CHARLESTONIA.

Shannon News, 25 March 1927, Page 2

CHARLESTONIA.

The Charleston has been popular for months (writes Patrick Chalmers in the “Daily Mail.”) Only during the last few -weeks has it become a disease. -I call it-Charlestons. Here are a few of many symptoms of Charlestons which have eqme my way in the las; week or two: - -

A young woman breaking into a Charleston step as she walked in tweeds and brogues over the downs; a tall woman. doing,-abstractedly, a little Charleston step as she looked into,a Bond Street shop' window; three page bov* doing a quiet Charleston in a corner o; a hotel foyer; a Charleston ball al which 3500 people, including one of the King’s sons, danced; another mammoth Charleston ball rtt which, betw. en 2 p.m. and 2 a.m. over 10 ; 0Q0 people danced

A society girl doing an exhibition solo Cbarleston’at private dance in Mayfair; programme girls surreptitiously Charlcstoning, back against the wall o( a theatre; factory girls doing a sort of group Charleston as they poured out of the works 'gate. Last night, travelling into the coun try, I was disturbed while reading ivi the Pullman ear. A strange, monotonous drumming sounded from the corridor. It was the attendant whiling away the time doing the Charleston. .

And yet people say that “no one is really interested in the “Charleston.” And for some time people back from New York have been saying that the Charleson has been dead in its original home for months. '

The Charleston died in New York because a ban against it was enforced in most of the dance places. It was prohibited because it was a nuisance—, entirely unsuited, with its kick-up side step and non-progressive backwar:! and forward movement, to a crowded ball-room

New York never knew the flat Charleston, which is just a staccato walk to the Charleston rhythm—with no kick'-ups, foot twists, cross-overs, or stamps. ; The invention of the flat Charleston has saved the dance here. It wiped out- at a stroke the kick and the nonprogressive movements, and so got the ban. lifted in practically every dance restaurant, club, and dance palace where the Charleston originally was prohibited. No one begins to understand this Charleston who regards it as an eccentric dance in which one flicks one ’ i feet about'and does weird things to. one’s knees. There is only one way to understand it: Listen to Charleston music, either “straight’’ Charleston pieces or a Charleston fox-trot.. Presently you hear the irresistible beat in the music. When you can pick that beat out you can change without pause or jerk from fox-trot to Charleston .and. back again, - and.' you can Charleston * * solo. ” .

You may also fall a victim —although this is problematical—to the prevailing epidemic. For this thing is not >; dance at all; it is a rhythm —a rhythm of youth, joy, laughter,‘high spirits, a sign of the inextinguishable gaiety of the younger generation.