Gorges Swing Weekend
Welcome to the Shorty Gorge 2023 Gorges Swing Weekend!
What: A Lindy Hop & Balboa workshop & dance weekend.
Dates: October 21st & 22nd (full schedule and descriptions).
Prices: See below, including new early registration and student discounts
Classes: Eight hours total, four hours on Saturday and four hours on Sunday.
Instructor: Jazz musician, bandleader, and swing dancer Adam Lee.
Dance: Music Saturday by the Ageless Jazz Band, Sunday by our DJ’s.
See below for full details on the schedule, registration, and locations.
Registration
Full weekend price
$50 ($42 students) through Monday Oct 9th
$60 ($52 students) until Saturday Oct 21st
$70 day of event, if space remains
Workshops only
Saturday workshop: $40 ($45 at event)
Sunday workshop: $40 ($45 at event)
Dance only
Saturday live band dance: $15
Sunday DJ'd dance: $5
Registration QR code
Schedule
Saturday, October 21
10:30am - 11:50am
Finding the Form
All levels (familiarity with swingout, basic Charleston)
Location: CSMA Hamblin Hall11:50am - 1:30pm
Discussion Lunch / break1:30pm - 2:50pm
Listening to the Levels
Adv. Beginner and up
Location: CSMA Hamblin Hall3pm - 4:20pm
Momentum and Stretch
Adv. Beginner and up
Location: CSMA Hamblin Hall7pm - 7:30pm
Crash course
No dance experience necessary
CSMA Hamblin Hall7:30pm - 10pm
Social dance with the Ageless Jazz Band
CSMA Hamblin Hall
Sunday, October 22
11am - 12:20pm
Seed movements - Tuck Turns
Familiarity with basic 6 and 8 count movements
Location: CSMA Basement Dance Studio12:20pm - 1:30pm
Discussion Lunch / break1:30pm - 2:50pm
Improvisation, as in Jazz so too in Dance
All levels
Location: CSMA Hamblin Hall3pm - 4:20pm
Balboa Musicality
Intermediate and up
Location: CSMA Hamblin Hall5pm - 7pm
Social dance with our DJ’s
CSMA Hamblin Hall
Location
All the classes and dances will be held at the CSMA. Except for the Sunday morning class, they will all be on the 3d floor Hamblin Hall.
CSMA
Hamblin Hall (3rd floor)
Community School of Music and Arts
330 East State St
Ithaca, NY 14850
The dance hall is on the third floor (accessible through stairs and an elevator) of the Community School of Music and Arts (CSMA) building. Follow the signs on the doors to find the venue.
The basement dance studio is in the baseement, down the stairs and the in the back of the building.
You can park in the CSMA parking lot as well as in the Ithaca Insurance parking lot behind the CSMA building. Street parking is also free during the weekends.
Workshops
Saturday classes - Oct 21
This class examines the common musical structures found within most swing era music (AABA, ABAC, 12 Bar Blues) and targets not only how to hear and identify that form but also uses some basic approaches for altering your dancing to fit that form.
All levels but please be at least familiar with a swingout and some basic Charleston.
Finding the Form
Discussion Lunch
Eat lunch and have an open Q&A on topics related to swing music and dance.
Lindy Hop is what I call an analog dance, not digital, it is about feeling when your body gives and receives feedback and going with that as opposed to executing routines of knowledge. This class will practice the body mechanics of the Lindy Hop and work on finding connection and feeling through those mechanics.
Advanced beginner and up.
Momentum and Stretch
Sunday classes - Oct 22
Using variations on a single type of movement to practice lead-follow techniques and listening to your partner and the music to create variation and texture in your dancing without needing to know a thousand different moves.
Must be familiar with both six count and eight count movements, but don’t need to be a master of them.
Seed movements - Tuck Turns
Eat lunch and have an open Q&A on topics related to swing music and dance.
Discussion Lunch
This class focuses on how to use the elements in the music to influence your dancing and how to free yourself from the bonds of moves and routines in order to get yourself dancing as an active listener, both in terms of response to the music and response to your partner.
All Levels but must be willing to make stuff up on your own.
Improvisation, as in Jazz so too in Dance
This class focuses on finding the different things that are happening in swing, particularly big band swing, and using those critical listening skills to alter your dance textures and respond to different elements of the music.
Subtopics include instrumental sections and their interplay, call and response, instrumental dexterity, and more.
Advanced beginner and up.
Listening to the Levels
This class focuses on speeding up and slowing down movements to create musical moments in Balboa, both in footwork and in lead-follow stretch and connection.
Intermediate and up.
Balboa Musicality
Instructors
Adam Lee
Adam Lee started down his swing path in the 2nd grade when he started playing clarinet, and his grandmother bought him his very first record, which happened to be a Benny Goodman record.
Growing up as a jazz musician, the addition of Lindy Hop to his life was a natural one. Adam started dancing in 1997 just a few months before the infamous GAP ad and was dancing five nights a week. In 2001 he moved to Beijing, China where he started the Lindy Hop scene and led a 17 piece big band. In 2010 he returned to the USA to do a Master’s degree in Music Education at NYU, and a few years later moved back to his home state of California, where he taught high school band and was the bandleader and music director for the LA Swing Barons.
He presently is working on his Ph.D. in Jazz Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, teaches band at Chatham University and the Afro American Music Institute. His passion is for the music of the swing era, specifically that of the Kansas City sound from the '30s. He also organizes swing dances and leads swing dance bands in the Pittsburgh area.
Music
Ageless Jazz Band
The Ageless Jazz Band is an 18-piece Big Band from Ithaca, NY that has been entertaining audiences for over 30 years with sophisticated charts from Swing to Bebop to Latin to Rock to Contemporary jazz.
Under the direction of saxophonist and composer/arranger Peter Rothbart, the band features professional and semi-professional musicians in the area enthusiastically committed to making Central New York swing.