10 Ways Beach Music, Romance & Self-expression Created the First ‘myspace’

by John Hook

Beach Music? Many define it by its geography and the kinds of songs it includes while describing 'friendship' and 'good times’ as the glue which binds it.

If you're like me you've thrilled to square dancing in bright costumes, two-stepping in country bars, bumping and hustling in discos, and line dancing in modern clubs. They’re all filled with friendship and good times; making those insufficient illustrations of what makes Beach Music what it is.

1. Beach Music in the East and the West are similar, but not the same.
Both coastal communities celebrate individuality and self-expression. At the center of West Coast beach culture is the surfer community encouraging private quests marked by athletic achievement while the East Coast dance culture inspires a new form of social success.

2. East Coast Beach Music nurtures new ideals of social equality, romance, and improvisational self-expression.
Fifteen years before Rock and Roll, white teenagers in the Southeast embraced Black music as their own. At the same time they developed a new dance to express themselves. From that mixture the Shag evolved.

3.  Many found the secret rites of Shag and Beach Music at the Beach.
Like the "soul surfers" of the West Coast, the “soul dancers” set new standards for the 'good life.' At the beach, personal and hometown histories stayed home while they assumed nicknames and developed new personalities.

4. Rhythm and Blues and Jazz were foundations for the Shag.
In addition to early black music, soul dancers often flipped over national pop hits to see if the 'B' side had the right beat and mood for carefree shuffles in coastal and inland pavilions.

5. Society sometimes misread them as mere ‘rebels.’
Like their West coast alter-egos they weren’t rebelling as much as forming new communities and social hierarchies of greater equality with rights of self-expression.

6. Balmy days and nights, sensual Shag moves, and their own ‘coat of arms’ embraced giddy summer romances.
The Shaggers’ dress code included Bass Weejuns, no socks, cashmere sweaters, and madras shirts. Like knights of old, girl-partners were revered.  When they danced, *she* was the most gorgeous woman in the world.

7. East Coast soul dancers enshrined the Art of Play as equal to Hard Work.
As such they considered social life equivalent to work life. While they worked summer jobs to support themselves, they worked just as hard at “not working” on the dance floor.

8. It looked like a sexual revolution.
It really wasn’t focused on sex. Self-confidence and cool were guiding principles and the 'safe date' was integral to Beach Music. They put dancing before drinking--unlike some who need a 'boost' to drop their inhibitions.

9. Classic Beach songs include national hits and treasures unknown outside the Southeast.
Fifties Beach songs celebrated the good times in several ways. Although "Drinkin' Wine Spo Dee O Dee" mentioned wine, it more loudly proclaimed the 'good times'! Fifties hits included "Good Rockin' Tonight," "Sixty Minute Man," and "Sh-Boom." The 60s added hundreds more like “Under the Boardwalk,” “My Girl,” “What Does it Take To Win Your Love,” and “Brown Eyed Girl.”

10. The ‘Shag’ had other names including the 'Bop' 'Freestylin'' and 'Fas' Dancin'.
The music wasn’t named for 25 years! In the beginning most teenagers found it at the Beach. Eventually there were 500+ inland dance clubs, Pavilions, restaurants, swimming pools, and fishing lakes with dance floors.

Beach Music and Shag history show a culture celebrating individual uniqueness in the rituals of music and romance experienced by those who were dancing to their own destinies.  The Beach Music community was like a ‘beta’ version of MySpace, a ‘flat’ world where everyone was equal, each member was in charge of their own self-expression and the accumulation of friends with whom they had common interests.  The internet has simply made the field of dance partners much much larger.

To learn more about this fascinating chapter of American life that is still being written, follow this link http://www.beachshag.com/BMG%20SITC.htm

"Fessa" John Hook is a 39 year broadcaster captains the Endless Summer Network of Beach and Shag music on the net.

His three books on Beach music and Shag  are: "Shaggin' in the Carolinas," and the "Beach Music Guide 1945-2006, Vols 1 & 2" and another, "Dancing On the Edge - How Music Freed the South," coming in the fall of 2009.

"'Shagging In the Carolinas,' according to Hook, a Beach Music and Shag enthusiast, is a love letter that took 26 years to write." --Sun Times newspaper

"Hook writes about how Shagging defied social conventions as carefree white teenagers were inspired by the possibilities inherent in improvisational black dance and music." --Lexington Dispatch

"Hook knows what he's talking about when it comes to Beach Music. As a broadcaster in the late 1980s, he was responsible for the first full-time Beach Music radio station in history....he chronicles the evolution of the dance....before the Lindy Hop, before the Jitterbug, came the Shag, a dance born and bred in the Carolinas." --Our State magazine