After conducting an informal survey around our dance scene, it seems to me that our awesome DJs in Toronto are not actually being paid to provide music for “for-profit” events (the only exception is the Toronto Swing Dance Society). That’s crazy.

As a dance DJ myself, I have probably poured more time and money into this passion than I will ever make back actually dj’ing so I know how much any type of remuneration helps us continue truckin’ on. Then I thought about the DJs that I actually invite out to play for our Yonge & Bloor Blues dance and realized that we don’t actually pay them either. This will change starting July 2nd for our next blues dance. While we do not make a boat-load of profit from the actual dance itself, it’s only fair to pay DJs for their time and expertise.

My friend Kevin Sue keeps saying that the best ideas are the ones that pass the common-sense test. I truly believe that this is one of them. For things to change in the scene that I am a part of, I have to actually start doing it myself first. This will keep me grounded and honest. Hopefully it will also keep me motivated to push for ideas that I believe in and at the end of the day, also keep me excited about dancing. :-)

So let’s get on and start paying our hard working DJs. Everybody wins when the music for dancing gets better.

Heard at Toronto’s Saturday night lindy hop dance at the Dovercourt House. Yeahhhhhhh.

Which picture doesn’t fit? I’ll give you one guess.

Last Saturday, Toronto and Dovercourt House held a fundraiser for the Frankie Fund (or was it the Frankie headstone?) in celebration of the joy Frankie Manning left for the world. There were bake sales, raffle draws, silent auctions, performances, and taxi dancers for “rent”. Being not really useful in any multi-organizational dance coordination capacity, I volunteered to be one of the taxi dancers whom you can purchase for $3 per dance. Awkward… let me explain.

First, it’s awkward to think that someone will pay money to dance one song with anybody, let alone me. All I want to do is dance with you and I’ll happily dance with you for free. Second, what do you do as a taxi dancer while waiting for someone to hand you a ticket to indicate that they have purchased you for a dance? Awkwardly stand around and scan the room to see if anyone is coming towards you a ticket. Granted, I have epic skills when it comes to social awkwardness but this definitely was a memorable type of awkwardness.

A special shout goes to the wonderful Vicky for being so diligent in organizing all the taxi dancers and a big THANKS to all the great ladies (and one dude) who donated to the Frankie fund (or headstone?). I’ll make sure to find each and everyone who bought tickets for future dances (so you get your money’s worth).

Standing for Something

I was talking to Marvelous Martha this afternoon and she sent me a link to a leadership video about having a belief. It got me thinking about an exercise that we did for the Yonge and Bloor community about what we stand for. It took us half a year but I believe that the Yonge & Bloor blues community is starting to find its own footing in the overall social dance scene in Toronto.

Just in case you missed it, this is what we stand for at Yonge & Bloor Blues:

#1 – Blues is a dance in its own right.
We believe that blues dancing is an art form all its own, which requires the same amount of study and practice as any other dance style. It is not just a dance done at the end of a lindy hop night nor is it done only at house parties.

#2 – Blues music for blues dances.
For blues dances, DJ’d or live music, we like to dance to blues music. There is a rich history of blues music including but not limited to jazz blues, delta blues, piedmont blues, and rhythm and blues.

#3 – Respect each other as dancers and individuals
On and off the dance floor we try to treat one another as we would like to be treated. Blues can be a very close and intimate dance, but only if both parties/dancers are comfortable with each other. Respect each other’s space and comfort level.

#4 – Build a community of dancers
We are a community with a shared passion – dance. If we focus on our shared passion, the fruits of a community naturally happen.

#5 – Pursue growth and encourage sharing of knowledge
We work as a community towards common goals – to learn and grow to become better dancers and to spread that knowledge to other people. We’ll try hard to provide opportunities for this to happen and we’d like you to try hard too.

To say that we came up with these beliefs naturally and easy would be a lie. We thought and debated about each point long and hard before committing to them. There were decisions made in drafting these beliefs that were not very popular with some of our existing community dance members in Toronto (and to some extent, still not, but it’s gotten significantly better).

In our community, we have some dancers whose personal preference about blues music is something that you might see at a lindy exchange, where the earlier part of the night is up-tempo swingin’ tunes before slowing it down later on, maybe after midnight. An all-blues music dance night is not for them and I understand and respect them for it. We all have our own personal preference for music and dancing and as any dance organizer knows all too painfully well, you can’t please everybody.

The change by introducing an all-night, blues-music-only dance in the community had its risks. We definitely received mixed reactions but all we could do was weather the initial knee-jerk reaction to change and keep pushing for something that we believed in. We wanted blues dancing to be it’s own dance in Toronto. Blues music for blues dancers.

Making a stand for something is not free from hassle; it does not mean we won’t alienate some lindy hoppers and we may even lose some dancers whom we don’t directly cater to in terms of musical or dance tastes. Not everyone will agree to our style of blues dancing and blues music, but that’s okay. Standing for what we believe in means that we are willing to lose a few people if it means we have others who LOVE blues dancing even more. They are also the ones constantly introducing new people to this dance and getting the word out. They are the ones really building the scene.

More to come later.

Previous entries:

• http://hamfats.ca/toronto/rebuilding-blues-part-2
• http://hamfats.ca/toronto/rebuilding-blues-part-1
• http://hamfats.ca/toronto/rebuilding-blues-part-0

Wow. The first poll definitely caught me by surprise in terms of how much everyone really cares about their respective scene. While I might not agree with some of the view points shared, the best thing about having a site like Hamfats is that people can share and convey ideas freely and without being moderated. After all, we’re all in this together and have the same goals in mind when thinking about improving our scene – more dancing and more dancers.

So my second poll this week is:

What is one thing YOU could do right now that can have a positive impact on the scene.

I’ve been thinking about being a positive influence in my dance scene this past year. Quite honestly, it keeps me up at night and I wake up with all these ideas stirring in my head. So now my question to you guys/gals is:

If you could improve one thing in your respective dance scene to make it better, what would it be? Let’s not worry about the actual “how can you change it” but simply, what would you like to see different.

Check out Jasper’s UT-Swing blog post about DJ’ing and training up newbies. This is something that is recently on my mind a lot so I’m glad to be throwing this re-blog up.

This weekend UT-Swing hosted a DJ seminar to give some aspiring DJs a little head start and share some tips of the trade. I was very happy with the outcome. The newbies left with a better sense of what swing DJing is all about… or at least, that’s what I hope.

Link: http://swing.sa.utoronto.ca/2010/04/06/dj-seminar-2010/

For a previous blog post about DJing, check out DJing with an Agenda

A few pictures from the Pirates of Dovercourt Night! A special edition of Saturday Night Swing hosted by Bees Knees Dance