The Ailey Extension To Offer Swing Dance Course

Harlem's Clyde Wilder, dance impresario of the Lindy Hop, Jitterbug, Swing and Blues will teach a 4-week Swing dance courses at The Ailey Extension on Fridays beginning March 5, 2010. Classes will be held Fridays from 6-7pm at The Ailey Studios, located at The Joan Weill Center for Dance (405 West 55th Street at 9th Avenue).

The original swing dance that grew in Harlem in the 1920s and ‘30s and made history at the Savoy Ballroom is still danced in clubs and ballrooms across the country and around the world. This class is for beginning dancers and anyone who wants to review the fundamentals of Swing dance, covering all the basic rhythms and patterns needed to hit the dance floor. The course will be offered in 4-week sessions, but participants may join for any class.

Clyde Wilder is a well-established director, choreographer and dancer. As the Director of the Harlem Swingers, he has captured the vocabulary of American Vernacular dance from its traditional influences and origins - African Dance - to its popular expressions of Swing Lindy Hop, Jitterbug and other modern counterparts. MR. Wilder was a dance consultant to choreographer Dianne McIntyre on the film "Beloved", has performed with Jon Hendricks, the Count Basie Orchestra and Stevie Wonder. He has appeared on Dance in America on PBS, National Geographic's Jitterbug and the Smithsonian Institute's, Stomping at the Savoy.

MR. Wilder was also Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater company member Matthew Rushing's Swing dance consultant on his Harlem Renaissance tribute, Uptown, which premiered this year and is now being performed on AAADT's 20-City US Tour.

To register for the Swing dance course, click here. For more information about The Ailey Extension and for a schedule of classes, please visit www.aileyextension.com.

Photo Credit: Clyde Wilder with partner Amaniyea Payne, as Norma Miller Jazz Dancers. Photograph courtesy of Larry Shulz.