured a swing scene that punches well above its weight despite the other major cities on our wee island, Dublin, Cork and Belfast, all dwarfing Galway by population.

That said, to suggest Galway is only better on a pound-for-pound basis does it a disservice because if the ever reliable meter of Facebook 'likes' are anything to go by, Galway is well ahead of the others on merit.

Size, however, isn't the be all and end all (now now, keep those innuendos in check!) and Paul and Sarah's warmth and fervent dedication has permeated the west of Ireland and is reflected in the earnest ebullience of its swing community.

The high standard of the dancers to be found in Galway (including some of my absolute favourite follows) is another credit to Paul and Sarah's teaching, and for this reason I have no doubt that Galway shall continue to be a joy to visit, but I am of course gutted that they are leaving.

with permission from Anita McGarry photography

As well as their contribution to the Irish swing family I am also incredibly grateful to Paul and Sarah on a personal level for the encouragement they gave me the first time I met them and on an occasion where I really needed it.

Last year, for my first ever swing weekender and not much longer than a year after I had started learning Lindy hop, I went to the London Swing Festival with Anna and, as well as attending our first pro workshops, this also included our first attempt at competing. It didn't go well.

Anna had introduced me to Paul and Sarah briefly when we had arrived on the Friday night as she had actually started dancing under their tutelage during her time in Galway, but before we could really get chatting, Anna and I were shortly called up for our competition heat.

It was to be an an all-skate (everyone dancing at once) which calmed the nerves a little, but having been asked to fan out across the floor we found ourselves at the front.

The dance was going well enough and then, as planned, we thought we'd throw in an airstep that we were hitherto pretty confident in, but, for a couple of reasons, it failed utterly and very publicly.

Not only could we not hide behind other dancers, courtesy of being at the front, it just so happened that our heat featured two Blue Peter presenters and so a few BBC cameras were also floating around recording the whole thing for national TV.

After inadvertently creating a move that we now refer to as the 'elegant salmon' and one that is unlikely to appeal to swing purists or anyone with a shred of dignity, we skulked off the floor, hoping it would swallow us up, but Paul made a point of immediately coming up to us and stating that "unlike everyone else, at least you went for it."

If I'd known Paul's significance in Lindy circles I would have been even more appreciative (as a point of comparison this was early enough in my swing career that I was distinctly unawed by the presence of Skye Humphires as I simply had never heard of him) but nonetheless it was exactly the kind of thing I needed to hear when my confidence had just taken a major hit. On top of that, Sarah insisted that we had several dances that weekend when there were plenty of much better leads to be had, and I was also to discover that Sarah is one of the most incredibly fun people to dance with.

Dancing is one of those things where confidence can play a huge role and I have to thank Paul and Sarah for helping me keep mine on that weekend and in my dancing since.

I also have to thank them for their continued support of this blog, as not only did Paul kindly allow me to interview him (in the midst of a busy Lindy Hopper's Delight weekender!) for a piece I wrote on Frankie Manning, Sarah has also been incredibly encouraging and complimentary about my articles, and that truly means a lot.

I'm very sad to see them go but equally I'm very excited to see what magic they can conjure in and around Birmingham, a city almost 14 times more populous than Galway.

I look forward to attending their first big event but now would be a great opportunity to share some information about Paul and Sarah's new classes!

They currently have three weekly classes planned that target beginners and shall hopefully see an exponential explosion of swing in the West Midlands:

Monday // Harborne: 7:45pm – St Mary’s Church, Vivian Road
Tuesday // Coventry: 7:30pm – Biggin Hotel Hall, 214 Binley Road
Wednesday // Sutton Coldfield: 7:30pm – St James Church Centre, 61 Mere Green Road

Their classes operate on a 'drop in' basis so no booking is required and payment is taken at the door: £7 each or £6 for students and the unwaged. Further information can be found on their website.

And now I suppose there is nothing else for me to do but wish them the very best of luck in their new endeavour! All aboard the Swing Express!!

Galway Lindyfest 2015

the Lindyfest lineup: JeongWoo & Crystal, Marcos & Lucille, Skye & Frida

It's easy to get excited about going away when you're flying to get there or heading somewhere new or exotic but when you only have to drive for four hours the anticipation of visiting somewhere otherworldly can be harder to evoke.

But that's just not the case with Galway.

What makes it so special is the high concentration of great dancers and great people in such a small city, making Galway, pound for pound, the best swing scene on our little green island or anywhere else (despite it being dwarfed by possibly every other city I've danced in) and long may that continue.

The drive itself was pretty straight forward and as with my last trip to Galway, we once again headed for the Kinlay Hostel where eight of the 13-person Belfast contingent (a new travelling record for our scene!!) piled into a single dorm before heading out for what was, quite honestly, the best pizza I think I have ever tasted. Good job, Dough Bros, and thanks to the Galway Swing girls who recommended it and met us there!

The weekend itself kicked off with the teachers introduction and then some competition heats interspersed with social dancing and plenty of greetings, hugs, and catch-ups: a really nice way to get things going.

Once you hit the dancefloor, however, you had to be careful you didn't actually hit it because I'm not sure I've danced on one quite as fast for a while and until I sorted myself out, I likely made a more than passing resemblance to Bambi's first encounter with a frozen lake. Still, for me that just opens things up as I enjoy incorporating slides into my dancing when I can. Although, on more than one occasion, said slides were not necessarily added by design.

One of the highlights of my Friday night was getting to dance with Lucille Pinteaux, one of the pros there to lead one third of the weekend's workshops alongside Marcos Agote, but had I had more sense about me I likely wouldn't have asked her for a dance on the first night when I hadn't quite warmed up.

It usually takes me at least a full day of dancing to build up the confidence (and practice!) to ask a pro for a dance at one of these events but as I didn't immediately recognise Lucille, and she happened to glance at me just as I was looking for my next dance partner, I decided to ask her up.

I should say that I intend no offence to Lucille by confessing I didn't recognise her right away but when I watch videos etc of any pros I very very rarely pay any attention to the follows - it's the leads who I want to emulate and they are the ones I focus on - so it wasn't until I took her hands for a swing out that I realised who she was.

The penny dropped when I felt Lucille's connection - that paradox of a handhold that is simultaneously delicate but firm, that feels barely there but is perfectly primed to respond to everything and anything the lead attempts, and one that immediately marks out a supreme dancer. And as soon as I got that, I immediately recognised who I was dancing with and my thoughts started screaming "DO GOOD STUFF!! DO THE BEST STUFF!!" as my brain became the gun-slinger in a Wild West saloon shooting directions at my feet and imploring them to dance.

I think I handled it well enough, Lucille was very pleasant afterwards and as no injury or embarrassment was caused to either party (or any around us) I shall mark it off as a success, and as it was to be my final dance of the night it meant I finished on a high.

The following morning, however, classes brought me down to earth with a bump.

We started with Skye Humphries and Frida Segerdahl and... well... holy heck... I've not had such an intense start to a Saturday morning since it involved an ignored alarm clock, unpacked luggage and an international flight. And do not let Skye's mellow visage fool you - the man's attention to detail is stunning!

To begin with, we warmed up with some up tempo solo jazz before they took us through a fairly basic but classic pattern - nothing revolutionary - but it was exactly the type of class that anyone who wants to put themselves into the 'advanced' level should get accustomed to. Deconstructing and reconstructing. Taking moves you think are second nature, stripping them down, and learning them all over again. Correctly.

And that kind of thing can be pretty humbling.

I've mentioned before how teachers sometimes stand in the middle of a class and provide veiled, targeted advice by remarking "I can see a few people doing this..." in a non-specific direction; and everyone nods but internally denies it's them. But then when the teacher comes up to you, rests a hand on your shoulder, looks straight into your eyes and says "no, really, don't..." you can be fairly certain that that message lacks ambiguity.

In fact, there were a few classes from the weekend which triggered plenty of reflection in terms of my basics and a desire to improve, and for that I am very grateful, but one of the things that I also must get over is my absolute disdain for solo jazz.

Right now, the best way I can think of it is that solo jazz is to Lindy hop what reading Shakespeare or Dickens was to my English curriculum at school - a necessary and vital part of my education that, once I push past the frustration, irritation and... eh... hatred, I shall likely look back upon it and fail to understand why it flummoxed me so much.

Actually, let's hope solo jazz is like Dickens. Dickens I can now appreciate. Shakespeare, however, I shall never understand. A Midsummer Night's Dream? Billy Shakes was trippin' balls. Why Tim Burton hasn't turned that one into a modern Gothic marvel I don't know. Too obvious? I digress...

Saturday night in full swing; Scott with his medal haul; the advanced class with Skye & Frida!

Anyhow, the weekend made it clear to me that if I want to get better at Lindy I need to put the time in to  get better  start learning some solo jazz.

In fact, it wasn't just solo jazz that was sprung upon us but balboa also made an unprompted appearance and that was absolutely fantastic.

I have wanted to learn balboa for a while so to get a crash course (from JeongWoo Hong and Crystal Lee) was really really cool. Seemingly, just about everyone else in the room had danced balboa before, and perhaps, as we were the advanced Lindy hop class, it was fair to assume we'd have a reasonable level of competency in balboa as well.

Me? Not so much.

Moves were called for the first mini balboa sequence of the class: "basic, basic, come-around, throw-out..." but just as everyone was about to launch into it, I ventured to put up my hand:

"sorry, but... eh... what's a basic?!"

JeongWoo and Crystal, and all of the follows that I then danced with, for that matter, were very accommodating and I was relieved to learn that it wasn't actually just me with no previous experience of balboa - I just happened to be the one voicing my shortcomings. But that little taster was just the right amount to have me convinced that I need to keep it up. And that Saturday night was a perfect example of why having a little bit of balboa in the back pocket can be very useful indeed.

The music that night was provided by a gypsy jazz band called "I Saw Stars" but I have to say I struggled with the high tempo (if only I knew more balboa!!) and spent an uncharacteristic amount of my time not dancing so I fell well short of my usual weekend target of trying to dance with every follow there! And that included two people pretty much at the top of my mental dance-card: Sarah Neary and Frida.

That said, the dances I did have were great fun and much like I finished the Friday night dancing with a pro, I ended the Saturday night in a similar vein as I got to dance with Crystal (again, amazing; obviously), and thankfully it was to a more Lindy hop style tempo!

The big events of the Saturday night, though, were the competitions and as well as the ensemble - where I competed as part of Belfast's group "Swing Situation, So It Is!" - I also entered the Jack & Jill.

The practices for the ensemble with Scott & Naomi, Sharon & Richard* (*occasionally, haha!), and Anna had been a lot of fun but had also been quite draining (if I hear Dinah Washington's I Diddle one more time...) and after much toil, bruising and body slams (sorry, Anna!) I am proud to report we came fourth! Although I begrudgingly accept that that result somewhat loses its lustre when you consider there were only four teams competing...

In the Jack & Jill (for anyone unfamiliar with this format, competition partners are decided purely by chance) I lucked out and got Naomi but my competition inexperience (this was my first Jack & Jill) did us no favours as I forgot to keep track of the eight 8-beat bars and didn't quite finish leading the spotlight in time! Ah well... Sorry, Naomi!

I have to say, I thought Anna looked fantastic in her spotlight, even though she missed out on placing, but I am happy to share that the Belfast contingent did not return home completely empty-handed (as you can see in the photo above) as Scott picked up 3rd in Solo Charleston, 2nd in the Allstars Jack & Jill, and 1st in the open Jack & Jill (partnered with Laura Hicks who deserves a mention for winning almost everything she could!).

There were more classes on the Sunday, with Skye & Frida again working on reworking and refining your basics and jazz, Marcos & Lucille teaching some more subtle but fantastic little moves, and JeongWoo and Crystal sharing some really fun swing-out timing and footwork variations.

This brought the weekend's main events to a close but a quite sizeable group then headed into town for food and more great live music and dancing. The first stop was at a bar called Seven and featured the same band that had performed the night before but this time they dropped the double bass, wound the tempo down for an easier Sunday night vibe and were now called "The Lazy Blues Band." This was later followed by a trip to a stunning little traditional drinking house called Tigh Neachtain and featured some fab blues by the "Tom Portman Trio" and it just provided a lovely way to finish the weekend - some wonderful final dances and quality time with awesome people.

I had a fantastic weekend and drove home very satisfied but I must say that it was also a little bittersweet, and that was nothing to do with the weekend itself but because of some big impending departures from the Galway scene.

Paul & Sarah Neary - the genial geniuses behind Galway Swing who should receive most of the praise for driving the swing revival across Ireland since Paul's arrival 12 years ago - are moving to Birmingham to set up a brand new swing collective called Swing Express (and I also encourage people to 'like' their Facebook page to keep abreast of their developments!).

I'm gutted, and I don't know anyone else in the dance community on our wee island that wouldn't be, and not least the ones in Galway, as their effervescence is what helped create my favourite scene to visit for a bit of Lindy, but I must also admit that I'm excited to see what they can do with what is the UK's largest city after London.

I've written a short post to thank them for their immensely positive influence on the swing community here and on me personally, as well as to provide some details on their new endeavour across the water, but for now I'd like to wish them the very best of luck!

Additionally, on the Sunday night I learnt that, as well as Sarah, another of my favourite dancers is due to depart in the coming months as Jessica is likely heading home to Spain in the summer. AND I heard that yet more cracking dancers, Duana and Lisa, may also be considering relocating! Girls, my selfish suggestion is: don't leave!

It almost seems like the end of an era, hence my conflicting emotions on my drive home, but I know it won't stop me returning as there are so many great dancers in Galway, and it attracts yet more, so I know it shall very much continue to be a long drive I fervently look forward to.

A few final notes:

Firstly, quite a few people remarked on my dance shoes - a few guys were keen to know where I got them and one of the pros, Lucille, recognised them as they are sold by a friend of hers! They are only made and sold by a little shop in Barcelona called Slide&Swing and I'd love to see them get their dues as they are a joy to dance in and look the dog's danglies.

Secondly, for a Belfast contingent of 13 people (a Swing Belfast dozen with the Bellehopper flag carried by the ever dapper Declan) to travel to Galway really made me feel very proud of our nascent scene. Cork, Galway and Dublin always represent themselves well when they travel to other events across Ireland so for Belfast to now be operating on that level makes me feel incredibly chuffed. I'm not attepting to take any praise for that but I had to mention how great it made me feel. Anna, Sharon, Richard, David, David, Richard, Scott, Naomi, Sarah, Katharina, Paul, Declan, and myself. Great, great effort!

And finally, I should apologise to anyone that may have gotten sick since Galway as I was not well, nor were some of the other Belfast crowd for that matter, and dancing with so many people in a hot and humid environment can have the potential to be somewhat unhealthy! But, as I have yet to be subjected to any cough-peppered invectives, I am hopeful everyone has escaped with an unburdened immune system!

All in all, it was another great Galway galavant. Thanks to Paul & Sarah for organising it (whilst packing up your lives!), the Galway swing community for hosting it, the teachers for their excellent workshops and everyone who went and made it so wonderful. See you next time!

the wall - getting from complete beginner to the next level

Some of the faster learners hit a wall after just a few weeks whilst others must pass through it a bit later but I think just about everyone, at some stage early on in their learning, contemplates screaming SCREW THIS! I'M OUT! while making a dramatic exit.

I'm fairly sure it's not unique to swing dancing but as that is the dance family that I'm a part of I hope this post will help some of the new learners appreciate that they are not alone - especially since the current term at Swing Belfast, where I help teach, is drawing to a close and class numbers are starting to drop.

I can remember my own frustrations starting out and they were magnified all the more because when I was first learning swing I was already somewhat competent at salsa and ceilidh dancing.

In the first few swing classes I could write-off my struggles as being normal. I had never moved my feet/arms/body in such a pattern before in my life so I was quite at peace with the idea of not 'getting it' and I reckoned it would come soon enough.

But around my fifth or sixth week of going to classes when I could see some others, who I assumed had started at the same time as me, were having no difficulty at all, all I could think of was "well... if only they could see me salsa dance they'd know I wasn't completely useless."

Pure and simple, it was pride. It sucked to be rubbish, to be near others who weren't, and to be at the bottom of the ladder again after having climbed much higher up a few others (although, if anyone saw me dance salsa now they'd wonder how I could claim to be anywhere but the bottom rung).

Thinking there were other styles that I wasn't completely useless at, and thinking that every time we rotated partners I had a new follow to disappoint, really tested my desire to persevere but as anyone who has broken through the wall can attest: keep going! It's the biggest dance hurdle you'll face!

In a way, these frustrations are a useful bottleneck as they filter out those with too much overt pride. The sanctimonious types who would likely be absolutely no fun to dance with anyway.

But there are plenty of people learning to dance who are naturally quite shy and reserved and after thinking it hasn't quite clicked for them, they decide to quietly slip away, avoiding what they expect to be certain public humiliation. It is those people that I hope will read this and stick at it.

Everyone has to learn from scratch, everyone has misread/kicked/apologised to a dance partner at some stage, and most importantly, everyone is still learning. For a perfect example, check out the most recent videos of your favourite pro dancers and then search for older videos of the same pros and you'll likely see a big difference. And not only in the way they dressed!

Stepping up from complete beginner to the next level is genuinely the biggest step you will take learning swing dancing. Beyond that point you will simply be adding to the concrete foundation you have built over the past few weeks or months as pretty much every other move you learn will be an embellishment or refinement of a fundamental pattern or rhythm that you already know.

And finally, it's worth emphasising that social dancing is where the learning and the fun really happens! There's no point learning a new skill if you don't actually trot it out but more than that, social dancing is where you will start to truly appreciate the hype about swing dancing! I've written before about the fear some people have for their first social dances (and a few tips for how to ease into the social scene) but going to a social dance well and truly obliterates any of these fears.

The dancing is awesome, the music is awesome but most of all the people are awesome and the sooner you realise that absolutely no one in the room cares who makes a fool of themselves (and the more you get into it you may actively attempt to look ridiculous) you'll wonder why you were so worried in the first place.

This is likely to be the only time I ever endorse Miley Cyrus but she makes a fair point - when you hit that wall, WRECK IT! Just keep your clothes on.