DON’T THINK ABOUT GETTING OLD A young boy, age 91, has landed on the 29 th of august at MXP Airport. A baseball hat on his head, sunglasses and a really eccentric look.This young boy is Frankie Manning and he’s come to Italy bringing with him his huge baggage of experience, as a dancer, but, most of all, as a man who lived his life for dancing.He’s going to Genova, where, on September the 3 rd and the 4 th, he will teach Lindy Hop in a stage that Bruno Rossi and Silvia Palazzolo (The Zenaswingers founders) have hardly but successfully put together, with the aim of bringing Lindy Hop to Italy and helping it to take off.So, who better than Frankie Manning could help him to make their dream come true? Don’t forget Frankie has been, since the early 30s, the king of Lindy Hop!!!When you ask him to tell you something about the very beginning of his career, his face becomes so bright it seems he’s 20 again and he smiles in such a particular way… he goes back in the past and suddenly, we’re thrown in the period when a still young Frankie managed to enter the Savoy Ballroom: yes, the Savoy, the famous ballroom right in the heart of Harlem, a place that greeted every kind of people, white, black, rich and poor, people coming from every possible class, every colour and every race, but all of them having something in common: their love for dancing.The Savoy Ballroom had a huge dance floor, and two great bands playing sometimes at the same time. Some of the most famous musician were Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Chick Webb and Benny Goodman.When Frankie talks about them, his eyes become sad for a little while, but soon he’s smiling again, while he talks about his girl Ella (Fitzgerald) and about the sweetest sides of the personality of his neighbour, Billie Holiday.This is Frankie: he brings his past with him, but still he’s humble, and even if he’s danced with the music of the greatest swing bands in the world, and he’s choreographed famous movies such as Hellzapoppin’ and Malcolm X, with the same pleasure and joy as in the past, today he’s with us, sharing his passion and his knowledge.The workshop welcomes people from all over Italy. All of them are waiting for Frankie with emotion and excitement. When he enters the room, he’s a man like any other: his pace is slow, his head is bent. But the music soon starts, and Frankie turns himself into a kid. His body moves, suddenly made young by the rhythm and by the music, his music, and his pace, once so slow, becomes quick, flexible and nimble.Frankie wants to teach us how to dance into the feel of music, letting ourselves go and freeing our minds from the thousands of everyday constrictions.During the classes he often closes his eyes, and with a smile full of bliss, he opens his arms wide as if he’s going to fly away, and he lets his body swing freely, with the music, inside the music.Many students stare at him, while, after a dinner he had with all of them, he’s describing the way in which more or less 70 years ago, he’s invented the very first Lindy Hop aerial step ever seen. He talks about all the accidents occurred with his partner Freda Washington, about their falls, their laughs and their playful misunderstandings.His narration is breathtaking and his students are laughing with him. At the end the couple manages to put together this aerial step and they’re ready for the competition at the Savoy, the famous one with Shorty Snowden, who had been till that moment the best Lindy Hopper in the world.The challenge is hard for both of them. But Frankie has got a surprise for his audience. Freda and Frankie are the last ones to dance, and when the band is at its top, they perform their aerial step, Suddenly everything stops in the ballroom, as the lady is flying over his partner’s head, to land in front of him after a couple of seconds: the audience has no words, they look at each other, their mouths wide open, and their eyes so surprised… they don’t realize what has just happened… but at the end all of them are clapping their hands, and they are going crazy for him.Frankie and Freda win the competition, and this is the beginning of Frankie’s sparkling career.On Sunday the 4 th, when the workshop is reachin the end, a strange sadness is in the air.Somebody sheds a tear, there’s a great emotion all around and everybody is trying to find any possible excuse to make their teacher stay a little bit longer. A picture, an autograph, two words in an uncertain English. Frankie doesn’t say no, even if he’s tired and he’d like to go home. He’s till the end a great artist and a really generous man.It’s difficult to explain what this experience has left us, such as the emotion and the simple happiness that Frankie, the ageless boy, has given us the possibility to feel.For those who have appreciated it and for those who, perhaps, haven’t fully understood the importance of the event, Frankie was there, without saving himself at all. His subtile teaching has reached the heart of those who, as he himself, have understood the real sense of dancing, of swinging, and, of course, of living: having fun, being able to play and always looking for the best side of things.So, don’t think about getting old, just enjoy life!!!
By Silvia Palazzolo
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