Travel Talk

Swing it!
Colorado GEM: Denver Museum of Nature & Science

Instructor demonstration at the cmDance Lindy Diversion Dance Weekend. © Harry Saito.

Swing it!
By Brad Weismann

“I dance four hours four nights a week, and I would much rather do that than sit down in front of the TV for an hour one night a week,” says Denver dance enthusiast and instructor David Vinson.

Concurs another local social-dance diva, Tiffiny Wine, “It’s energetic and exciting; a really lovely dance, the most creative and artistic dance you can do with a partner.”

They are talking about jitterbugging—an art form that encourages both self-expression and social interaction. Its culture of like-minded fans do the Lindy Hop, the West Coast Swing, the Balboa, and the shag, with moves such as dips, drops, pushes, passes, whips, pretzels, side cars and lampposts, the last of which sends one partner flipping over the back of another.

On almost every night of the week, venerable venues such as Denver’s Mercury Café and Turnverein Dance and Cultural Center host dances and classes. (The best reference site on the Web is the Denver Dance Calendar). There, live bands and enthusiastic DJs play or spin tunes new and old as the crowd pairs up in time to a happy beat.

The Turnverein, open since 1920 at 1570 Clarkson St. in Denver, is home to two social dance organizations, the Rocky Mountain Swing Dance Club and the Colorado Swing Dance. It has two ballrooms—a 4,500-square-foot gem upstairs and a newly expanded and upgraded 2,700-square-foot dance floor below, according to general manager Paul Maxie.

“It’s fun to play those old tunes,” says Roger Campbell, bandleader of After Midnight, a local sextet that mixes big-band classics with original compositions as it pumps out the accompaniment for area hepcats. It’s one of nearly two dozen regional ensembles who perform for jaspers and janes seeking to trip the light fantastic.

Denver is an ironic place in which a new swing boom might take place, as it almost killed “King of Swing” Benny Goodman’s career right before his big national breakthrough at Los Angeles’ Palomar Ballroom on August 21, 1935. Former Elitch Gardens proprietor Jack Gurtler told Denver historian Corrine Hunt, “Benny Goodman bombed in Denver!”

In the early 1930s, there were two basic kinds of jazz, broken down along racial lines. For black audiences, there were the adventurous, virtuoso sounds of artists typified by the brilliant inventions of Louis Armstrong. Then there was “sweet” jazz, a kind of sentimental and bland puree ladled out to white, mainstream culture by such men as the original “King of Jazz,” the internationally famous Denver native Paul Whiteman.

However, visionary composers and arrangers such as Duke Ellington, Eddie Durham, Don Redman and, most prominently, Fletcher Henderson, were crafting a new, hot sound. This harmonically dense, brass-blasting, driving music caught on in influential ballrooms such as the Savoy in Harlem.

Tiffiny Wine, who teaches and hosts numerous classes and dances at Denver’s Mercury Café, explains, “Early jazz, ragtime, was kind of like rock ‘n’ roll in that only the ‘bad kids’ did it. The flapper era came out of that music, and the Charleston was the biggest dance craze that ever hit the country.”

Finally, legend has it that at a Harlem dance marathon in 1928, “Shorty” George Snowden invented the “breakaway”—a dance move in which one partner flings his partner out and improvises a few solo steps. The watching crowd went wild. When asked what the dance was, Snowden replied “the Lindy” (Charles Lindbergh had flown across the Atlantic solo only a year before.) The Lindy Hop was born.


cmDance presents Lindy on the Rocks: Sunday Sunset Swing at Cheeseman Park.
© Harry Saito.

Still, it took several years for swing and jitterbugging to catch on. The brilliant clarinetist from Chicago, Benny Goodman, became entranced with the swing sound and put together a band of like-minded musicians who could play it. Using a raft of charts (musical scores) by Henderson, Goodman pegged away despite some audiences’ disdain.

Goodman and his men drove in a caravan from New York City to the West Coast in late July 1935, making appearances along the way. A major stopover was a three-week gig at the top ballroom in Denver—Elitch’s renowned Trocadero.

When the hard-charging, vibrant sound hit the patrons, they were staggered—and off the dance floor they sped. “I hired a dance band!” yelled the venue’s manager. “Can’t you boys play any waltzes?” Goodman biographer Ross Firestone states, “Benny remembered the evening as ‘about the most humiliating experience of my life.”

Goodman salvaged the engagement by sticking to a watered-down playlist, but it proved to be his trial of fire. A week later at their last gig of the tour, the Palomar, he and his men decided to “go down swinging”—and to their surprise and delight, the curious crowd exploded in a frenzy of appreciation. Suddenly, swing was here to stay.

Denver soon caught swing fever. The Troc, the Riviera and the Rainbow Ballroom were only the most popular of a dozen or more dance clubs that sprang up against the mountain backdrop. From 1935 to 1945, swing was king.

The end of World War II brought new fashions in music, and the genre slowly faded from earshot. The last prominent local bandleader, Dean Bushnell, still leads his Orchestra at the occasional gala, having spent a whopping 60 years in the music business.

“The demand has slowed down the past three or four years,” says Bushnell from his home in Englewood. However, smaller combos such as David Booker and his Swingtet assert that they average 30 playing dates a month.

There are plenty of dances to play for—and even rival schools of swing dance. Some are partial to East Coast Swing, a simplified Lindy Hop that is said to allow for more improvisation, “bounce,” and the memorable kicks and acrobatics that one associates with swing dancing. Others prefer West Coast Swing, a smoother, “cooler” set of moves that is credited with being more amenable to newer forms of music.

“It’s a much more diverse dance, adaptable to all kinds of music,” says Shane McIntyre, who runs Gravity Dance Productions with Keri McLean. The two burn a lot of miles on I-25, teaching and dancing, when not leading classes in their studio. “It followed the trend of the music, whereas the Lindy Hop stayed with jazz.”

Meanwhile, Vinson states that “the great thing about the Lindy is that it’s an insanely versatile dance.” Oh well, at least it’s a friendly rivalry.

McIntyre, as well as others in the scene, see dancers from their mid-20s to their 80s out on the floor, in pairs or looking for partners.

It’s tricky to pin down just what is driving folks to the dance halls these days. The first Swing Revival took place in the 1990s, fueled by bands such as Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, the Squirrel Nut Zippers and the Cherry Poppin’ Daddies, as well as the popular 1996 film Swingers.

“I don’t know what has caused this upsurge,” McIntyre says. “Whether it’s Dancing with the Stars on TV, or just the fact that dance makes people happy.”

Wine touts the mental as well as the physical benefits of the trend. “We have a couple of regulars, man and wife, who term themselves marriage educators. They recommend dance as a relationship tool—learning how to dance together is a way to keep your marriage light and fun,” she says.

Independently, Vinson echoes their words. “I want to dance every dance that I can,” he says. “I don’t think of it as great exercise—I think of it as great fun.”

Brad Weismann is a writer, editor and social media expert who lives in Boulder. After years as a comedian, he transformed himself into a journalist. Since then, he has written on topics ranging from grand opera to midget wrestling, for magazines and websites in America, England and Australia. You can find out more about his work at bradweismann.blogspot.com.



A giant T. Rex skeleton greets visitors at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. Courtesy of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science.

Colorado GEM: Denver Museum of Nature & Science

The Denver Museum of Nature and Science is one of the largest natural history museums in the country. Hands-on activities in the Expedition Health exhibit demonstrate how the body functions and changes. Prehistoric Journey contains a working fossil lab as well as exhibits of the sights, sounds and vegetation existing on Earth millions of years ago.

Other exhibits feature wildlife dioramas, Egyptian mummies, American Indian cultures, gems and minerals, and sections devoted to the South Pacific islands, Australia and Africa. Explore galaxies at the Space Odyssey exhibit and take a 3-D look at the stars at Gates Planetarium.

Traveling exhibits, such as the current T. Rex Experience (in its final days), are featured frequently at the three-story museum. The Phipps IMAX Theater and Gates Planetarium present a variety of shows, while Discovery Zone keeps even the youngest visitors entertained with special hands-on exhibits, stories and sing-a-longs, and much more.

For more information on the Denver Museum of Nature and Science visit www.dmns.org or call 303-370-6000.

This is one of the Colorado GEMs listed in the AAA TourBook. GEMs are Great Experiences for Members—top picks for things to do or see in the state. Get the newly redesigned 2012 AAA TourBooks at any branch office or online at www.AAA.com/travel.

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