Swing
article reprinted from The Influx, Spring 1998
University of Oregon School of Journalism and
Communication
Betty (Henderson) Wood and partner dance at
the Roxy Theater in New York. |
Story
by Kara Barrett, based on articles by Denise Steele
and interviews with Betty Wood.
Photographs courtesy of Denise Steele via Betty
Wood.
he year is 1937 and the biggest dance craze in
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina is the Big Apple, a
collection of jazzy swing moves danced in a group
circle with a caller announcing the steps to big
band music. African American dancers invented the
swinging steps at a synagogue turned nightclub in
Columbia, South Carolina, and later, three white
students copied the steps at the University of South
Carolina's prom. From there, the Big Apple was taken
to New York by a group of sixteen teenagers who
danced at the Roxy Theatre, performing five or six
shows a day to packed crowds of 6,500 people. Betty
Wood was one of those teenagers. And out of the
original sixteen, Betty was one of only six chosen
to dance on Broadway.
That
was 61 years ago, and today Betty is still making an
impact by spreading the Big Apple to audiences eager
to rediscover the genre. Big band music and swing
dancing--in all its forms--is popular again in a big
way. According to Denise Steele, a Lindy Hop
instructor, the dances are at the root of the
exploding swing trend. "Exposing America back
to its own dance forms affected swing music and now
it's come full circle," she says. Steele is
currently in her fourth year teaching the Lindy
full-time all over Western Oregon. She says she has
had up to three hundred students total in her four
instructing locations at one time. Steele has also
brought Frankie Manning, an original Whitey's Lindy
Hopper--and now Betty Wood--to the Northwest to
teach workshops to the public.
|
A newspaper clipping of Betty and partner
demonstrating the Big Apple. |
On a
Saturday morning in early May, about fifty students
of all ages have gathered to learn four dances known
as the Big Apple, Little Apple, Carolina Jitterbug,
and Shag, from Wood. "I'm little but I'm
mighty," says the time-tested Betty over a
microphone from onstage in a gymnasium at the
University of Oregon. At age 77, Betty looks like
your typical grandmother. In fact, she has six
grandkids. She has curly white hair and wears
glasses and bright pink lipstick. She speaks with a
gentle Southern accent from her years growing up in
Charlotte, North Carolina. Now as she stands
onstage, Betty grins from ear to ear and watches the
students as if they were her own grandchildren.
Her
dance partner and co-instructor is a man about half
her age. Lance Benishek, who is also a dance
historian and choreographer, rediscovered Betty back
in 1992. Betty had stopped swing dancing in 1962
when she and her husband moved to Florida. Instead
she taught ballroom, tap, and jazz dance. But in
1992, she was the only one of the original sixteen
Roxy dancers who remembered the steps to the Big
Apple and other dances. Since then, she has traveled
to Sweden, England, and across the United States,
spreading her knowledge of the dances to others. She
jokes around by saying that dancing with Lance is
like dancing with her son. But she admires his
knowledge and says, "He knows more about where
or when dances originated than I do."
|
Betty (Henderson) Wood and Kenneth Clark
demonstrate their newfound dance step. |
Even
though the Big Apple was one of the three biggest
dance crazes to hit the United States--the other two
being the Charleston and the Twist--its popularity
wore off and the dance evolved into other forms.
According to Betty, a partner dance known as the
Little Apple was created out of the Big Apple, and
with the introduction of the swing kick, it became
the Jitterbug of the 1940s and 1950s. "We had
the same eight-count as up in Harlem,"
remembers Betty, noting that the Lindy and Jitterbug
were simply known as "fast dancing" back
then.
Betty
says she never imagined that the dances she grew up
with would be this popular again, but she thinks the
resurgence of "touch dancing" is
wonderful. Although she listens to swing music
24-hours-a-day because it's "good for the
soul," Betty isn't familiar with modern swing
bands like the Cherry Poppin' Daddies. Lance, on the
other hand, admires the efforts of the Daddies and
other groups working with the swing sound. "I
think it's great. They're giving people a modern
form to do these dances to and that's real
special." Steele predicts that this is just the
beginning of a widespread interest in vintage
dancing. "People will go back to the dances and
the swing era and discover that it's so rich."
She believes that jazz and swing are a big part of
our cultural history and we should be really proud
of them. With people like Betty willing to spread
these dances to a new, enthusiastic generation,
swing is finally receiving the recognition it
deserves.
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