A day with Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes

My random life in London

The day I met Magneto! One thing I love about London is the random gigs and opportunities you get. My latest random adventure was getting to spend an afternoon as an extra on the set of a new Sherlock Holmes film called Mr. Holmes. It’s a feature film set to be released next year and stars Ian McKellan as the legendary Sherlock Holmes. The film is based on the novel A Slight Trick of the Mind by Mitch Cullin, and will be centered around the retired detective, aged 93 in this film, who is grappling with an old unresolved mystery, while facing the decline of his memory and deductive prowess.

I got to meet Ian McKellan himself. He was really lovely chatting with us extras, and even offered us lollies. In the film, I’ll be hugging a lady farewell (Melanie) who I open the door for and as she steps on the train. The date is 1947 and its fun dressing up in the fashion of an era. I have the smallest role in the world but fun to be involved.

Overall, it was a great experience and a nice break from the crazy world of Lindy Hop that I’m so immersed in at present.

Thanks again to Bernadette Cumento. 

A weekend with Jean Veloz in London.

An incredible weekend with Jean Veloz

It’s been just a little over a week since our epic Jean Veloz weekend and we’re still on a high from it. For those of you who may not know who Jean Veloz is, she is a legend of Hollywood style Lindy and the only original Hollywood style dancer for the 1940s still alive and teaching. At the time Jean came to London she was 90 years old.

I met Jean Veloz years ago in Washington DC at a camp that used to exist called Groovie Movie. I met Jean a few times after that and then again in 2013 at Camp Hollywood and that’s when I decided that it would be fantastic if the London Lindy community had the opportunity to meet and work with Jean and to listen to her stories. It would be such an incredible experience for them to meet someone so historically important who has contributed much to the Lindy scene. We did something similar with Frankie Manning years ago and still remains one of the best things I’ve ever done.

So, several email exchanges with Rusty Frank later we were fortunate to have Jean with us for a weekend.  This was also her first time teaching in England so it was a great honour for us in many ways. I’m proud of my team who have been slowly and carefully placing posts on Facebook over the last 12 months to create a real awareness of who Jean Veloz is since we have a lot of new dancers. Nothing gave me more joy than watching all the respect the Londoners showed for her, and the way they always stood up, and how they queued up to meet her and have photos with her.  

I also loved how jean stayed to the end at all three social events and clapped and cheered the dancers in front of her. The lady oozed with positive energy.

Words simply can’t describe how exciting it was to have Jean here. Her teaching was incredible. The way she moved was incredible. It was a great honour for me to be able to dance with her. I’m really proud that London put its best foot forward and we had three great nights with Jean. I thought she’d be exhausted by the final night; I kept reassuring her that it would be fine if she only stayed for half an hour. But every single night she stayed right to the very end and just loved watching the dancers dance would get so excited watching people do their swing-outs. She’s such a lovely lady and was so gracious. It was such an inspiring weekend and one that we’ll always remember.

Elif, Sibhe, Sally Young and Laura Hicks were great behind the scenes making this weekend happen and I couldn't have done this without the team.

Some other highlights:

* Jean talking about dancing in front of and then chatting with Gene Kelly.

* Jean talking about her love of the Big Bands from her day.

* The London dancers and their absolute respect of Jean

* The joy for all to have Jean around.

* Rusty and her great teaching. I learnt loads.

* Jean and her humble and lovely nature.

Here’s a video and some great photos from the weekend:

Jean Veloz dancing at Wilton’s Music Hall with one honoured guy.

Photos: Friday at Wilton's Music Hall

Photos: Saturday at the Bishopsgate Institute

Photos: Sunday at Red Rhythm

Sartori - a tribute.

A beautiful dancing tribute to Sartori - member of the Swing Patrol community.

You often hear of requests for a dance group to perform at weddings and birthdays, but it’s not too often that you get a request to dance at a wake. And yet we recently did and what a special tribute it was. It all started when I received a call from Kannan who explained to me that he was having a wake for his girlfriend who had passed away due to cancer. One of her great loves was dancing with Swing Patrol and so he wanted to hire two teachers to perform for the final hour of the wake, as a tribute to his girlfriend and her love of dancing. Sartori had performed at the last Performance Ball at York Hall and had many friends in the Swing Patrol community.  I was really touched by this phone call and immediately promised to support the event.

It just so happened that my whole teaching team was meeting for a teacher training and catch up session, so I told them about the request and put the idea to them. Before I knew it, what was originally going to be two people dancing turned out to be the entire teaching team dancing for Sartori’s friends and family. The team were unanimously supportive of doing this gig for Sartori. It was a very sad and solemn day and the speeches were quite powerful. Sartori’s boyfriend spoke about how his biggest regret was not having gone swing dancing with her. At the end, the teachers performed and put on quite the show for that special last hour of Sartori’s wake. as per the wish of Kannan the event finished on a real positive high even though it was naturally really emotionally charged.

Afterwards, when I was having a drink with the team, it was just great to reflect on the impact Swing Patrol had on Sartori. I’m really proud of my team for doing this gig. They gave up their time to do this for free, and most of them didn’t even know her. She was a student at Finsbury Park so the Finsbury Park teachers knew her, along with a few of the others, but the rest of the teachers didn’t. They were so generous and all pulled together to put on a performance in memory of Sartori. It really makes me proud of what lindy hop and the Swing Patrol community can do, and to be part of such a great environment where people just love what they do.

I felt this was worth writing about and wish I knew Sartori better as going on the tributes and speeches this was a very special person with a wonderful passion for life.

The better quality photos thanks to Nikki Zigras.

Thanks to Bernadette Cumento who is assisting me.