Spotify playlists for swing, jazz and blues

I think music knowledge is important when you dance. After all it is the music that inspires us to dance in a certain way.

‘Tis the Season

Confession time: I have a small love affair with Christmas music.

"Sita Sings the Blues": An Animated Indian Myth set to 1920s Jazz

"Sita Sings the Blues" is one of those multi-thread, multi-cultural vanity projects that shouldn't work, but somehow does.  Producer / animator / director / writer Nina Paley manages to blend the ancient Indian myth of Ramayana with 1920s jazz provided by diva Annette Hanshaw , as told by three contemporary Indians represented as shadow puppets.  Oh, and there's the side story about a San Francisco couple that suffers marital woes when the husband gets a contract in India.  Whu-what?

Matty Matlock — No seriously, that’s his name!

With the Annapolis Dixieland Jazz Band dance coming up this Saturday, I thought it would be a good time to revisit the history of Dixieland jazz.

Fat Babies

I'm at a bit of a loss for words, other than cusses. Last night was the best night of music I've heard in months...maybe even in a year. I went to the Black Rock Tavern, not far from my house, where Nicolle Wood (of the Galaxie) was hosting a dance with a live band called the Fat Babies.

Cab Calloway’s Cat-alogue

Hey gang, I’m currently in the excellent position of hopping from Australia to New Zealand. I won’t have a chance to come up with a substantial post for a few days, but in light of last week’s post, I thought I’d let Cab Calloway take over Swungover for a day. Here is Cab’s dictionary of jive, the Cat-alogue.

EBC 2010 Competition Music

Another great year at EBC. Awesome competitions, great bands and always kick ass dancing. Following the great response to my ABW competition list, I am excited to post the complete competition list for EBC 2010. This time around, I decided to make it even easier for everyone to buy this great music by including Amazon links for every song (when available).  Enjoy the list!

Intro to Big Band (a flirtation with Chick Webb)

Let's suppose for a moment that you take a random look at my music collection- we'll look at my "all jazz" playlist, to avoid too much dance-style bias.  Suppose, then, that you search for songs with a trombone and a clarinet in them, and then sort by playcount (what?  I don't know why you'd do it, but suppose.).  If you look at the top 17 most-played tracks, you will find 17 that are new-orleans style jazz.  Messy, polymelodic, hard-swinging. You will find exactly 0 neatly-arranged, larger-than-life big band tunes.  At a quick glance, I'd estimate about 8 songs in the top 50... and several of those are choreographies (which bumps the playcount up).

Jam Cellar: The Musical

A couple weeks ago I referenced the guest DJ show The Jam Cellar did for Yehoodi Radio.  In addition to 10 of our only best DJ’s contributing their favorite songs to play at the Jam Cellar, the executive producer, Jesse Miner encouraged us to be as creative as possible with the program.

Nostalgia from Songs: The Carioca

There are songs that to individuals, that once they are played, bring back strong emotions and memories. T’aint What You Do by Jimmy Lunceford and Love Me or Leave Me by Nina Simone are examples of that in our swing dance community.

Secret Scary DJ Times

Believe It x2

It’s not too often that you get to hear the same band with the same personnel play the same song on the same recording date and give it two entirely different feels.