Great Dancing, Great Music, Great Atmosphere, Great Fun!!
Joel and his partner swinging to the music
Joel Hinderson is a student studying music at the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom, currently on exchange at the University of Hong Kong.
He recently started to attend swing-dancing lessons taught by this group in Hong Kong called Hong Kong Swings.
One of his friends started to attend these lessons and raved about how wonderful the whole experience was and convinced Joel to check out the social night, just to get a taste of what swing dancing is about.
The social dance nights take place at Grappa’s Cellar, a restaurant in Central, Hong Kong.
During these nights, HK Swings offers free dancing lessons to anyone interested.
After attending a couple of social events held by the Hong Kong Swings, he loved the atmosphere, the people, and the dancing so much that he decided to take their formal classes in addition to going to their free dancing social events.
Joel has had no prior dancing experience nor did he particularly appreciate dancing before. He jokes that being a typical British, it is sometimes hard for him to let go and just have fun.
According to Hong Kong Swings, they define swing as a dance style danced to the jazz music of the 1920s-40s.
The lindy hop is a kind of swing dance that originated in the Harlem ballrooms of New York during the 1930s and is a free, improvised dance with an emphasis on music, rhythm and groove.
It can be slow and sassy or fast and raw. Swing dancing is rich and unique in history and not to mention, fun!
Joel has met and made many great friends there. And he states that the most likely reason why he, and he thinks many others, keeps going back to these events is because of the great atmosphere, the great music, and the great people.
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So many gorgeous pictures of Joel dancing and having fun. Love the background music!
absolutely adore the background music! It really makes me get into that chill and fun atmosphere! And the variety of the dancing photos are lovely and really fun to watch!
Never knew about this type of gather in HK until after watching this video. Recording could be clearer, but pictures are nice.
Nice piece of work. I didn’t know there was swing in Hong Kong. The background music gives create an ambiance and gives you the peps to start dancing or at least move.
More pictures about the guy dancing would have given more peps to the story may be. As in a sequence of the steps or movement when the people were dancing. But it is very difficult to capture them though.
But anyway great job.
Agree with Yannie, really appreciated the background music. The pictures were very nice and I think they captured the atmosphere very well.
Hello. I enjoyed the article. I am an exchange student in HK right now as well and would love to dance to some swing music. I am trying to find a place where I can go and enjoy that kind of music and spin around the dance floor a couple of times. Does anybody know of a club or a bar where this is possible? Would really appreciate it =)))
Hi Mila, thanks for enjoying the article =]. Are you into swing dancing? HK Swings has swing dancing (teaching and also just dancing for fun–free) once a week and they also teach lessons once a week as well (those cost money though). I don’t know if they changed their schedules or not but you can definitely google them and find out =D. They used to meet at Grappa’s Cellar in Central at Jardine’s House every Weds but I’m not sure if that’s changed. They do change locations occasionally. Good luck! And have fun dancing!!