YouCanDanceToit!,
To celebrate AB's 11th anniversary, the kids in 1968 try to
do The Stroll to a clip of the kids in Philadelphia from 1957.
Airdate: Aug. 17, 1968
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Edited by Azizi Powell
This is Part III of a three part pancocojams series on the Stroll, a late 1950s/early 1960s Rock & Roll line dance.
This post showcases three YouTube videos (film clips) of The Stroll and two 1970s videos of the Soul Train Line. The Soul Train Line was modeled after the 1950s/1960s Stroll line dance. I showcased Soul Train Line videos from the 1970s because I prefer that decade to the 1980s Soul Train Line videos.
This pancocojams post also includes a bonus film clip of Black teens or young adults performing a somewhat related 1957 Rock & Roll dance called "The Walk". That film clip is from the 1957 movie entitled Let's Rock.
The videos in this post are mostly given without my editorial notes.However, Part I of this pancocojams series includes my notes about the film clip that is given as Video #2 below and Part II of this pancocojams series provides some background to Video #1 in this post.
Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2012/02/soul-train-line-formation-video.html for additional Soul Train line videos and information about the Soul Train line (2012 pancocojams post entitled "The Soul Train Line Formation - Five Video Examples").
Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2022/04/the-real-originators-of-late-1950s-line.html for Part I of this pancocojams series. Part I presents general information about The Stroll along with selected comments about that dance from a YouTube video discussion thread.
Click https://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2022/04/which-teen-dance-show-first-televised.html for Part II of this pancocojams series. Part II presents excerpts from the 2012 book by Matthew F. Delmont entitled "The Nicest Kids In Town, American Bandstand, Rock 'n' Roll, and the Struggle for Civil Rights in 1950s Philadelphia"*. Mathew F. Delmont's book focuses on The Mitch Thomas Show, a 1950s Wilmington, Delaware Black teen dance show. That book quotes various sources which document that White dancers on American Bandstand watched The Mitch Thomas Show to learn the latest Rock & Roll dances, including "the Stroll".
The content of this post is presented for historical and cultural purposes.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks to all of the publishers of these videos on YouTube.
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This post is part of an ongoing pancocojams series on 1950s and 1960s Rock and Roll dances. Click the tags below for previous pancocojams post and for subsequent pancocojams posts on this subject.
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ADDITIONAL VIDEO EXAMPLES OF THE STROLL
VIDEO #2: The Original Stroll - February 1958
MrMemories, Feb 4, 2011
On a local television dance show in Idaho in February 1958,
local teens dance to one of the biggest dance crazes out of the late-1950's
called The Stroll, which originated from American Bandstand. This dance was
performed in a line formed with boys on one side and girls on the other,
creating an isle between them. The boy and girl in the front of the line would
meet up in the middle, grab hands and stroll their way down the line, as the
other kids in the line would move their way up to the front using the same
dance steps that the couple moving down the line would use, but move from side
to side instead. When the first couple made their way down the line, another
couple would meet in the middle and stroll down the isle.
-snip-
Corrections: "The Stroll" didn't originate on American Bandstand and this 1958 film clip was from Ames, Iowa and not Idaho.
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VIDEO #3: American Graffiti - The Stroll
Roland Burton, March 27, 2020
In this scene, they're at the Hop school dance and the band is playing The Stroll.
-snip-
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Graffiti
" 'American Graffiti' is a 1973 American coming-of-age
comedy-drama film...that is "Set in Modesto, California, in 1962"...
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TWO 1970s VIDEOS OF THE SOUL TRAIN LINE
VIDEO #1: Soul Train Line Dance to The O Jays Love Train
MultiMaestro77, Nov 30, 2010
-snip-
I'm not sure when this Soul Train Line was filmed, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Soul_Train_episodes indicates that the O'Jays appeared
on anepisode of Soul Train on April 21, 1973.
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VIDEO #2
steve3, Feb
18, 2014
-snip-
I'm not sure when this Soul Train Line was filmed, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Soul_Train_episodes indicates that Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes appeared on an episode of Soul Train on Feb. 23, 1974.
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BONUS FILM CLIP: The Stroll dance origin - film + Patsy by The Diamonds
GeoSilverWay, August 13, 2021
The late 1950s US dance fad was created by blacks and the Stroll hit record was by the Diamonds in 1958. I believe Chuck Willis and his group used to do the step in his stage performances, creating the dance.
This 1957 movie "Let's Rock" with Julius Larosa showed this gem film of blacks doing the dance in a park...
-snip-
"Chuck Willis (January 31, 1926[1] – April 10, 1958) was known as the King Of Strolls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Willis
I'm not sure if he and his group did Stroll steps during his stage performances, but it would make sense that he did. However, that doesn't mean that Chuck Willis created the Stroll line dance.
"Cool Daddy" wrote a comment in that video's discussion thread in 2022 that, among other things, indicated that "the dance in this clip with the black dancers is NOT the Stroll...it is a slightly faster dance called The walk".
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This concludes Part III of this pancocojams series.
Thanks for visiting pancocojams.
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