The Soapbox Archives:
I always look forward to this band. They're not really a swing band; they're a dance band and their sole purpose in the universe is to fill the dance floor so they play their music with the kind of energy that makes your feet drag the rest of your body onto the dance floor. Have they ever played a song that I didn't like? *Possibly*, but I doubt it and certainly wouldn't remember it over the number of songs where I stayed on the dance floor. I'm going to be so tired at the end of the night.
Of course, there's the BSDN dance, the dance that I attended after my first public foray into the social dance scene the night before. This was in 1991, three months after I started taking swing dance lessons. It's always been one of the best beginner-friendly dances I've been to. I might have spent the whole night holding up a wall if my future dance partner Susan Brown hadn't remembered me from class and dragged me off onto the dance floor. I always scheduled my California business trips so I'd be home for each month's dance. I thought I was going to miss one dance because I was stuck in Silicon Valley during 9/11. It was worth the effort to get a seat on the first United flight out of San Francisco that week; I got home three hours before the dance.
Lou Laudani's daughter Nora sent the following in:
Westview Cemetery (Section; Maple Ridge, Range D)P.S.: In a separate occasion, there will be a tribute to Lou by The Boston Swing Dance Network. Friends and family are invited to St. James Armenian Church, 465 Mt. Auburn Street, (at the corner of School Street,) in Watertown. $15 admission. Saturday, November 14th. In an evening of dancing to Doc Scanlon's Rhythm Boys from 8 to midnight, friends will pause mid-way to share remembrances of Lou Laudani at 9:30PM.
520 Bedford Street
Lexington, MA 02420
781-861-2718
November 22, 2009 10:45 AMDirections: Take Route 95/128 to Exit 31B. Follow Bedford Street .09 miles.
My own comments
For a last look at Lou doing what he did best, see Lou in Swing a Trois with Lisa Kleitz and Susan Dayno. You da man, Lou!
From Lou's family:
Please join us in a day of remembrance of A. Louis Laudani, as we gather at the Westview Cemetery for the burial of his ashes Sunday, November 22, at 10:45 am. We welcome anyone to speak, and please feel free to pass the word along to friends and family.
Westview Cemetery (Section; Maple Ridge, Range D)
520 Bedford Street
Lexington, MA 02420
781-861-2718
November 22, 2009 10:45 AMDirections: Take Route 95/128 to Exit 31B. Follow Bedford Street .09 miles.
I can tell you now that Smoken' Joe's BBQ & Blues in Brighton does *NOT* have any dancing. The whole place has a wooden floor but it's a small restaurant and one of the waitresses said that they didn't have a "dancing" license. What a shame. I'm not sure how the Love Dogs fit on that "stage".
While I was waiting for my food to arrive, I watched some guy in a Prius *try* to back into a space in front of the restaurant. A Prius is a pretty small car and the space was plenty big enough for it. The driver managed to *hit* the car behind him (not just a "tap") and pushed it back about 6 inches. On a second pass at parking, he still managed to hit the car again. I thought it'd be funny to run out and start yelling at the car for hitting "my" car, but luckily I didn't. It turned out that the driver was one of the musicians for the night.
On a slightly different note, I was wondering if Eight To The Bar was reading my HTML text because they sent me a note to tell me that a specific venue where they play definitely had a dance floor. This week's Soapbox was in last week's file but it was commented out when I had something more important to post. I was actually thinking of The Love Dogs' weekly mailing that never includes a start time, address or information about a dance floor at any dance venue they play at.
And on *that* note, does anyone know if the Strange Brew Tavern in Manchester, New Hampshire, has a dance floor? The 'Dogs are play there on December 11.
I saw a reprinted letter in someone's weekly newsletter about the importance of dancing with beginners. I was all excited about having someone promote dancing with beginners as a good thing.
It's not a reflection on the sender since it's not his letter, but I was somewhat disappointed in the letter. It appealed to the selfishness and self-interest of non-beginner dancers; it didn't discourage them from being snobby, it just suggested that it's worth suffering beginners in order to help a more advanced dancer improve their own leading and following skills. The note told readers that dancing with better dancers didn't help one's dancing because better dancers are better able to recover from bad leads/follows. Dancing with beginners forces people to make sure they're leading/following correctly and clearly. My point is that this letter tells people to dance with beginners for selfish reasons. I don't agree with that.
At my very first public dance, I was standing outside the dance floor when one of my teachers, Lynn Foord, walked by and saw me standing there and made me to go dance with her. Sure, it's the teacher's job to dance with their students once in a while; first-timers are going to be shy about getting on the dance floor; the teacher is going to want their students to have a good time and to come back (and take more lessons, of course). However, I think she asked me to dance because she was a nice person, knew how hard it was for beginners to start dancing, and possibly saw the potential that I might not be a beginner dancer forever. I doubt if she could have predicted that I would end up in the Rugcutters Dance Company two years later.
At my second public dance the next night, my future dance partner, Susan Brown, saw me holding up a wall at the back of the old BSDN dance (the original "IC Dance"). We had just been in class together in Swing 2 at Rugcutters and she was a familiar friendly face (to my great relief). She, too, dragged my sorry butt out to the dance floor and made sure I had a good time. Would I have gone out dancing anyway if these two women hadn't been generous to me? Probably...or I might have just watched from the back of the room for the rest of the night.
It was really three years of dance classes and dancing before I really broke the barrier that kept me from the Intermediate level and many more years before I felt good about my dancing. I wouldn't gotten there if it weren't for some nice people asking me to dance at my first few outtings.
Here are my thoughts about dancing with beginners:
The dance survives because there is a constant influx of new people entering the dance scene. Don't choke off that supply of future dancers by snubbing a beginner dancer.