Scottie Cupit’s swing dance school has its share of plaques and medals – but, for Cupit, fun always comes first.
“I’d rather put people over dance,” he says. “Our philosophy is that you can teach great technique while having a joyful experience. It’s not just a dance class in a studio – we want people to have a night out.”
Swing Patrol offers classes at clubs, pubs and ballrooms around Melbourne, where students practice the Balboa and the Lindy hop and other swing techniques in a chatty and relaxed atmosphere. Cupit has focused on making the school welcoming to beginners – having two left feet is no excuse not to drop in, he says.
Steph Ashby was looking for a night out when she went to her first Swing Patrol class. In the two years since, she’s become a competitive dancer as part of the school’s Harlem Shout performance troupe. Now, the school’s Meet Our Scene Ball is a highlight of her year.
“It started out as a hobby, but then it quickly got serious,” Ashby says. “There’s something addictive about it. I got the bug – sometimes they call it the swing-dancing bug – now I’m never stuck for something to do. There’s always an event on. I have a crazy social calendar because of swing dancing.”
As well as giving dancers a fierce cardio workout, swing can be an expressive outlet, she says.
“I’m not an artist by any means,” Ashby says. “I never would’ve thought of myself as creative. But dancing made me realise that maybe I actually am, because it’s an outlet for creativity as well.”
In swing, two dancers – a leader and a follower – improvise in tandem before switching off to find their rhythm with new partners. Cupit explains that the cooperative aspect of swing makes it good social therapy.
“You can’t swing dance without smiling,” he says. “Sometimes someone comes in as a shy person and learns how to express themselves on the dancefloor, through the music. While they might be an awkward person to have a beer with, you wouldn’t believe it when you see them dance, because they’ve found this creative side that they didn’t know they had.”
The first Swing Patrol school opened in Melbourne in 1997. Since then, the program has spread to Sydney before going to the UK and Germany. Swing Patrol UK has become the highest-membership branch, and holds the Guinness World Record for the largest Charleston dance. But Swing Patrol’s achievements wouldn’t have been possible without professionals from the Melbourne school, Cupit says.
“It all started in Melbourne,” he says. “Swing Patrol London is now a monster – a very big, accomplished group. But everything that London did was based on Melbourne. As a Melbourne boy, I’m incredibly proud of what’s happened in London.”
Melbourne is well known for its vigorous jazz scene and for lively venues like the Jazzlab and The Paris Cat. Cupit has worked to grow a connection between his school and the greater jazz community through performance events like SwingCity, held at the 2017 Melbourne International Jazz Festival. Cupit divulges that Swing Patrol is currently sketching out plans for a possible event at this year’s festival.
“There are a whole bunch of people out there in Melbourne who think jazz is just for sitting and listening,” he says. “But swing dancing and swing music have that perfect synergy, like ham and pineapple. I fell in love with swing because I saw it. You see the movement and you say, ‘That’s something that I want to do.’”
At Swing Patrol performances, shiny spectator shoes, suspenders and vintage neckties are everywhere. Despite this nostalgic and even conservative aesthetic, Cupit wants Swing Patrol to set a progressive example for other dance groups. This means allowing women to dance as leading partners with men, discouraging men from refusing to dance with other men and, in one case, taking a firm line with a dancer who wanted to dress as Pocahontas to an event.
“You’ve got to run that gauntlet of showing compassion and patience, but also being very firm,” Cupit says. “Are we welcoming to all cultures, all nationalities? I think we do a great job, but it’s still a challenge. The world is moving, and we’ve been quite proud to move with it.”
