In the book Frankie Manning –
Ambassador of Lindy Hop I came across the titles of many swing tunes, some
of which I had never heard before. In honor of Frankie, and as a way of
celebrating my 20th Swing Mix on 8tracks.com I decided to make a mix of 8 tunes
that Frankie used to dance to. Follow the link Swing Mix #20 or press play on the Swing Mix
#20 player on the right side of this blog.
Below, in book (not track) order, are the excerpts in which the songs (in bold) are
mentioned and some YouTube videos with songs that are mentioned but do not
appear in my mix.
#1 Savoy Lindy hoppers liked dancing to fast tunes (like Chick Webb’s “Clap
Hands! Here Come Charley,” flag wavers as he called them, which meant crowd
pleasers), but not all the time, so orchestras didn’t play fast numbers all
night. Dancers today like doing jam circles to “Sing, Sing, Sing,” but we never
jammed to music like that. We didn’t even like “Sing, Sing, Sing.” There was
too much drum. I’d dance to a fast tune if it was swinging and I liked it.
Otherwise, I’d sit it out. (70)
#2 In
late 1934 Frankie Manning and his then partner Hilda Morris got to perform at
the Apollo Theater as part of a revue and ended up working with Duke Ellington
and his band who were on the bill for that week. Frankie remembers: Now, we
used to go see Duke all the time at the Apollo and the Harlem Opera House, and
we loved his music, but there wasn’t anything I’d heard that was all that
danceable. It was fantastic music, and it was exotic – we used to call it
jungle music – but his band just didn’t work for the Lindy hoppers. This was
1934, so it was before he came out with all those swing tunes like “Jack the
Bear,” “Cotton Tail,” “In a Mellotone,” and “Take the ‘A’ Train.” I’d been
listening to “Black and Tan Fantasy,” “Mood Indigo,” “Sophisticated Lady,” and
all this other beautiful music, but nothing that was swinging. Finally,
Ellington said, “We have a tune called ‘Stompy Jones.’ Would you like to hear it?”
I said, “I’ve never heard of it, but just play it and we’ll dance.” So Hilda
and I performed the whole week to “Stompy Jones,” which worked just fine (84).
Here's Ellington's famous "Take the 'A' Train" from the film Reveille with Beverly from 1943:
#3 …the tune we always used in contests was “Christopher
Columbus.” But earlier in the evening, Chick [Webb] had played “Down South Camp
Meeting,” which is this real swingy tune. If you heard it, you’d dance to it. I
had found that I could catch all these little breaks in the music, so I said,
“How about ‘Down South Camp Meeting’?” “You got it," he said. “What tempo do
you want?” “Something about right here,” I said, snapping my fingers. That
little humpbacked man up there on the drums hit off the tempo, and those cats
started swinging! (99)
#4 Soon after I introduced the first air step, I was at
the Savoy dancing to Jimmie Lunceford’s “Posin’,” either while he was
rehearsing in the afternoon or during one of those battle of the bands. As I’ve
said, I used to like to catch breaks in the music, and “Posin’”, which he had
just come out with, had a nice stop rhythm to it. Each time Willie Smith sang
“Evvv-ry-bod-y pose!” and the music stopped, I would freeze my body, then begin
dancing again when the band started up after holding for eight counts. Nobody
else was doing that, but I did it with my partner because I was so in tune with
the music” (103).
#5 In March 1936, we had a two - or three - week run at the
Roxy Theater, the first time there for a group of Whitey’s dancers….Around this
time, truckin’ was the new vogue, and everybody was doing it. A song titled
“Truckin’” had recently come out that went something like, “They had to have
something new, a dance to do, up here in Harlem – so, someone started truckin’.
To truck, your feet shuffle right, left, right, left with the right side of
your body leading as you move diagonally forward, and your right hand shakes
while your index finger points up in the air. People said truckin’ was a dance,
but it was really just one step, like the black bottom or the Suzie-Q. Whitey
was always trying to add the latest dances into the Lindy to make it more
exciting and more marketable. In order to make a routine for the stage out of
any of these movements, you had to put them with other jazz steps or the Lindy
hop. We went into the Roxy as truckers, according to the program, but we just
mixed it into our Lindy solos, so the audience would say, “Yeah, they
truckin’” (114). The version of "Truckin'" I included in my mix is by Duke Ellington with vocals by Ivie Anderson. Fats Waller's version, however, I have to admit is my favorite:
#7 Later
that spring I worked with Count Basie for the first time. I had been listening
to Chick Webb since I first began going to the Savoy, but by early 1937 some of
us were turning into Basie-ites. To me, Basie swung more than any band out
there....Nowadays, whenever I hear Basie, it always makes me want to dance.
Some of my favorite songs for dancing are "Shiny Stockings" and
"Moten Swing." If I want to show off, I use "Jumpin' at the
Woodside" or "Every Tub" (132-133). Of "Moten
Swing" there are many Basie versions on YouTube. I am guessing this is
probably closest to the version that Frankie would have danced to. I wanted to add it to my mix but 8tracks regulations do not allow you to add more than two tracks by each artist.
#8 "John's Idea" is a very swinging tune by Count Basie that Frankie used initially in order to choreograph his version of the Big Apple routine back in 1937. Frankie says: Whitey asked me to make up a big apple routine for the Lindy hoppers, so I got to work. At first, as I read the letter and tried visualizing the movements, I thought, What the hell is he talking about? Then I began playing some music and actually doing the steps. I used Count Basie's "John's Idea," initially, but then I switched to "One O'Clock Jump" because it was a little slower and more swinging" (143). [see also my post The Big Apple]
