Herräng Dance Camp
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The Herräng Dance Camp is an annual four week dance camp, focussing on African American jazz dances, including lindy hop, boogie woogie, tap, authentic jazz, and balboa. The camp, which is run by the dance troupe Harlem Hot Shots is held in its namesake town of Herräng in Sweden.
While the camp holds nightly social dances, with music by live bands and DJs from around the world, the main focus of the camp is on workshops and teaching. The teachers employed by the camp include the most experienced and most well respected dancers from around the world, with the Harlem Hot Shots both organising the camp and carrying the greater burden of teaching during the week.
Herräng is also known for its emphasis on traditional jazz dance and invites surviving dancers from the 'original' swing era, including Frankie Manning, Norma Miller, Sugar Sullivan and others.
Herräng is the biggest lindy hop camp in the world, with a reputation for offering both the highest standard of teaching and attracting the finest dancers from around the world for social dancing.
Rumours that the camp may be closed in 2007 resulted in record numbers of dancers attending the 2006 camp. In July of that year over 1200 dancers attended the camp. 2007 will see the camp extended to five weeks as a result.
The Herräng Dance Camp was originally started by some of the members of the Swedish Swing Society based in Stockholm. The first camp in Herräng was held in 1982. In its infancy, the camp attracted around 100 students a year. The camp began to expand in the 1990s when it started attracting more and more foreign dancers from all around the world. Dancers have come from as far away as Japan, Australia and the west coast of the USA to partake in the camp.
With over 1,000 people attending the camp each summer, the camp creates--then later disassembles--its own infrastructure each summer to meet the needs of the large number of dancers; you can find several cafes, a full cafeteria serving buffet-style meals, a shop for dance supplies, accessories and daily essentials, bicycle rental, housing of various standards, nightly entertainment, airport limo service and much more.
The camp is preceded by a 'swing bus' tour of Europe by the Harlem Hot Shots, where the troupe stop to teach and perform. Other dancers have been able to travel on the bus in the past. The camp itself officially runs for four weeks, with a 'break down' week of unofficial parties. This week has been included in the official program for 2007.
