Show PRAISE ALLAH I for tIle the BIG APPLE Wild Urge of Youth Finds Its Outlet in This Hectic I Modern Adaptation of the Old Virginia Reel to Swing l By WILLIAM C UTLEY YOU'D OUD never believe it but it all started in the House of Peace And it has caused more excitement noise and general pandemonium in the giddy social whirl than any any- anything anything thing since Gilda Gray and the thousands who imitated her shimmy That's the Ule Big Apple An un- un untamed untamed tamed exhausting thing that re- re releases releases leases all the wild urge of youth in a modern nervous age To say that It has taken the Ole country by storm is like saying Shirley Temple has charm youve you've to add And then some A few months ago no on one had ever heard of this dance yet today you'll find the Dig Big Apple in places of such widely divergent character as Chicago's black and tan belt and New Yorks York's Rockefeller Center al- al almost almost most any roads cross Saturday night dance hall and Hollywoods Hollywood's Brown Derby The Dig Big Apple is not a fruit growers promotion gag although perhaps nothing has publicized the theY Y 4 apple so widelY since Ute the phrase An apple a day keeps Ute the doctor away was coined It was named for Ute the negro night club where It the originated Big Apple club In Columbia S C In other days the building had been a synagogue called the House of Peace Peace-an odd enough birthplace for this frantic frolic of of the feet Youve You've Got to Be Athletic Negroes invented it young col- col college college lege students saw it and introduced it at their parties and from there it spread to the four points of the compass faster than the latest Mae West joke Lets Let's visit a party where the Big Apple is in progress It may be beat beat at a fraternity dance in one of the large state universities at n a fine seashore hotel at a swanky coun- coun country country try club or at a tonk joint in Harlem The rigorous routine is the same The band leader is the boss here herc and he can drive his slaves to rhythm as hard as any slave driver er r in an ancient galley He throws them waving their arms and kicking their feet into the old familiar and with another call he plunges them Into the newer and wilder Suzi Q Swing high sets the jc in a clockwise direction swing low shifts it into reverse Couples cut the apple r e rand and heel the apple at the call Survival hal or of the thc Fittest After this preliminary workout the leader calls upon individual cou- cou t r yb nA i J Ja JD a D 4 h j 5 S 'S 55 55 5 54 S 'S 4 sz y i t tEven Even the kl kh's arc doing itt Marilyn Lou Olsen left and Marlene Marie l In Chicago's famed College Inn or of the thc hotel Sherman are arc shown taking n a fling Maybe they'll bring a Big Apple for teacher pIes to shine Each couple at a nod from Crom him takes a turn In Ute the center of the circle while the others thankfully drop to one knee clap clapin clapIn in rhythm and cheer the shiners after demon demon- demonstrates on Couple couple strates the progress or the retro retro- retrogress retrogress gress of the modern depend dance ing entirely upon the point of view There are dozens of varia- varia variations variations the Camel Walk and Possin the Flea Hop the Ule Bunny Jump Ute the Sugar Foot and probably most violent of all all the Lindy Hop When one couple has performed everything it knows or exhausted every last ounce of strength another is called upon upon The music gets faster and faster the walls wails of Ute the trumpet and clari- clari clarinet clarinet net grow more and more weird and the moans of the saxophone lower and bluer It builds up to an ex ex- ex exciting citing peak and then at a signal F r 1 w ii iia a i W f V V i f tF t I iW i t b f J Ji F fF LI N 5 L LAt At Kearney N J students s threatened a strike If IC School I Principal G G Mankey refused to lift his ban on the Big nig Apple here are two o Kearney earney students who dont don't give a hang for Cor the thc rule dancing their fa favorite new swing craze from the leader all the couples who have not by this time fallen by the wayside duck their heads and stag stag- stagger stagger ger into the center crying Wahoo What does all this represent A return to the thc savage and primitive Is civilization degenerating Per Per- Perhaps Perhaps haps But is not swing music itself merely a technical refinement of the primitive elemental rhythm of th the tom tom-tom Only sophisticated overtones overtones have been added Most folks would rather believe that the Big Apple is a good thing for modern civilization for civilized though we may be there is a wild urge in the meekest among us and the dance gives that urge safe phys phys phys- physical ical expression Probably the Big Apple Is no wilder for us than the Virginia Reel was for our grandfathers and grand grand- grandmothers mothers The waltz sweet graceful and proper was the popular dance of two generations ago But a faint glimmer of light heralding the dawn of a new age was the faster jerkier variation called the Boston The devils daredevils danced it Ragtime Revolutionizes Dancing The Spanish American war the horseless carriage the phonograph and other Innovations speeded up life and the dance kept pace with the step one and later the two two- step Thin Things s were perking up Came 1910 and the American dance suddenly became a craze The Turkey Trot had been invented A guy could now dance a lot closer to his bis gal than the waltz ever per per- permitted permitted The sanctimonious lifted worried eyebrows but the young folks kept right on with their jerky t I new step and even invented more daring variations of the It-the Bunny Hug the Grizzly Bear the Gotham Gobble and the Lovers Walk And then Alexanders Ragtime Band The storm broke This was a new brand kind of music Exciting Stimulating Hot Rag Rag- Ragtime Ragtime time Dancing came out Into the open The restaurants sacrificed a afew afew few tables for floor space on which to dance Orchestra directors who had led lcd sweet stringed dinner mu sic numbers suddenly began to sway their hips in the new rhythm of jazz From South America came the I Tango about the same time that the I Turkey Trot made its bow It was wasa wasa a good change oI of pace and It has hasl l lived until this day Vernon and Irene Castle the fa fa- fa famous dance team were the idol of youth in those days das Early in 1913 they bowled the country over with their grace and invention they made a graceful more pleasant thing of the Turkey Trot Thou Thou- Thousands sands flocked to see them in Louis Martins Martin's Cafe de Castle Killed in 1918 The Castles probably did more than any other professional dancers to increase the popularity of public dancing Their most important con con- contribution contribution was the Invention of the Fox Trot which is the basis of most dancing today Originally it consisted of eight running steps and turn later it slowed down to four slow and four quick steps All through the Ule World war the craze for the Fox Trot continued Vernon Castle was k killed in 1918 but not before the changes in dancing dancing ing which he had helped to bring about had become well established The soldier boys danced It with their wives and sweethearts before they went o overseas and after aler they came came back It was upon their return that the mad perIod we call the Jazz age be- be began be gan Youth was finding a new free free- freedom freedom dom The speakeasy had become a national institution The cry was for more and faster and hotter music And some weird and abor- abor abortive abortive tive dance steps found their ways to Ute the public fancy Enter the Probably we might have expected ballroom dancing to wane in popularity popularity larity during the dark years ears of the depression but the opposite was the actual case The explanation may maybe maybe be found in the fact that dancing provided an 10 escape from gloom and andin andin in the added leisure which most people had to endure The came in during the depression Some tourists probably picked it up in the West Indies and started Ute the country on the way to a anew anew new craze It w will never become as popular as the Fox Trot or waltz waltz because it is too difficult but It may remain beside the Tango as a stunt number for the more ac- ac accomplished dancers Most important of the recent inno inno- innovations Is swing music which is hardly more than a rehash of old old- time Jazz With it came the lively Shag a dance which is the most im- im important Important fundamental of the Big Apple But Dut in America more than any any- anywhere anywhere where else fame Is a fickle crew crea tune ture and who knows perhaps next year the Big Apple will have been forgotten and some new and even madder dance inspiration will fire the country If a Western Union |