This has been the most fun Lindy Hop related project that I have worked on. It’s been a huge pleasure to work with such an enthusiastic and creative group of people. I can’t tell you how cool it was to suggest idea after idea to these people, who would then jump all over it, and amazingly turned into something much better than I thought possible. I hope you get as much enjoyment out of listening to the show as we did putting it together.

Our DJ’s
I’d like to thank all the DJ’s who participated by scouring their vast music collections for their hottest tunes to put on the air. Every time I thought the music couldn’t get better, I received someone else’s submissions and got my mind blown again.

Luke Albao
Jerry Almonte
Kate Hedin
Allen Kerr
Betsy Kipperman
Mike Marcotte
Andy Reid
Glenn Scales
Lee Tucker
Naomi Uyama

The Announcers
I’d like to thank the voices of The Jam Cellar on Yehoodi Radio: Luke Albao and Bobby White who pulled triple duty writing, performing, and recording their voiceovers for the show.

There’s also a special cameo appearance by Mark Kotishon of the Boilermaker Jazz Band.

The Hot Club de Jam Cellar
For turning a throw away idea into preposterously amusing recordings.
Vocals-Naomi Uyama
Viola-Kate Hedin
Drums-Jeff Booth
Guitars-Luke Albao, Andy Reid, Bobby White
Dinah’s Southern Gentleman Friend-Bobby White
Lyrics by Luke Albao and Naomi Uyama.

Everyone else who helped out with this project
Jesse Miner at Yehoodi.com for shepherding us through this process.
Soo Clarke for taking the DJ picture.
Hyong Lee for providing the recording of the Boilermakers at DCLX 2006.
Paul Cosentino for letting us use said recording.
And of course all the great musicians, both past and present, that inspire us to dance every week.

Check it out here.

Don’t worry, You will like it.

I made this Jam Cellar announcement for you. I hope you like it. It's got dinosaurs.

Dad told me I'd better do better than that, since he has to spend most of his coal mining paycheck for you on Mothers Day. So me and sis and all the others got together to put on the Most Splendiferous Jam Cellar Family Mother's Day Talent Show Ever!!! tonight. For starters, we made a radio show for you! And that scary Mr. Almonte even promised he'd put it on the online! And he and Uncle Mike Marcott are going to play music from it at The Most Happidiest Jam Cellar Family Mother's Day Talent Show Ever!!! tonight. I want to be a shark when I grow up.

Love,

Billy Watson

P.s. — I also got you a Transformer. I hope you like it.

P.s.s.s. – See our program for the Most Bestest Fun-Fun Jam Cellar Ninja Family Mother's Day Talent Show Ever!!!

Building Your Basics starts tonight!

Daddy promised he'd get Uncle Jeff and Aunt Kate to teach us how to Lindy Hop , even though daddy says they're nothing but deadbeat musicians. I've never seen them do magic, but it'd be great if they could for the talent show. Anyway, they'll teach beginner Lindy Hop over the next six weeks! ($60 for six weeks, includes dances).

31 Flavors Class starts tonight!

Aunt Naomi and Uncle Bob are going to surprise you with a visit and talk about many different ways to mix-up swing dance fun-damentals. It'll be just like last Christmas when they came to visit, except Uncle Bob won't forget to take his pills and put the dog in the mashed potatos. At least, he promised he wouldn't. ($50 for four weeks, includes dances. For inter/adv dancers.)

Big Big Event June 6-8!

We're also putting together a CIRCUS! complete with Jugglers! Elephants! Dinosaurs! (Peter and Ramona) Trampolines! Clowns! (Mike Faltesek and Casey Schneider) Bands galore! (Russ Wilson Orchestra, Boilermaker Orchestra, Solomon Douglas) Races! (Peabody contest) and spectacular feats of flight! (Strictly Lindy Comp). Sign up!

Jam Cellar Old Timey Radio Programme!

Yehoodi interweb site promised it would play our radio program all month beginning this Thursday! It includes music from everyone in the Jam Cellar family, and lots of silly stuff from Bobby and Luke, who are sometimes almost as funny as Laffy Taffy jokes. Heehee… Laffy Taffy. They're funny cause they're true.

There's a little preview of the show on "Hey, Mr. Jesse" a Lindy Hop focused podcast with Jesse Miner and Spuds. You won't have to wait long as we're featured in the first 5 minutes of the show. You can download it here.

Then this and every Thursday in May, check out The Jam Cellar on Yehoodi Radio!

Jerry also helps to organize The Big Big Event coming in June 6-8, 2008.  Check it out.

Welcome Jerry.

We got a lot of announcements today, so I'll keep it short and bland by saying Paul Roth will be tonight's DJ, and Markus and Deonna will be teaching the final hand-dancing class tonight.

Big Big Event

"Seriously, what makes the Big Big Event so big?" I hear this all the time, beside the dance floor, at the Chinese market, in the gym locker-room. Well, we'll tell you. On-site jugglers make it big, magicians make it big big. A strictly-competition makes it big, a late-night peabody dance contest makes it big big. Peter Strom's shoulders make it big, Ramona's sass makes it big big. The Boilermakers and Russ Wilson make it big, but the the fact they will battle each other during a night of NON-STOP live music makes it big big. It's big considering we've invited incredible dancers across the region, it's big big that we're also inviting Leonardo Decaprio, Bette Midler, and the original cast of "You Can't Do That on Television." June 6-8! Early bird registration ends this week! www.thebigbigevent.com.

New Class series: 31 Flavors begins next week!

Next week begins

31 flavors for inter/adv/master dancers and the instructors themselves. This class is all about different styles and variations to the fundamental basics of the dance to keep it interesting. Perfect for those who have done our "building your basics" class series. $50, includes free entrance to dances, a great deal.

Building your basics begins next week

It's time for another installment of

"Building Your Basics," our 6-week class series. Learn all about Lindy Hop, swivels, Charlestons, and the ten or so moves that even the best dancers do 90% of the time. $60, includes free entrance to dances.

The Jam Cellar on Yehoodi

The Jam Cellar has produced a 4-hour radio show for Yehoodi radio's streaming radio show. It includes selections from many of our favorite Jam Cellar DJs, as well as a couple songs from the Hot Club of Jam Cellar, and tons of miscellaneous tomfoolery by your Jam Cellar radio announcer team,
Luke and Bobby. Produced by Jerry Almonte, it will premier on Yehoodi radio May 8.

SWM seeks part-time love affair with a job

I know this has little to do with what's happening at Jam Cellar, but it seemed like an opportunity to reach a lot of people, and ultimately make my writing and teaching work with the Jam Cellar better in the long run. A semi-professional swing dance teacher and writer (me) is looking for a flexible part-time job. I currently hold a 40-hour-per week job with excellent employee reviews. I can write copy (not just humorous) for web, press releases, and marketing, I am a published journalist, and am well-versed in being a personal assistant if you are looking for one. I'm also tall and can change light bulbs. If you know of anything, please write huh@thejamcellar.com and they'll forward it to me, Robert "Bobby" White. Also, I've written a humorous novel, in case you have any connections to any literary agents, publishers, or novelists I can talk to. I think that about does it for today's begging. Thank you.

.

My Name: Naomi Uyama
Year I Started Swing Dancing: 1997
Where I Started Swing Dancing: Washington DC
Current Location: Washington, DC

Sing Lim

About 3 months after I started swing dance lessons I saw my first "clip", a taste of the dance world outside DC.  Someone was playing the video from Can't Top the Lindy Hop and event that coincided with Frankie's 80th birthday, held in NYC '94.  That's when I saw Sing dancing with Ryan Francois in the opening sequence and a guy standing next to me said "That's Sing Lim.  She's the best follow in the world.  They say she can follow anything."  Boom, my dance universe exploded and I thought, 'that's what I want- to follow anyone doing anything at anytime."  It really shaped my priorities during the sponge phase of learning to dance, and I think her influence, not so much as a literal teacher- I never took a class from her, but as an ideal really shaped my following and the focus I've always put on it.  Aaaand her jam with Ryan towards the end of the vid totally stands the test of time, its amazing.

(See Sing with Ryan Francois at about 2:00 above. - ed)

Sylvia Skylar

Sylvia and Eric taught the first big workshop I ever attended (Coincidentally I believe it was the first big workshop they had taught).   Before then I had just been learning the basics from local teachers.  When I saw her what blew my mind is the way she was doing what she was doing.  I hadn't yet realized there was more than one way of doing things, and that your basics could look stylish, with lines and grace.  Not only that but their presence opened my mind to scenes outside my own, and gave me the desire to travel and dance in other places which proved invaluable in my first years of learning.  Plus she's a funny lady and sews pretty things, who can beat that?

Sylvia Sykes

I remember when the lindy hoppers all adopted Sylvia as their own second mom.  She had been doing her thing for years, keeping the flame alive in the shag and west coast scenes and right around 2000 came this rush of rag tag kids who all claimed her as their own.  Her dancing was smooth and understated.  She could do bal, west coast, shag, and goodness knows what else.  She was a classy and very  versatile follow which I looked up to immensely.  Plus she's been dancing for decades, sometimes with a partner, sometimes without, when her style is in, or when no one had heard of it.  She's a strong dedicated lady and she still shows me a path I would like to take.

Everyone at the jam cellar tonight will dance with 100% recycled moves. And it won't be easy, since DJ Kevin Crandell will be spinning, and he inspires. Speaking of which, here's some recycled Jam Cellar announcements.

Tonight, HAND DANCING (week 1 of 2)

The final part of our Roots and Offshoots series will start tonight with a two-week series on hand dancing taught by some of the best in the world… hands…. down? Markus and Deonna.

Next Intermediate Series: 31 flavors

Starting May 6, we've got 31 flavors, a special class for inter/adv dancers on variations to all of Lindy Hop. If you feel like you're stuck in a box, this class will get you out. Bring boxes to class.

Big Big Event

Registration is open for the Big Big Event. You don't want to miss Mike and Casey, you can't miss Peter and Ramona, and we all miss Chad and Midori, who taught here last year. Also, the kickin'est band line-up we've ever had.

And don't forget, there are many ways you can help make the environment better, including riding a bike to work, recycling your office paper and plastic bottles, planting trees, sending strongly worded letters to "the man," confronting "the man" in hand-to-hand combat, winning, honoring "the mans" tribal burial customs and sticking him under the tree you planted, consoling "the man's" wife in her desperation, marrying her, raising "the man's" children ("Chescott" and Blaine"), slowly getting her to see the error of her first husband's wasteful ways, and finally getting her to run for president on an environmental platform, which by then should hopefully be easy to do, assuming you can still breath with the plastic 6-pack rings that we'll keep swimming into when the polar ice caps melt.

Inspiration 2: Steven Mitchell
Steven taught me how to dance from my heart.  From Steven I learned how amazing it is to move with a partner.  We used to follow him around the northeast (before everyone flew everywhere) and attend all his classes.  Every time I saw Steven he would have a very simple, but very sage piece of advise for me.  He was always very direct and very concise.  I think the most notable advice I recall is when he approached me after watching me dance (during a rather wild and frantic period in my dancing).  He said "I need to take you to my church." and just looked up, opened up his arms, took a breath in and, and stopped moving.  I knew exactly what he meant.  That comment forever changed my dancing.  I've never been a religious person, but Steven introduced me to a sprit that I had never felt before.

Here's a video of Steven dancing with the legendary Dawn Hampton:


And, what the hell, he's a clip from Can't Top The Lindy Hop in 1995.  Steven is in the taxi cab pants and Erin Stevens is his partner:

Inspiration 3: The Rhythm Hot Shots
The Rhythm Hot Shots were a team of dancers from Sweden.  These Swedish powerhouses!  I remember seeing "Hellzapoppin'" for the first time and thinking… "Ain't no way I could do that."  They make me think it's possible.  They are still around as The Harlem Hot Shots.  Check em out.

Another clip from 1995's Can't Top The Lindy Hop.  I must have worn this tape out:



Inspiration 4: (The Other Members of) Minnies Moochers
When I was 22, I was asked to join a dance group full of teenagers.  The were the best dancers in town and I enjoyed their company.  They inspired me and shaped my dancing and we all grew together.  What was happening in this group was really something special and unique and I jumped in head first.  We spend several days of every week in the gym in a creative frenzy and it was one of the greatest times of my life.  Minnie's Moochers was, and is, Kate Engle, Lucy Engle, Caitlin George Wellman, Susan Wolff, Sylvie Ynetma, Jenna Hallas, Simnia Singer Sayada, Ramona Staffeld, Sarah Spence, Mark Eckstein, Robin Coleman, Skye Humphries, Finian Makepeace, Ben Furnas, and I.

Here we are, in 2000 at NADC:



Inspiration 5: (The Other Members of) Silver Shadows
Yes.  Another team I am in.  This team is my family and these are the folks I look to and find the most inspiration.  Silver Shadows are Nina Gilkenson, Naomi Uyama, Ramona Staffeld, Caitlin George Wellman, Frida Segerdahl, Skye Humphries, Peter Strom, Todd Yannacone, and I.

My favorite routine we've done:

I an attempt to start generating some regular video content on this blog again, I am going to start a new feature called "Those Who Paved My Way". In this feature, many dancers that you may or may not know will be highlighting their teachers/inspirations/mentors with videos and words.

Stay tuned… The first installment will be coming soon.

Andy

PS. For those of you reading this on RSS aggregators, I have revamped the RSS feed so that it now includes the class reviews and a little better presentation. I suggest you unsubscribe and resubscribe to this url: http://feeds.feedburner.com/jamcellar