Lindy in the Park Captures Fascination of Jitterbuggers

By Ronitte Libedinsky

Every Sunday, the music from Hep Jen's free dance lesson behind the M.H. de Young Memorial Museum in Golden Gate Park draws a loyal crowd of dancers who boogie, not to hip hop, but to lindy hop.

"It's such a carefree and exuberant dance. People are just drawn to it and then they're hooked," said Jennifer Holland, a.k.a. Hep Jen.

"It really celebrates life. I'm always on a high after dancing," said Maryanne Cattaneo, who went to a lesson one Sunday in March and has been going back every week since then.

The lindy hop, a form of swing dancing originally popular in the 1930s and early 1940s, is drawn from African-American and European dance traditions. It is related to the Charleston, but the energetic lindy hop, packed with jumps, kicks and fast stepping moves, allows for more personal expression and freedom to improvise.

Hep Jen, 35, first saw the lindy hop in a movie in 1993 and immediately fell in love with the dance.

"I got totally addicted. Before I knew it, I was out dancing six nights a week," she said.

While working full time at a human resources company, Hep Jen began teaching lindy hop classes. When swing dancing underwent a revival in the mid-1990s, she was able to quit her job and begin devoting her life to lindy hop.

"It hasn't been easy, but it's been adventurous and I wouldn't trade it for anything," she said.

Now, Hep Jen teaches up to five classes a week, offers private lessons, performs two to three times a week for seniors and at hospitals, choreographs dances and is a regular swing music DJ at various dance clubs in San Francisco. And to prevent lindy hop exhaustion, she dances even more.

"It's important to me to go dancing for myself, to keep the love alive," she said.

When Hep Jen moved to San Francisco from Seattle three years ago, she found herself dancing every week at Lindy in the Park, a free, weekly swing dance party in Golden Gate Park that was started by Chad Kubo and Ken Watanabe in 1996. But she noticed that there were very few beginning dancers, and she offered to give free lessons to encourage new dancers to join the fun.

"Because of the nature of our work, we don't get together in large groups like people used to," said Michael Martin, who has been dancing at Lindy in the Park for two-and-a-half-years.

"But Lindy in the Park gets people to talk and socialize in a comfortable setting," he said.

Swing dancing continues to thrive in San Francisco, in large part because of the active live music scene in the City. It is possible to go swing dancing to a live band almost every night of the week. Hep Jen plans to continue teaching lindy hop and to introduce the creative and carefree dance to even more people.

"It's the perfect escape from the real world. It's good for the soul," she said.

For more information about Hep Jen or Lindy in the Park, visit www.hepjen.com and www.lindyinthepark.com.