A week @Herräng
Saturday July 14 I entered a bus going to Stockholm to meet up my friend Hanna. Together we drove by car to the small village Herräng, arriving 9ish pm. She crashed while I took a shower and wanted to start swinging at least for an hour or two, but I kept this first night short. I had hardly danced any swing with partners for 2 months (since I left US).
The public accommodation is basically a school where they have placed a lot of bunk beds in every room, gym and everywhere. Outside there a lot of big tent halls with dance floor, where classes are held as well as in the building "Folkets hus". I love the "camp" feeling, with people living everywhere, sharing kitchen and all that. You meet so much happy people and everybody is there for one reason; they love dancing! There are also tent and trailer areas next to the school.
Classes usually begin at 10 or 11.20 am and a common amount of classes are 3-4 each day. Between the "holes" in the schedule, we tried to have some food and constantly taking a shower because the heat and lots of sweating.
The last class ends at 7.20 pm and at 9pm an evening meeting take place, that is kind of a talk show for about an hour. Then two different (free) classes take place, without skill demands, which can be something different such as shag, beginning balboa, air steps, latin dances or something else. Around midnight most people have started social dancing at Folkets hus and the three dance floors plus the bar, keep lots of people happy, even if it's often too crowdy really swinging out the first couple of hours. They keep playing as long as they have people dancing, but usually I left between 5 and 7 am and it was always lots of people on at least one of the floors.
I was in the intermediate-advanced level of classes and they fit me pretty good overall, the advanced level request you do the try-out but is then divided into three groups and personally I think the worst dancers in group 3 probably were less skilled than a lot of us in the int-adv level. The days at Herräng felt very busy and the lack of sleep didn't help, but if you don't want to skip classes there are some things happening during the week that may give you a short break. One forenoon a cultural day take place, one of the nights a cabaret show happens (I participated in the first number, where we did Steven Mitchell's choreography) and Tuesday is blues night while Friday is the "big" night when everybody dress really nice. The book signing with Frankie Manning and a talk show with Frankie, Chazz Young and Dawn Hampton was also appreciated.
It was very interesting and useful having all different kind of instructors, from having some kind of street routine by Stephen, to a fun courteous-to-girl routine by Frankie Manning but also experience the "buggified" lindy the Swedish teachers are teaching. I think it also was very cool with the cabaret, because our number was first we met a bit earlier than the other, and just hanging out in the bar talking to Dawn Hampton about "the old days" for 45 min before the show started was a memory itself!
Overall, it was a long time ago I had so sore legs and such a tough camp with so good dancing! Some of the musicality lessons with Andy and Nina was very needed by me, and by getting lots of good dances with very good dancers really made me pawing the next level of dancing, after struggling at the same level for a while! The rhythm and musicality definitely progressed and I also got a bunch of dances with mostly girls but in following position that really gave me more perspective of leading and good ideas. I can't say anything else then lots of creds!!! to Herräng and I recommend every lindy hopper to visit the camp at least once in their lifetime! Now I've added friends to my list coming from Lithuania, US, Switzerland, Holland, Belgium, England, Norway, Spain, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, China, Denmark and Finland among others!
Keep dancing and feel the swing, yeah!!!
The public accommodation is basically a school where they have placed a lot of bunk beds in every room, gym and everywhere. Outside there a lot of big tent halls with dance floor, where classes are held as well as in the building "Folkets hus". I love the "camp" feeling, with people living everywhere, sharing kitchen and all that. You meet so much happy people and everybody is there for one reason; they love dancing! There are also tent and trailer areas next to the school.
Classes usually begin at 10 or 11.20 am and a common amount of classes are 3-4 each day. Between the "holes" in the schedule, we tried to have some food and constantly taking a shower because the heat and lots of sweating.
The last class ends at 7.20 pm and at 9pm an evening meeting take place, that is kind of a talk show for about an hour. Then two different (free) classes take place, without skill demands, which can be something different such as shag, beginning balboa, air steps, latin dances or something else. Around midnight most people have started social dancing at Folkets hus and the three dance floors plus the bar, keep lots of people happy, even if it's often too crowdy really swinging out the first couple of hours. They keep playing as long as they have people dancing, but usually I left between 5 and 7 am and it was always lots of people on at least one of the floors.
I was in the intermediate-advanced level of classes and they fit me pretty good overall, the advanced level request you do the try-out but is then divided into three groups and personally I think the worst dancers in group 3 probably were less skilled than a lot of us in the int-adv level. The days at Herräng felt very busy and the lack of sleep didn't help, but if you don't want to skip classes there are some things happening during the week that may give you a short break. One forenoon a cultural day take place, one of the nights a cabaret show happens (I participated in the first number, where we did Steven Mitchell's choreography) and Tuesday is blues night while Friday is the "big" night when everybody dress really nice. The book signing with Frankie Manning and a talk show with Frankie, Chazz Young and Dawn Hampton was also appreciated.
It was very interesting and useful having all different kind of instructors, from having some kind of street routine by Stephen, to a fun courteous-to-girl routine by Frankie Manning but also experience the "buggified" lindy the Swedish teachers are teaching. I think it also was very cool with the cabaret, because our number was first we met a bit earlier than the other, and just hanging out in the bar talking to Dawn Hampton about "the old days" for 45 min before the show started was a memory itself!
Overall, it was a long time ago I had so sore legs and such a tough camp with so good dancing! Some of the musicality lessons with Andy and Nina was very needed by me, and by getting lots of good dances with very good dancers really made me pawing the next level of dancing, after struggling at the same level for a while! The rhythm and musicality definitely progressed and I also got a bunch of dances with mostly girls but in following position that really gave me more perspective of leading and good ideas. I can't say anything else then lots of creds!!! to Herräng and I recommend every lindy hopper to visit the camp at least once in their lifetime! Now I've added friends to my list coming from Lithuania, US, Switzerland, Holland, Belgium, England, Norway, Spain, Australia, Singapore, Malaysia, China, Denmark and Finland among others!
Keep dancing and feel the swing, yeah!!!
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