Do people still dance together?

The hubby and I don't dance but I do like to watch square dancing.
I do remember Disco and went on a date with someone who took me to the Playboy Club in New York City.
I near vomited when that stupid chick in the bunny suit said, "HI, I'm your bunny for the evening." All the lights and that crazy music gave me a migraine. Not a fun evening.
 
We have not gone since Covid.. 😞 We go to a Veteran's Club for drinks and dancing..
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My mom made me take dance lessons when I was around 12. She insisted I be raised to be an officer and a gentleman. Actually, I got pretty good at it and enjoyed cutting a rug. Now . . . my legs just don't wanna move so much.... :confused:
OH! Dig this! We lived on a small island in the Pacific when the Twist came along and nobody knew what to do. Anyone who arrived from Hawaii was immediately interrogated but we were still out of the loop. It wasn't until we returned to The States and I finally learned to twist again like they did last summer . . .
OH!!! And even better! My Spanish language teacher was a cool guy and threw a party at the end of the year. He put up a sign declaring that anyone who spoke the most Spanish that evening would win a prize. Well, being the consummate smart ass I just babbled the entire time and won . . . a 45 of El Twist in . . . Spanish! Damn I loved that record.
 
Lewkat said:
Of course they did, but the band is active with permission from the Miller family to entertain with his name on it.
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Oh! Ok! But it still isn’t the Glen Miller band. That’s quite a bit different but I get what you are saying. Their ‘music’ is still alive and people still listen to it. I enjoy playing a lot of their songs on my sax.
 
Gaer said:
Do people still dance together? I know i'm out of it here in the sticks but I haven't seen anyone dance for many, many years! Bars are for drinking. Clubs where you used to dance are gone away.
Are any of you old enough to remember the waltz, Foxtrot, swing, tango?
My favorite were the latin dances, especially the rumba and the samba!

Then disco came in. This IMO was the death of music for awhile. Good musicians, all over the country, couldn't get work because of the piped-in electronic
"stayin alive"stuff. Not only was real music dead but dancing was dead. Well, Dancing with a partner, I should say.

Do any of you still dance? Do live bands still exist out there?
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Dancing in the sense that you are describing was dead well before disco, though as you say, the onset of disco did kill off a lot of musicians' jobs.

In the 1960s there were shows such as American Bandstand, Thaxton's Hop, and others in which people didn't dance. Instead, they just wiggled at each other.

On the other hand, I know some people who are really into ballroom dancing and some even compete nationally. It seems to be a VERY expensive hobby unless you are strictly local amateur taking inexpensive classes. From what I can tell, even that is a lot of fun and a great way to socialize.

When I was growing up and those dance programs in which people just wiggled at each other were popular, square dancing was certainly alive and well among the older crowd.

As for musicians and disco. I was working full time as a musician, playing Holiday Inns, resorts, and supper clubs at the tail end of that era and just as disco was starting to gain ground. Clubs could hire a DJ to just play records, and later, CDs, instead of hiring a live band. I had decided to get out of that life style and settle down at just the right time, but a lot of folks who had committed their careers to that kind of touring, really got short-changed.

The big band players became like a specialized art form that developed into a nice niche for those who stuck with it, though financially it was certainly tough going for them. They began playing concerts instead of dances. I remember going to see several of these when they came through town. The kind of musician I was, and those along with me (or me with them) were on the road all the time playing music to dance to in the forum of then current pop tunes and, in the nice supper clubs, standards, but not to the skill level that the big band musicians were. We were more "jobbers" while those guys were artists, at least in my personal opinion and observation. I was glad to see that at least some of these big band people were able to find a niche when that music was no longer a mainstay in our culture.

But, then, these kinds of sweeping changes come and affect a lot of people. Consider how technology is changing the work landscape today as has been discussed in some recent threads. A lot of jobs that get replaced or changed by technology don't, unfortunately create the new jobs outside technology, just as not everybody wants to be a DJ. I certainly have no interest in that. Part of being a musician is developing a real skill playing one or more instruments, arranging tunes, etc.

So this post isn't disagreeing with you, but instead fully agreeing and adding to it, which is why I quoted it.

Tony
 
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tbeltrans said:
Dancing in the sense that you are describing was dead well before disco, though as you say, the onset of disco did kill off a lot of musicians' jobs.

In the 1960s there were shows such as American Bandstand, Thaxton's Hop, and others in which people didn't dance. Instead, they just wiggled at each other.

On the other hand, I know some people who are really into ballroom dancing and some even compete nationally. It seems to be a VERY expensive hobby unless you are strictly local amateur taking inexpensive classes. From what I can tell, even that is a lot of fun and a great way to socialize.

When I was growing up and those dance programs in which people just wiggled at each other were popular, square dancing was certainly alive and well among the older crowd.

As for musicians and disco. I was working full time as a musician, playing Holiday Inns, resorts, and supper clubs at the tail end of that era and just as disco was starting to gain ground. Clubs could hire a DJ to just play records, and later, CDs, instead of hiring a live band. I had decided to get out of that life style and settle down at just the right time, but a lot of folks who had committed their careers to that kind of touring, really got short-changed.

The big band players became like a specialized art form that developed into a nice niche for those who stuck with it, though financially it was certainly tough going for them. They began playing concerts instead of dances. I remember going to see several of these when they came through town. The kind of musician I was, and those along with me (or me with them) were on the road all the time playing music to dance to in the forum of then current pop tunes and, in the nice supper clubs, standards, but not to the skill level that the big band musicians were. We were more "jobbers" while those guys were artists, at least in my personal opinion and observation. I was glad to see that at least some of these big band people were able to find a niche when that music was no longer a mainstay in our culture.

But, then, these kinds of sweeping changes come and affect a lot of people. Consider how technology is changing the work landscape today as has been discussed in some recent threads. A lot of jobs that get replaced or changed by technology don't, unfortunately create the new jobs outside technology, just as not everybody wants to be a DJ. I certainly have no interest in that. Part of being a musician is developing a real skill playing one or more instruments, arranging tunes, etc.

So this post isn't disagreeing with you, but instead fully agreeing and adding to it, which is why I quoted it.

Tony
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Well said.
Yes, I was a ballroom dance instructor of gold dancing at Fred Astaire and Arthur Murrey 15 years before Disco came in. This electronic "musac" as well as "rap" and "DJ's" were only facimilies to actual music.
Occasionally, they will have a C & W band here in NM, but I haven't heard one in about 10 years.
 
In my world people still dance together...besides dancing at home with my hubby, usually the slow waltz, very, very slow :ROFLMAO:..I am involved with a few charities and usually there are a couple of fund raising balls during the year when I get to practice my skills. I was taught all the ballroom dances at an early age, part of the curriculum at my school in the UK..waltz, foxtrot, quickstep, Viennese waltz and tango.
 

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