Blues dance

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Like Blues music, Blues dancing finds its origins in African rhythm and movement. It emerged from 19th century dances like the Cake walk, which was one of the earliest combinations of European and African dance traditions, just as Blues music emerged from work songs and gospel music, which were a combination of African and European musical traditions.

Early Blues dances were very simple and open to musical interpretation. They were often a simple one-step or two-step and never became a focus for popular culture the way that dances like Lindy Hop and Charleston did. As a result, Blues dance has retained the intimacy from its early days and continues to focus on the interaction between dance partners, whereas the more popular dances often became quite showy and more focused, to a degree, on the spectators. While dances like Lindy Hop and Charleston were seen in some of the most prestigious ballrooms and nightclubs of the era, Blues dancing remained the purview of the house party, the juke joint, and the smoky, little hole-in-the-wall bar.

Because the spectrum of Blues music is so large, there are many different interpretations and styles of traditional Blues dance. "The Gut-Bucket," "The Fish Tail," "Struttin'" and "The Slow Drag" are only a few of the dances that history passes down with this wide variety of music. Unfortunately, the history of these dances is incomplete. There is no vast archive of film and writing, along with the living archive of the dancers from the era, that the more popular dances of the day, like Lindy Hop, produced. As a result, Blues dance today incorporates those historical elements which are available with more modern elements of dance, but keeps the focus on the music and one's partner.

Some people have the impression that a Blues dance must be both sensual and intense. However, anyone who has listened to a fair amount of Blues music will have heard songs that are lonely, longing, sad, angry, and joyful, as well as songs that are loving, lustful, and bawdy. Blues music is about common experiences. It is a sharing of human conditions that everyone can access on some level, and a Blues dance can include the entire spectrum of human emotions.

With the resurgence of the Lindy Hop in the 90's, there was a renewed interest in other dances from the same time period and culture. Blues music started being played during after-hours dances at Lindy Exchanges, which eventually led to the recreation of Blues house parties strictly for blues dancing. It was only natural that some of the more historically minded dancers started to look at the dances that were originally done to this music.

The traditional Blues dances started to resurface, some were expanded, some were changed, and new dances were spawned in the same tradition. Alongside this trend of rediscovery and popularization a freestyle form of partner dancing slowly grew. Based on Lindy Hop principles, but mixed with elements of West Coast Swing, Foxtrot, Argentine Tango, and general club dancing, it grew rapidly because of the style of music played and its low learning curve. In this way it shares a lot of similarity to dances like Modern Jive. “Fusion” is often the name given to the combination of blues and tango concepts.