Every year the International Lindy Hop Championship is held in the Washington DC area and this year was no exception. Despite a horrible earthquake and a massive hurricane packing stiff breezes and light drizzle (at least in our area) the show went on and 700 plus hard core lindy hoppers from all over the world converged on the Westin in Alexandria, VA. The weekend started out on Thursday and didn’t let up until early in the morning on Monday. The competition included the normal range of events such as the Strictly Lindy, various levels of Jack and Jill, Show Case, Team and Cabare. This year’s competitions included a Classic Lindy division and a Junior division.

Annie performs an aerial during her showcase routine.

The Washington DC metro area has a great lindy hop scene. There is live music and multiple dance options just about every night of the week. Whether you like classic lindy, rock-a-billy and jitterbug, balboa, blues, or fusion, you can get a fix several times a week. However, some weeks are better than others and last weekend was one of the weekends at the better end of the scale. There wasn’t a large international event going on like ILHC coming up this weekend. No, this was just 2 of the main lindy hop organizations in town brining in big names for weekend dances…  just because.

The Liquorice Stick

Now that I’ve moved to the DC metro, I’ve been trying to go dancing as much as possible to make new friends and meet people here. One of my favorite nights of dancing is Tuesday nights at the Jam Cellar. The dance is cheap ($6), the crowd is great and the floor is awesome. It is a little tough some times being in the middle of the week and in DC and the drive is always “interesting”. This week, it was about 90 degrees, but I (and everyone else) soldiered on and as always, it was a fun night.

Closed

This year’s Lindyfest in Houston was the best yet despite my initially ho-hum attitude about classes. The instructor lineup, as always, was awesome and with live music from Jonathan Stout and his Campus Five, featuring in Hilary Alexander the social dancing was to die for. My plan this year was to only do a few classes and try to enjoy as much social dancing as possible while actually getting sleep. Anyone that has attended Lindyfest (or any of the other big lindy exchange/camps) knows that it is basically an endurance challenge. If you go to all the classes and stay even remotely long at the social dances (say until only 3:00AM) you end up getting about 4 hours a sleep a night to support 12 to 16 hours of intense exercise.  Photographically I was prepared to be frustrated. My D700 was still at Nikon being repaired after a rough time in New Zealand so I was using my D5000 which doesn’t have very good low light performance compared to the D700.

Showing off in the jam circle: Cool... Showing off in the jam circle with a sleeping infant hanging from your chest: Beyond Awesome.

For the past few years (starting in 2008), Austin has hosted the Lone Star Championships, a swing competition featuring Jack and Jill, Strictly, Blues and Charleston divisions. This year, I could only attend Friday and Saturday. I competed, social danced and took photos during competitions and performances for fun. Here are a few highlight pictures from the event.

Performances

Adrienne Weidert and Shesha Marvin performing a cabaret routine.

The 2010 International Lindy Hop Championship is held was held in Alexandrian, VA this year and the world’s best lindy hoppers attended.

[Show as slideshow]

Jam circles are a staple of the lindyhop world. When you get some of the best dancers in the world together, they are spectacular. A song comes on, someone starts clapping and the next thing you know everyone is gathered around a 2 meter wide circle on the floor to watch the action. At lindyfest, with hundreds of dancers on the floor, seeing anything can be impossible unless you happen to be there at the right moment.

The first 2 jam circles that I was present for, one on Friday and the other around midnight on Saturday were a wash for me. I was stuck in the back, barely able to see. I could only take pictures by holding the camera over my head and pressing the button. However, as the band wound up its final set on Saturday evening (well Sunday morning) at 3:00AM, I suspect their encore might spark a jam so I grabbed my camera and began milling about near the stage.

I was right, and I was rewarded with a place on the edge of the circle, lying on the floor next to the stage. That is as good as it gets. Sweat from the flailing dancers was the least of my worries. Getting kicked in the head while looking through the view finder was a real risk. These pictures were taken with my 35mm f/1.8 lens with the aperture wide open using a SB-600.  Even so the amount of light was barely sufficient for portraits, much less fast action with the song surging along at 200+ beats per minute. All I could do is point the camera and try to hit the button at the right split second. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and while these photos are not ideal exposures, they are some of my favorite photos to date.

[Show as slideshow]