Category Archives: menz

Single Ladies, J-setting and battle

This is yet another post about Beyonce’s ‘Single Ladies’

and the Beyond Prejudice performance of Single Ladies routine:

The gender-flex of this routine is more an essential part of the original video than a fan-response to the choreography. The Single Ladies video was choreographed by Frank Gatson and JaQuel Knight and, to quote wikipedia “incorporates J-Setting choreography”.

J-setting (to quote wikipedia again)

…is a highly stylized modern lead and follow style of hip hop dance, characterized by cheerleading style sharp movements to an eight-beat count music. Popular in southern U.S. African American gay clubs, like the vogue-style before it, it became popular by exposure in a pop music video…

Background
In 1970, former majorette Shirley Middleton became troupe leader of the Jackson State University cheerleading group, The Prancing Jaycettes. Middleton wanted something different, and so threw away their batons, and began dancing in formation. Based on a classical cheerleader eight-beat style, the signature thrusts, pumps, and high kicks were developed into a lead-and-follow “wave” through the troupe.[1]
However, the style was strictly reserved for women only until 1997, when male troupe baton twirling member DeMorris Adams, was asked to fill in for an injured female troupe member. After this, although the performing troupe was still female, the crowd supporters started to grow from the colleges gay community.

The wikipedia entry references “The Big Idea: J-Setting Beyond Beyoncé”, Vibe.com (February 2009. Retrieved 2009-11-22) and I think it’s worth adding the clarification from that piece: “The Prancing Jaycettes were the female dance line of the infamous JSU marching band”. Marching bands are important in the history of black vernacular dance in America, and the inherently competitive, battle challenge of marching bands (and cheerleaders and step and… so on) is important here. I do recommend searching for the ‘prancing j-settes’ on youtube for an idea of what was going on.

The Vibe piece adds another great little note:

He was not alone in his adoration of the Prancing J-Settes. “The young men would be on the sideline during practice watching and learning,” recalls Anthony Hardaway, a gay activist and historian from Memphis who was a student at JSU from 1990 to ’94. “My friends would be on the side doing the dance alongside the girls.” However, their imi-tation was not seen by all as flattery. “Teachers and coaches would run the gay boys away,” Hardaway says with a laugh, “because when it was time for the games, the gay boys would be in the stands doing the routine and outperforming the girls on the field.”

There’s something totally excellent about the thought of young, fabulous black boys being shooed away because they might a) engayen the football players (lol in the current Australian AFL climate), and b) outshine the girls. Is there any better battle challenge, any greater call to arms than this?
Here, check this out:

Of course, J-setting has changed since the 1970s, which is the way all vernacular dance works. It responds to trend and fashion to retain relevancy.

Let’s look at JaQuel Knight for a second:

Knight’s muscularity changes the choreography a bit, as do his flat shoes (which change the line of his legs and the movement of his hips). It’s interesting to compare his movements with Dana Foglia beside him. Her hips and legs in high heels give us the more Single Ladies type lines. I’ve written about this before in reference to Balanchine and the Whitey’s Lindy Hoppers, so I won’t go into it again. But this video gives us a fabulous modern day example of the gendering of these types of bodily aesthetics.

But wait, I’m totally off-track. Let’s just look at the essentials of J-setting for a second. This is a call and response type battle/dance. The troupe has a leader who ‘calls’ the steps, which the rest of the troupe then ‘respond’ to by repeating the steps. This is key. The lycra leotards and athletic wear are also key markers of J-setting. Now think about this as something that was happening in gay clubs, and think about gay men’s bodies in these settings. That’s some seriously subversive shit right there. All sorts of complex gendering going on. Sure, those guys are ‘dancing woman’, but they’re also very masculine in their aggressive posturing. But if cheerleading is also clearly about battle and competition, then aggression isn’t as gendered as all that… it’s just played out in gendered terms.

The call and response of j-setting works in slightly different terms in this video with JaQuel Knight, in a teaching context:

In summary, then, J-setting began with marching band dance troupes, and with women dancing. It was taken up by black gay men, partly because of the influence of a male dancer in the troupe, but more probably because the j-setting was totally fabulous, totally competitive, and totally awesome. It retain(s) its competitive element in a gay club context. Here, look at this:

(I included this dodgy quality clip because it gives you an idea of what it’s actually like doing this stuff in real-life settings: the lighting is shit, there are errors (those these guys are tight), it’s not clean and pretty).

J-setting moves out into the wider community, to the point where Beyonce wants to get into that action. Big name j-setting dancers are involved in choreographing the Single Ladies routine.

But wait. There’s more. The Single Ladies routine is referencing a Bob Fosse choreography, which most peeps know as ‘the Mexican breakfast’ dance (there was a fair bit of discussion about this, and this video is kind of interesting for its discussion of Fosse). You can see the Bob Fosse Mexican Breakfast choreography here, but ignore the subtitles.

So, to sum up, Kanye was onto something. The Single Ladies video could be the best video of all time. OF ALL TIME. And J-setting is exciting because it offers a model for competition and battle in dance which isn’t using the standard krumping/hippity hop model. This is really interesting.

My previous posts about this video:
what again?! I’m still crapping on about dance, power, etc

all the single ladies

No news

[rage edit]HEY, if you’d like to give me a serve about being some sort of elitist, how’s about you a) read some of this blog, b) read my comment below. Because I am onto your shit, and I will NOT tolerate it. While I’m at it I DO HAVE A CLUE ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN ETHNICITY, CLASS AND CULTURAL CAPITAL IN LINDY HOP, YOU IDIOTS.[/]

I’d write a post about gender and DJing, but nothing has changed since the last time I wrote about it. Women do most of the local DJing, men dominate the DJ line ups at big events. Women DJs problem solve collaboratively, male DJs don’t. Men mansplain technical problems to me when I’m DJing (even if they know nothing about sound gear). There are one or two exceptions.

I’d write a post about labour and pay in the lindy hop world, but nothing has changed since the last time I wrote about it. Teachers, DJs and volunteers are overworked, underpaid and exploited. Dancers refuse to pay more than $40 for a big live band playing for four hours, even though they’re getting the best goddamn dancing of their lives in a restored ball room with the best musicians in the country. Fuckers still make volunteers work for hours and hours, and DJs still aren’t being paid properly by large events (if at all). No, comping entry is NOT THE SAME AS PAYING.

LINDY HOPPERS: stop being such bloody tight arses. Pay more money for live music. Pay more for events run by dancers, just so you can dance. $6 for a DJed gig? IT IS NOT ENOUGH. $20 for a live band in a large, clean space with a good dance floor? INSUFFICIENT. Refusing to pay more than $10 for a four or five hour late night party featuring two rooms of music, six DJs, free food and requiring about 25 people’s worth of labour? YOU ARE TOO TIGHT, DANCERS.

Just in case you thought things were totally fucked, they’re not. This past weekend I counted three or four women who only lead, who I had not seen out social dancing before. They were all wearing nice waistcoats and trousers and jackets and ties and were PWNING ALL. Male leads: you need to level up, because the sisters PWN YOU; your half-arsed leading, your lack of triple steps, your bullshit lazy arse lack of bounce is being shown up. It’s not too late: GO TO CLASS. LEARN ALL THE THINGS. GET GOOD. Male follows: GET ON THE GODDAMN FLOOR.

Nina Mae McKinney



Nina Mae McKinney., originally uploaded by carbonated.

I ran across this photo of Nina Mae McKinney (who I wrote about during last year’s Women’s History Month posts here) on pintrest (via p8ronella), and was delighted to see the costume from this (fabulous) film sequence:

Swanee Shuffle – Curtis Mosby

That film clip is supercool for many reasons, though one of them is for the tall-woman/short-man partner sequence (I think the woman leads, though I’m not sure).

Blues in place

‘Bessie Smith at the Office’ – Anne Emond

(if you like this, you can buy a nice print: from Ann’s shop)

Last night I dropped in at the Geoff Bull and the Finer Cuts gig at the Corridor in Newtown. The corridor is a skinny, two-story joint with a roof top garden and heaps of hipsters. Because it is a small space, you’re wedged up against the band. Literally – I was hip-to-butt with the saxophonist a few times, and Geoff had to ask some Rowdy Yoofs to be a bit careful when they danced. All three of them. There’s only one mic – for the vocals. Otherwise, everything’s as it’s meant to be in jazz: unamplified, rowdy, right there up in your face.

Geoff Bull is a gun. He holds those young people musicians together, the way a good band leader should. Without him, they flounder a bit. Every band needs a good leader. Watching, I was suddenly struck by the way jazz music is like jazz dance. Well, duh, but it really struck me last night. We’ve been focussing our teaching on rhythms and sharing rhythms lately, and I suddenly realised that a good jazz band shares a little rhythm or a bit of melody in a gig the way we share a nice rhythm on the dance floor. Geoff played a little clump of notes once, twice, his eyebrows raised in the direction of the (ninja) trombone dood. By the third time, trombone guy had it, and joined in, at first the same notes, then mucking with the harmony.

I was suddenly reminded of the way I might share a rhythm or a move with a friend on the social dance floor, either my partner in lindy hop, or my solo dancing buddy(s). Once, twice, and then you both have it.
Watching Geoff, I felt my muscles start to jump as the signal got through. Once, twice, and then I had to hold myself to my seat to stop from leaping up to join in.

Bump-bump-baaa-bumpty-bump.

Just like in class, when we’re teaching the beginners rhythms: we step it or scat it clap it, then they join in when they’re ready. Then we step it out. Then we’re all dancing together, all joining in on that one repeating rhythm. And then you each start to play with it, make it slightly different. And suddenly you realise that every dancer’s body makes the rhythm unique. If you’re tall, your steps are wider, the time between each step is longer, If you’re little and fierce, you can add a little accenting stampy-stamp. Just like the musicians in the band: lower notes for a trombone, shouting squawks from a trumpet, bouncing thumps from a bass.

Bump-bump-baaa-bumpty-bump.

Watching the band, I wondered how they’d feel about me jumping up and joining in. Would they like it? I know I would. Later on, Geoff encouraged clapping, and clapping at just the right time. I think he’d like it too.

Later on,

the band sang that song ‘Closer to the bone’, where the lyrics go like this:

Closest to the bone
Sweeter is the meat
Last slice of Virginia ham
Is the best that you can eat
Don’t talk about my baby
She’s slender but she’s sweet
Closest to the bone
And sweeter is the meat

Now she’d make a good thermometer
If she drank a glass of wine
She’s built just like a garter snake
She climbs up like a vine
My friends tell me I’m a fool
To love a girl like that
Here’s the reason I like ’em slim
Instead of big and fat

‘Cause…..Closest to the bone
Sweeter is the meat
Last slice of Virginia ham
Is the best that you can eat
Now don’t talk about my baby
She’s slender but she’s sweet
Closest to the bone
And sweeter is the meat

Now she’d make a first class fountain pen
If she only knew how to write
Her figure’s like a piece of string
She rolls up every night
Everybody thinks that I’m a nut
To love this lovely worm
Boy there’s one reason I like ’em slim
Instead of round and firm

Sweeter is the meat
Last slice of Virginia ham
Is the best that you can eat
Now don’cha talk about my baby
She’s slender but she’s sweet,
Closest to the bone

She’d make a fine piccolo
If she only stayed on key
Boy she’s shaped like a rubber band
And she loves to snap at me
Everybody thinks I’m insane
To overlook her faults
But here’s the reason I like ’em skinny
Instead of full of schmaltz

‘Cause…..Closest to the bone
Sweeter is the meat
Last slice of Virginia ham
Is the best that you can eat
Don’t talk about my baby
She’s slender but she’s sweet
And it’s closest to the bone
And sweeter is the meat

Ordinarily, I like this sort of song. But this one bothers me. Something about a man singing about consuming, objectifying a woman’s flesh, his insistence that her personality can be overlooked because she’s physically all that… nah. I don’t like that talk. In a context where women’s bodies are commodified by our culture, this song makes me feel a bit not ok. If it were a woman singing about a man… well. Maybe that’d be different.

Looking around the room (because for a moment, I didn’t want to look at or engage with the band), I realised there were at least a handful of thin, beautiful young women near us. I wondered what they thought about this objectification of their bodies. And then I realised, they were already letting me know what they thought, in the best way possible. They were talking to each other loudly and enthusiastically, ignoring the band. Your sexist song? It is beneath our notice. Sisterhood is far more powerful, yo.

I like this at a jazz gig. If a band can’t keep the attention of its audience, then it doesn’t deserve that attention. If what you’re saying and doing isn’t reaching out grabbing at the attention of the people in the room, your work isn’t working. Particularly if the room is about the size of a large train carriage. Almost the size.

It was an interesting moment. The song was fun, it was good, it involved a fair bit of shouting from the band. But the content wasn’t cutting it. It made me feel uncomfortable, and it wasn’t working for those fashionable, thin young women. Your shock-content song: it fails to register.

And this brings me (finally) to Ann Emond’s comic up there. Bessie Smith sang songs that objectified men’s (and women’s) bodies, with the sort of fleshly enthusiasm that blues is very good at. But she was a woman, a powerful black woman, singing about men. She wasn’t a bunch of white middle class jazz musician blokes in an inner western Sydney bar. She was in a tent or a bar, shouting at a crowd who respected her (or were about to respect her), and she was a black woman in a time and place when black women were only very recently objects to be bought and sold (by white men). It meant – it means – something very different. And I write this as someone who understand the blues music idiom. I understand that there are layers of meaning to a song, and that this particular song invites reading on the slant, as well as on the face of it. But I’m not convinced that there enough layers, or enough complexity in the delivery of that song last night.

I think that context is what makes a blues song. It’s what makes the lyrics work. And while I was enjoying that Finer Cuts gig – I did enjoy that gig, far more than the last time I’ve seen them – that particular song didn’t quite cut it. 1950s Louis Prima isn’t quite the same as 1920s Bessie Smith. Or even 1930s Louis Prima. And I’ve seen that song not quite cut it before when Puggsly Buzzard’s played it.

Sure, I understand that they’re trying to be bold with dirty, transgressive lyrics. But I don’t think there’s anything much transgressive about a bunch of enfranchised blokes singing about consuming the bodies of women. That’s really just business as usual. The status quo in our culture.
It was particularly telling when you consider the fact that a beautiful, young, slim, black woman had joined the band for a chorus or two of ‘Careless Love’ just a moment before. If I had seen her sing about the sweetness of meat close to the bone, about the skinny, snappy man she liked for his body, if it had been that woman belting out those lyrics, then the band really would have been doing something transgressive. It really would have been provocative.

teaching with gender

This week I was mocked for describing students’ ‘beautiful basics’ with too much enthusiasm. I admit, I was cooing and gushing a little, but I have Strong Feelings about beginner dancers doing basics. So next week I’m going to experiment with using manly words to describe swingouts.

“Great! What ruggedly masculine triple steps!”

“What hairy-chested bounce!”

“I like how you let her in close and then pushed her away!”

“Hey, you almost emoted there, but then suddenly shut down and repressed – great stuff!”

Perhaps I should just go ‘Proper Man’ and just do taciturn.

“Grunt.”

That’ll totally inspire the students.

man on man grooming

This photo reminds me of Bobby White’s new project. Nothing homosocial about a blog full of pictures of hot guys where the women are entirely incidental. Nothing homosocial about bros checking out each other’s (fine selves) in fine clothes. NOTHING AT ALL*.

I found this photo on gingerhaze, but I can’t remember where. This is the link, here.

*And it would be totally immature to find this idea a bit sexeh. Totally immature.

Happy International Women’s Day: equity and inclusiveness can be easy

As you may or may not know, I’m teaching lindy hop with a female friend. That means that the students have two female teachers, one leading and one following. So far it hasn’t seemed to make any difference to their learning or relationship with us – beginners are too busy worrying about their feet to actually notice that the leader teacher has boobs. One of the nicest parts about our class has been that we see regular women leaders and a male follower – all very serious about learning.

One of the things we worried about when we started planning classes which welcomed – normalised! – female leads, male follows and generally genderflexed approaches to dance roles was how we’d handle some problems. We welcome women who don’t feel comfortable dancing with men (for whatever reason), and we also welcome men who’d rather dance with men. But we weren’t sure how we’d make clear who was leading, who was following, and who wanted to dance with whom.

My first instinct is ‘everyone dance with everyone else – we’re a safe, welcoming place’, but I also understand that many women simply don’t feel safe or ok being touched by men. And that some men would really rather dance with other men, because the opportunities to social dance like this with other men are so few and far between. So how were we to accomodate all these variations in partnering?

Well, we haven’t solved those particular problems (we are currently just encouraging everyone and hopefully modelling a dancing partnership where each partner is treated with respect, and dancers learn to touch in a respectful way), but other problems have turned up. For as long as I’ve been leading, I’ve never been in a class where no one has remarked on the fact that I’m a woman leading (rather a man). Until this past weekend at the Sweet n Hot workshops, where nobody commented, and even I forgot that I was doing something unusual. Until I had to ask (reluctantly, and with trembling-scardycatness) for the teachers to use gender neutral pronouns because I was getting confused. Generally, though, I’m placed in a position where I have to respond to endless, endless comments about the fact that I’m a woman. I’ve always replied with lighthearted explanations.

I suspect that the students in our classes have had similar experiences. We usually mention the fact that we welcome students in either role, though we are still figuring out a way to do this that doesn’t imply that male leaders and female followers were/are ‘normal’, because they have always been just one option of many. But students are obviously still dealing with curious comments.

I’ve realised over the last couple of weeks, though, that the students have figured out their own solution. They just write ‘leader’ or ‘follower’ on their name tag, underneath their name. Simple, and effective. Why haven’t I ever thought of that? #doofus

Happy International Women’s Day! Some problems need big, complicated, difficult solutions. But others just need a little practical thinking.

Women’s History Month: Billy Tipton!


(image lifted from wikipedia)

I’d never heard of pianist, composer, bandleader Billy Tipton before I was sent an email recommending him for this series of posts (I’ll leave that kind correspondent to out themselves in the comments if they like.) Everything I know, I’ve scrounged online.

Basically, Billy Tipton was born Dorothy Lucille Tipton in 1911, and was a keen pianist interested in a life in jazz. By 1940 he was living as a man, binding his breasts and otherwise dressing and identifying as male. It wasn’t until he died in 1989 that Tipton’s family discovered he was assigned female at birth.

I don’t know the exact reasons for Tipton’s living as a man, but I want to include him in these Women’s History Month posts because he draws attention to the limits of single definitions of masculine and feminine. And one of the clearest points to be made about Tipton’s story is that living as a woman musician limited (and limits today) your profesional opportunities.

Sweet Georgia Brown by Billy Tipton

Women’s History Month: some thoughts at day 6

It’s women’s history month again, and I’m listing a different woman musician from the first half of the century every day (as I explain here). Last year I did a different woman dancer every day, and that was super great fun. I’m enjoying the women musicians, but I haven’t really had a chance to research or push myself, as I’ve been away at a dance event for most of this month. And today, I’m still feeling a little tired and rough, so I’m not really ready to push myself. Tomorrow. Tomorrow.

I did decide in that first post of the month that I’d only dance as a lead this month, as a way of exploring International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month and what it means to be a woman dancing. Well, actually, I just decided that on a whim, without much thinking at all. I don’t follow much these days as I’m really trying to get my leading up to snuff, and the best way to get better at dancing is to dance. And as every lead knows, the real challenge comes on the social dance floor, when you need to come up with a series of moves, connect with your partner and attempt some sort of creativity all at the same time.
We won’t even mention the battle to maintain the fitness and aerobic capacity lindy hop demands.

I have to say, it hasn’t been hard, because I get to dance with amazing dancers, most of whom are my friends. And I’ve learnt so much in the past month or two it’s kind of scary – I suddenly find myself stretching and expanding my skills, pushing myself to try things that I’d never have tried before. But it’s certainly meant a bit of rethinking the way I operate socially at exchanges and dance weekends. My weekend pretty much felt like this:

I mean, the biggest change for me this past weekend in Melbourne was simply spending very little time with men. I have lots of lovely male friends, but I only danced with two of them this weekends, and I discovered that I just didn’t end up spending as much time catching up with blokes as I usually do. :( I think that’s mostly because I’d be chatting to some chicks, and then a song would start and one of them, or I would say “let’s dance!” and then we would, and then afterwards I’d end up mixing with chicks and chatting. Rinse repeat. This of course means that the men in the dancing scene need to man up and start with the following, because I refuse to miss out on their dancing wonderfulness! Good thing Keith and I got to DJ together, or I’d hardly have spent any quality time with a bloke at all this weekend. And that is UNACCEPTABLE.

Workshops on Sunday were fun. I learnt a LOT. And I did a private class with Ramona on Friday, which kind of broke my dancing for a bit, and then suddenly it all came back together and I was a dancing machine on Saturday night. Blues dancing: still a bit too dull for me atm. But then, only boring people are bored, and that’s doubly true of dancers – only a boring lead is bored. I need to woman up.

The DJ Dual with Keith went really well. In fact, I had the most fun DJing I’ve had in ages and ages. We ended up trading three songs until the last moment when we played alternative songs. I think we would have liked to continue for another hour or so, trading single songs, as we got more confident and figured out the skills and tactics we needed. But we’d been DJing for an hour and a half by then, so we might’ve gotten a bit tired. And I had to go in the jack and jill, and I’m not sure it would have been ok for me to DJ the competition I was in. Overall, it was nice to have a bit of a challenge, and it was nice to work with a friend I like and have lots in common with musically. But he is a bit of a sly dog, and wouldn’t tell me what he was playing next, most of the time, so I had to keep on my toes. But that was actually even more fun. DJ Dual: LIKE.

NB There were THREE women leads in the jack and jill competition, and one got through to the finals (in a group of six leads)!!11!1 That photo above is one I lifted from Faceplant – sorry I can’t remember whose it was. It’s of the J&J, I’m in there, and so is at least one of the other female leads.

Now: NEED MORE MALE FOLLOWS!!!

I ended up catching up with lots of internet friends over the weekend as well. Which is always a bit of a push, but well worth it. The best part was walking into a cafe, saying “Hello, I’m Sam, nice to meet you!” and then barrelling into an hour of solid, hardcore talking as though we’d known each other for years. Which we have, really. Just not in person. This trip I went for smaller catch ups, rather than bigger groups, because I wanted to get a chance to actually connect with everyone and I often don’t get that at bigger meet ups. But that also meant I didn’t get to see everyone I wanted to. Oh well, good thing I go to Melbourne regularly! I’m planning another trip in May for the Frankie Manning birthday celebrations, so I’ll see if I can fit in the people I missed this time. But that sucks, because you’re still missing people! And then there are all the dance people I want to see off the dance floor! This is, of course, why exchanges are so much fun and so challenging – so many friends descend on one city for just one weekend you really need an enormous dance floor to connect with them all!

Righto, I’d better write up today’s jazz woman!