You don't stop dancing because you've grown old. You grow old because you've stopped dancing.
- apologies to G.B. Shaw

Special Announcement

November 4, 1999: At the ALHC in Stamford last weekend, two meetings were held to discuss: The Formation of an American Lindy Hop Organization and The World Rock & Roll Confederation/World Lindy Hop Competition and its Rules

The minutes from each of those meetings are being edited and will be distributed in DRAFT FORM to the meeting attendees within the next few days for corrections. Once corrections have been made, the minutes will be posted on the same three websites that host the debate archives and distributed to other web sites around the world. See "Mirror Archive Sites" below.

If you would like to receive a copy of the completed minutes, with a list of action items recommended at each of the meetings, send your name and email address to me at:

Also, Nathalie Gomes will host a very important meeting next Monday, November 8th to discuss continuing plans for World Lindy Hop and American Lindy Hop Competitions. The meeting will begin at NOON. Location will be announced in the next 24 hours.

If you feel you have constructive input to offer (no cat fighting allowed) :), and would like to receive an invitation, please send email to the same email address as above.

Finally, recommendations were made at the ALHC meetings to form an exploritory committee to investigate the possibility of establishing a US-based, or North American based, Lindy Hop Organization. Volunteers signed up to participate on the committee at the ALHC meeting. In the interest of being inclusive of as many swing dance communities in North America as is possible, if you have recommendations for appropriate people to serve on this committee, or if you would like to volunteer yourself... please send email to:

World Lindy Hop Championship Debate

Last updated, Thur, Nov 4, 1999

September 24, 1999: A debate took place between Ryan Francois, Marcus Koch, Nathalie Gomes and others concerning the governance of the World Lindy Hop Championships, November 7, 1999, in New York City.

The following material is a collection of messages either sent to me to be posted here for public inspection or posted to public discussion boards around the US and gathered here to complete the body of communications between the parties. This information is provided in the hopes of helping every concerned party to develop a better understanding of what is going on.

The material posted here is the most complete discussion of this debate that I have found with the exception of two cases:

1. occasional "one-liners" and "quips" that I have chosen not to include for lack of substance.
2. a few unusually angry messages that contributed no useful discussion to the debate that I have chosen to omit

If you have any additional information to contribute that can help all of us to better understand the issues at hand, please email it to me at and I will do my best to get it posted here as quickly as possible. Also, if you have corrections to the following material that can be validated, please forward that info to me as well. Thanks.

Please recognize that I have posted this page in an effort to prevent damaging rumors and convey factual information to the Lindy Hop communities worldwide. I am not interested in arguing with anyone about this issue. I am trying to understand the issues and help us all to affect positive changes. If you want to argue, please do that on your neighborhood discussion board - don't send flames to me.

Finally, I would like to encourage you to read this material carefully and peer down below the surface of the arguments to listen carefully to the issues being debated. You may not feel that these debates affect you or your dance community now, but the outcomes will affect the future of the American-born, grass-roots art form we all know and love as Lindy Hop.

Then, when you've read enough... A one, a two, you know a what to do!  :  )

Spin Doctor

Mirror Archive Sites:

Most (or all) of the material found here, and some additional material, can also be found on Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen's web site at http://www.swinginhepcats.com and at Alan Sugarman's web site at http://www.swingout-ny.com Thanks Wendy and Alan for your hard work in helping to archive this important debate. May the thoughts expressed here encourage us all to become more critical thinkers and work harder at nurturing the beautiful dance form that we all love so much.

I had hoped to add an Index to this page some time ago, but life got in the way. There have been no updates to this page since November 1999. I do not plan to add anything to this page since the '99 debates are over. If new developments occur I may start a new archive.

If you submit additional information please provide a traceable source. I will publish all information, and email addresses of sources, that can be verified. But in the interest of clarity, good communication between our worldwide Lindy Hop communities, and in an effort to not proliferate rumors, I will be reluctant to publish untraceable materials or information of dubious nature.

Ryan's Original Message
As broadcast to numerous mail lists around the world. It was this letter that brought world-wide attention to the debate.

Confirmed From: Ryan Francois MrZoots@aol.com

Sep 18, 1999

A few years ago the World Lindy Federation was founded much to the dismay of the main Lindy community of the time. at first it's goals were well intended but it had no support from anyone who would be considered to be the main core of the Swing revival - myself included - therefore it didn't quite work.

This left an open door for the World R & R federation spearheaded by Marcus Koch to attempt to take over the Lindy Fed and impose their rules and regulations into the dance form. this included standardising the movements and dictating to teachers how they should be taught so that we did the exact same things. The pure among us found this to be an intolerable idea. A dance based on improvisation standardised? Worse still owned by a federation who were not even Lindy Hoppers!

There were many other reasons for Marcus and his Federation to get their fingers on the Lindy but these already were enough. This caused uproar in Europe and after many a heated discussion the World Lindy federation was disbanded. And supposedly forgotten about. Now the scene in America and across the globe hadn't established itself at this time, so they were no doubt blissfully unaware of the rumblings in

Europe which made it a perfect place to Start a World Championships run by the World R & R fed picking a continent ignorant of its prior shady dealings which is exactly what they did in Europe before the idea was destroyed.

So all I can say is beware, this is a venture born of self interest not for the good of the dance. I have never spoke out before about anything but on this I am adamant. This is BAD for Lindy Hop Take care Ryan You can circulate this message if you wish to whomever you wish, I'm not afraid of my statement.

Ryan Francois

Additional Details from Ryan
As posted by Robert Casey rgcasey@avana.netto the "Swingtown" Atlanta swing dance discussion list at http://www.onelist.com

From: Ryan Francois MrZoots@aol.com

Sep 19, 1999

Robert Casey rgcasey@avana.net
To: swingtown@onelist.com
Mailing-List: list swingtown@onelist.com; contact swingtown-owner@onelist.com
Delivered-To: mailing list swingtown@onelist.com
Reply-to: swingtown@onelist.com
Subject: [swingtown] [Fwd: Clarity on Ryan's message] WLHF and WRR

For those who might be interested in this controversy, please see attached...I have no opinion on whether it is really Ryan Francois.

There are some pretty good Lindy Hoppers in Atlanta. Don't know if anyone is seriously considering a career in Lindy Hop (like full-time professional...) but if you are, competing (and winning!) is one of the best ways to gain recognition, fame, and enhanced earning ability. This kind of "politics" IS serious for the pros. And there is some obvious bad feelings between the Lindy Hop revivalists and entrenched Ballroom establishment. (Maybe this is natural...I have yet to see Fred Astaire - to me an icon of Ballroom dance - actually do any Lindy Hop swing dancing in any of his movies, even "Swing Time"!)

Bob

IMPORTANT NOTICE
This is not a hoax

This is an important notice written by Ryan Francois for any Lindy Hoppers interested in keeping the Lindy out of the hands of Marcus Koch and The World Rock & Roll Federation

It is not a usual practice for me to write down my feelings about the way the Swing community operates but I am compelled to speak out on this particular subject. Please forgive me if my eloquence on paper is not up to the task of expressing my feelings as clearly as I would like it to. But these are my opinions as best I can present them. I Hope that it will spur you all to act now on behalf of the Lindy and boycott the World Lindy Championships and all other related events and/or people involved with this sneaky plan to arrest the dance from it's true following.

Let me give you some background as far as I understand it.

A few years ago the World Lindy Federation was founded much to the dismay of the main Lindy community of the time. At first it's goals were well intended but it had no support from anyone who would be considered to be the main core of the Swing revival - myself included - therefore it didn't quite work. This left an open door for the World R & R federation spearheaded by Marcus Koch to attempt to take over the Lindy Federation and impose their rules and regulations into the dance form. This included standardizing the movements and dictating to teachers how they should be taught so that we did the exact same things. The pure among us found this to be an intolerable idea. A dance based on improvisation standardized? Worse still owned by a federation who were Ballroom dancers not even Lindy Hoppers! There were many other reasons for Marcus and his Federation to get their fingers on the Lindy but these already were enough. This caused uproar in Europe and after many a heated discussion the World Lindy Federation was disbanded. And supposedly forgotten about.

Now the scene in America and across the globe hadn't established itself at this time. They were no doubt blissfully unaware of the rumblings in Europe, which made it a perfect place to Start a World Lindy Hop Championships run by the World R & R Federation picking a continent ignorant of its prior shady dealings. Which is exactly happened in Europe before the idea was destroyed.

A few months ago I got an invite from Natalie Gomez to attend the World Lindy Hop Championships held at The Supper Club in New York. An idea I wasn't opposed to at first, until I found out later that it was going to be run by R&R Federation. You may not understand this at this point but it will become clear soon that there is no coincidence that both Natalie and Marcus belong to that Federation and neither can be thought of as true Lindy Hoppers. Anyway I digress.

I am asking you not to take me at my word but find out for yourselves about the intentions of this Federation. If you agree with my findings I'm asking you to STAND BY ME and call for a NATIONWIDE BOYCOTT of this event.

Tell as many people as you can not to go. Put it on your web pages and if there are any lawyers out there willing to help me legally stamp this out please email me at mrzoots@aol.com.

I will be asking for your signatures on a protest sheet which I know will be signed by most if not all of the teachers I have grown to respect over the years.

I also plan on picketing The Supper Club on the day of the event and anyone with similar feelings is welcome to join.

Just as a matter of interest these villains even had the temerity to use Frankie Mannings name as someone who was sanctioning the event. Which is completely untrue and then called The UK Lindy Hop Championships in London to tell them they were no longer allowed to run there competition without the approval of the R&R Federation.

Ryan Francois Has Declared WAR I will not go quietly

So now is the time to see where you stand in this. Please get involved, take this seriously and don't stand on the side. As far as I'm concerned the future is at stake and it's up to us to keep Lindy Hop for the Lindy Hoppers.

Act Soon

Ryan Francois
mrzoots@aol.com

To follow is some correspondence from the UK Lindy Championships to the head of the R&R Federation.

Ed: Apparently Ryan (or possibly Robert Casey) is forwarding a message composed by Fred Hunt of the UK Lindy Championships

From: live2jive live2jive@live2jive.co.uk<BRTo: de Coster Dominique

Dominique - thank you for your email.

What is missing from the email is the background information which Lindy Hoppers ought to know before making any decision, and which you have conveniently omitted to give them.

On the face of it this appears to be a simple plea for co-operation from a new Lindy Hopper, but it doesn't say that you are an important figure in the World Rock and Roll Confederation, and that the WRRC is actively trying to take control of Lindy Hop world-wide. Nor does it say that your interest in Lindy Hop is a commercial one based on the interests of the WRRC and not Lindy Hop.

You claimed during our recent telephone conversation that the WRRC was invited to take over the organisation of Lindy Hop after the collapse of the WLHF. As I said to you, the un-named group of people who invited you to do this had no legal right to assign to you control of a world-wide network of clubs, events and competitions. That they did so without any form of general consultation is not only insulting to us all, but is guaranteed to fail to win support.

You claim that you were given 'permission' to run all Lindy Hop competitions world-wide by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), based on the request of the Ballroom dance world to have their type of dancing accepted as an Olympic sport. Lindy Hop is considered by the dancers to be a grass-roots dance which has no connection with the false and stylised world of Ballroom dancing. To use the IOC's ruling that only one governing body can represent an Olympic sport to insist that Lindy Hop is included is totally ludicrous. Not only this, you have handed UK control to the British Dance Council, one of the controlling bodies within the UK ballroom dance world and a million miles from the Lindy Hop world!

Not only has the WRRC assumed, without requesting agreement from others, the role of competition organisers, it has decided unilaterally on a set of competition rules which are based on Ballroom jive and Ballroom R 'n' R (see attachment). These are in no way similar to the rules used in Lindy Hop competitions world-wide, including the UK National Lindy Hop Championships which is run in accordance with the general principles of the World Swing Dance Council. These general rules have been applied to all Lindy Hop competitions or sections within competitions except for the last World Lindy Hop Championships.

The last World Lindy Hop Championships were run by the organisers, and without reference to the competitors, under WRRC rules. The competition is generally felt to have been a farce, with music to fast and too short, and competitors from some countries who were clearly not Lindy Hoppers but had won the right to compete under your 'allocation' rules to the exclusion of good dancers who could have competed. To add to the farce, instead of having the competition at the end of the Herrang dance camp, when Stockholm would have been full of top Lindy Hop dancers, it was moved back a week by the organisers for 'commercial reasons' to the Swedish Water Festival week, by which time many dancers had returned home!

It was claimed by you that you are doing no more than the now defunct World Lindy Hop Federation. The difference is that the WLHF was set up by a group of well-intentioned dancers, mostly Lindy Hoppers but not all, to bring together a world-wide link of Lindy Hop clubs and organisers and to allow different countries to stage the World Championships. To this end they made presentations at a number of conventions, including the Swing Jam, in order that dancers could hear their plans and raise queries. Their objectives for creation of the WLHF were solely based on the love of Lindy Hop and for no other reasons, certainly not that it be handed over lock, stock and barrel to a Ballroom dance based organisation.

Before any Lindy Hop dancers 'sign up' as your 'European Friends' I seriously urge them to consider the implications of providing you with any form of support for yourself and the WRRC which is not intended. They should be assured that they are in no way unknowingly giving support to the WRRC or its plans for Lindy Hop.

Fred Hunt

Marcus' Message
As emailed by Barbara (Baerbl) Kaufer BaerblKaufer@worldofswing.com on Sep 19, 1999

From: Marcus Koch MarcusKoch@WorldofSwing.com

Ed: Notice the date of this message is Nov 20, 1997

E-Mail from Marcus 20.11.97:

Dear Lindy Hop dancers and Lindy Hop enthusiasts,

my name is Marcus Koch and some of you know me as a Lindy Hop and Boogie Woogie teacher and trainer. First off all excuse any language and grammar mistakes you will find (probably many), English is not my native language.

For a few years the Lindy Hop is rapidly growing in all parts of the world. After the first Lindy Hop World Championship 1995 in Norway the interest of different groups influencing the competition scene was raising very fast. Even if you are not interested in competitions in Lindy Hop I would ask you to read the following text because it can still be important for you. If you are not informed about the background please jump to the background information first, starting at the next page.

After I discovered the Lindy about years ago I was stuck to it, so I was very interested to support the idea of a world wide Lindy Hop organization and to help spreading the word of this fantastic Lindy. So I tried to put in my knowledge for dance organizations I got in building up the Boogie Woogie scene in Germany. Unfortunately all the efforts of the last three years burst with the last meeting of the WLHF. The only real losers are all these dancers that are not members of the WRRC and the only winner would be Sweden which came closer to its aim to establish Lindy Competitions internationally in the WRRC as a pure sport with the Swedish rules and education system.

Nobody of the people that were working for the WLHF did all this work for any personal advantages. All of them did this because they believed in the idea of an international Lindy Hop organization. Maybe some people don't believe this, but than they don't realize that if these people really wanted to get control on the Lindy, it would be so much easier for them to set up everything inside the WRRC like Sweden is trying to do, because almost all the WLHF and ILHA directors and workers are already member of the WRRC. Nobody of these people was begging for all of the work but they thought that it is important to be done. (Maybe this is not cool anymore, to think about others and work for the benefit of others)

Even there was the foundation of the International Lindy Hop association, where I was the secretary of, there was no real support for it. The reason for writing this letter is that the WRRC got now twice a letter from Ann-Britt Neman Kilgren (President of the Swedish Dance Sport Federation) including the protocol of the general meeting of the WLHF and the result of the decision and forcing the WRRC to do Lindy Hop competitions under the umbrella of the WWRC without any influence of the WLHF.

I was thinking about this whole federation stuff very much. After doing so much work the last years for the Lindy Hop and getting so little support I'm so much tired fighting against windmills if there are no people to fight and work for.

There are two possibilities at the moment. One is that the competitions would be represented only by the WRRC without any influence by the Lindy dancing people (represented by the ILHA or somebody else) This implies that many dancers won't be able to dance at the next championship, because they are not members of the WRRC or they have problems in their country with their national WRRC organization. Organizers like Simon or the people from Washington, that want to organize the WC in 1998 and 1999, won't be able or maybe don't want to fulfill the requirements set by the WRRC (e.g. free accommodation for each participant, only judges by the WRRC which are chosen by each nation itself, refund the expenses of the judges according to the WRRC fee scales, etc.) If they decide to organize a separate World Championship beside the one by the WRRC, they probably won't get enough dancers and support, because all the WRRC members probably won't get the allowance to participate in a non-WRRC competition. It won't help the Lindy Hop, anyway.

Despite its phenomenal growth, the Lindy Communitee is still too small. So there will be only one chance for the Lindy Hop, if the Lindy dancers and Lindy enthusiasts work together. The other possibility is to support the ILHA (or maybe form something else). At the moment the ILHA won't be recognized as a representative of the Lindy dancers if it consists almost only out of WRRC members.

For myself I really want to do something for my dancing again and don't want to waste plenty of time for something that can't work with the support of other people. I liked to help the other Lindy people, but its not my task to solve the problems of them if they don't want get them solved. It's so strange that many of the people who didn't support the WLHF (respectively ILHA) or worked against them are the people that have the disadvantages with the moment status. So the last thing where I decided to waste my time for is writing this email to inform at least all the Lindy people about what's happening. It's up to you know what the future will bring.

Have fun dancing the Lindy and keep up the spirit.

Hope to seeing you somewhere in the World.

Yours Marcus

For more information, questions, or support please contact Jaana Lepalla at jaana.leppala@helsinki.fi.

===== Background information:

During the workshops and the Championship in Norway mentioned above Steven Mitchell and Freddy Haugan were spreading the idea of forming a Lindy Hop association with should help to build up a network between the different Lindy groups and individuals in the world and should establish and coordinate a annual Lindy Hop World Championship. So 22 people from different nations were sitting together and talking about the way this vision could come true. Finally there were some people who volunteered to do the prework that had to be done to form an organization like this (e. g. organization form, statutes, ways of support Lindy and achieve the set aims, etc. -See also Hoppin' magazine Volume 2 issue 4 September 1995)

The hoppin' magazine became the official newsletter and the World Lindy Hop Federation Archives were born on the Internet, managed by Keith Hughes from Seattle (many thanks from me for this incredible work). Unfortunately the Hoppin' magazine stopped because the producers couldn't stand the local envy and fights.

At the meeting after the second World Championship in Munich everybody realized that the prework that was done was not enough regarding the organizational questions. Many questions regarding the statutes, and the specific country laws could not be answered satisfily. After discussing many ways of how to give better support to the Lindy Hoppers the result was that the statutes shall be worked out till the next meeting. After having another discussing at the Herrang dance camp the final date for forming the organization by law was set to be at the Herrang dance camp between the third and fourth week.

Caused by the organization of the first Lindy Hop Championship other dance organizations were starting to claim their interest in the Lindy Hop. The first was the IDO, International Dance Organization.

The IDO has its headquarter in Italy and is an international organization which started in covering professional dancers. The head of the IDO is Mr. Polidori from Italy. He is as far as I know the founder of the organization and the big chief (maybe you can compare him with the function of Bill Gates at Microsoft) The IDO is organizing many dance competitions (e.g. Disco, Hustle, Mambo, Argentine Tango, Showdance, Swing, etc.) The IDO was organizing Boogie Woogie competitions before the Boogie Woogie moved under the umbrella of the WRRC (World Rock 'n' Roll confederation) which will be talked about later. They still do Swing, were the same styles by the same dancers as in the former IDO Boogie Woogie will be done with faster music. The IDO competitions are big competitions with many different dance competitions happening in the same event. (around 5 to 7).

The day before the first Lindy Hop World Championship the secretary of the IDO was calling Freddy Haugan complaining about that competition. They claimed holding the right for doing Lindy Hop Competitions because they are the international dance organization. After asking the secretary how many Lindy dancers the IDO has the secretary said that the conversation was already to long and quit the call. Later the IDO organized one World Championship by themselves which had 7 competitors.

Another international dance organization is the WRRC (World Rock 'n' Roll Confederation) which also has a lot of members almost all over the world and has its seat in Germany. The members of the WRRC are national organizations which are responsible for the Rock 'n' Roll in their countries. All the people of the board are democratically elected by its members. It is an organization for amateur and professional dancers. Like their name says the organization is supporting and managing Rock 'n' Roll competitions. The Rock 'n' Roll style nowadays is going very much into Jazz dancing and has the main emphasis on high and spectacular aerials (stepped in double summersault). It has almost nothing to do with the 30ies or 50ies style of Jitterbug dancing anymore.

Mr. Polidori from the IDO was many years Vice President in the WRRC. A few years ago the WRRC and the IDO came to an agreement that Boogie Woogie will be done under the umbrella of the WRRC.

A few month after the foundation of the WLHF in Oslo the national members of the WRRC from Sweden and from Germany made a proposal to the general meeting of the WRRC. They wanted that the WRRC should cover the Lindy competitions and education for Lindy beside Rock 'n' Roll and Boogie Woogie, because it is very much connected to Rock 'n' Roll and Boogie Woogie. The main reason for the Swedish proposal was that they wanted to get their Swedish rules and the Swedish education system as the international Standard (statement of Ivan Berggren). The main reason for Germany was the fear of a different organization for Lindy Hop in the own country.

(In many countries in the World dancing as a kind of sports is part of the national sports federation, which normally implies that there is only one accepted national organization for each kind of sport. This means that all the others don't get any social or financial support, or like in France may not (by law) organize any French competition.)

The president of the WRRC, Mr. Wolfgang Steuer, knows me for quite a time and he also new that I was informed about what's happing around the Lindy Hop, because of my travelling and teaching. He also knew about the first World Championship and the foundation of the WLHF. So he asked me about the status of the Lindy Hop at the moment. He said that the two proposals are on the topics for the next general meeting but he don't want to have two organizations working against each other and also respects the WLHF as the representative of the Lindy dancers. He made an offer to the WLHF to combine the strength of both organizations either in form of an own committee responsible for Lindy Hop inside the WRRC or in the way of an associated membership which means that both organizations stay individual but have an agreement how each others members can participate in the offerings of the others organization.

As the elected representative of the WLHF I went to the general meeting of the WRRC and presented for the members of the WRRC what the WLHF is, which aims it has, and that we would like to know in which ways we could work together. Finally there was a committee elected with WRRC members (Godehard Pöttker from Germany, a representative from Schweden - which became Ivan Berggren -, Manfred Mohab from Austria - as a representative from the WRRC presidency, Freddy Haugan (WLHF) and me).

There was one meeting in Stockholm where Ivan's main interest was to talk about the competition rules for the second World Lindy Hop Championship even it was meant to find possible ways of working together. Finally it was a very exhausting but good meeting. This was the only meeting of this committee.

At the next general meeting of the WLHF after the 2nd World Championship the present people decided that they want to focus on an associated membership with the WRRC.

The next general meeting in Herrang elected Jaana Leppalla as the president of the WLHF. Her aim was to build up a network of national contact addresses that will spread the information and help preparing the necessary statutes for the next meeting. 24 people volunteered to be a national contact address, but only 3 responded to the emails Jaana send out. So the statutes were made in a weeks fulltime work mainly by Jaana, Timo Arstila, Taina Kortelainen and me in Herrang this summer.

It was planned, as decided at the last general meeting, to set up the statutes at the fourth general meeting of the WLHF in Herrang this summer. To make it easier there was a six hours discussion period with different topics where everybody could participate and talk. It was meant to set up the direction the majority want to go and to solve problems that can be solved beforehand. After a break there was the voting period with the voting on the single paragraphs of the statutes. The estimation was that maybe 150 people will come to the discussion and only 30 to the boring voting. Unexpectedly there were around 35 people at the discussions and more than 100 at the voting. But most of the voting people wanted to go to the camp meeting first. So the voting was moved by three hours. At the later time there were only 40 people that came back.

After finally trying to start the meeting there was a disapproval against the whole meeting by Peter Renzland from Canada who wanted the WLHF to be only a loose network and not a strong organization. Ivan Berggren, who was once elected by the WRRC to find ways of working together with the WRRC, supported Peter very loudly. So a strange discussions started because still most of the present people weren't at the discussions or weren't involved the last three years. Peter finally asked for a voting on if the WLHF should be a loose network or a strong organization. 24 against 16 decided for loose social network.

To understand the result it is important to know, that a lot of people didn't know what the whole thing was about and didn't realize the consequences. As one consequence of the voting, Jaana Leppalla quit her function as the president and the meeting was closed, because there was nothing to do anymore. (The reason of this meeting was to set up the statutes.)

During the period of trying to understand what has happened some of the people who believed in the aims and the necessity of a world wide Lindy Hop organization joined together and worked on the statutes for the International Lindy Hop Organization, which was founded a few days after this strange meeting in Herrang.

In the meanwhile Sweden send the protocol of the WLHF meeting with the result of the voting twice to Wolfgang Steuer to force the WRRC to accept the Swedish roules and education system.

End of background information ====

Marcus & Baerbl's Response to Ryan's Message
As emailed by Barbara (Baerbl) Kaufer BaerblKaufer@worldofswing.com on Sep 19, 1999

From: Marcus & Baerbl MarcusKoch@WorldofSwing.comBaerblKaufer@worldofswing.com

Hello LINDY Hop Dancers, these is a message for everybody who is interested in LINDY HOP. If you're not interested, throw it away. I'm forwarding these mails to all of the swing dancers I'm having the e-mail address (sended with blindcopy). Please pass it on to the people you know. It can happen then that somebody get it twice.

Please give YOUR STATEMENT to these E-Mails directly to Ryan Francois (Founder of these mails, attacking person, makes war, is calling for a nationwide Boycott, E-Mail: mrzoots@aol.com), Joe Gerrits (Chicago, is supporting Ryan, E-Mail: info@hepcatswing.com), Dominique de Coster (Belgium, Lindy Dancer, responsible for Lindy Hop in the WRRC, E-Mail: ddecoster@arcadis.be), Nathalie Gomes (New York, Organizer of the World Championship Lindy Hop 1999, E-Mail: ngswing@earthlink.net), Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen (Minnesota, gave us information about this (forwarded us these messages), E-Mail: gertj001@maroon.tc.umn.edu); Marcus Koch (Germany, attacked person, E-Mail: MarcusKoch@WorldofSwing.com), Fred Hunt (London, Organizer of Swing Master Jam (see message to Dominique de Coster, E-Mail: live2jive@live2jive.co.uk), Wolfgang Steuer (Germany, WRRC-President, E-Mail: Wolfgang.Steuer@wrrc.org), John Hudson (Old Time Dancer, gave statement (E-Mail: Hudshop@aol.com); AnneBrit Neman (Sweden, responsible for Lindy Hop Competitions in Sweden, E-Mail: abnk@ekero.mail.telia.com)

Please read the stuff carefully and think about what's written there and then make your statements. Think twice about what you're writing (give your comment to Ryan for sure). It should be true and shouldn't hurt people like it was done here. This can destroy a lot in the Swing World. Even if it's kind of big at the moment but if everybody is fighting against each other and spreading lies around, it can break down very quickly. I think the people should work together to keep what they love and not fighting against it or against each other. It's not fair at all to write unproofed things (just something that somebody makes up in his mind) and spread it around. That is like poison. Thanks

Baerbl Kaufer

Marcus dance partner, that means I'm involved, too and it hurts me badly, too)

Ed: The following was included in the body of Baerbl's email message.

From: Marcus Koch MarcusKoch@WorldOfSwing.com
Date: Sonntag, 19. September 1999
To: info@hepcatswing.com; mrzoots@aol.com; gertj001@maroon.tc.umn.edu; Barbara Kaufer; John Hudson; Nathalie Gomes; live2jive@live2jive.co.uk; Dominique de Coster
Subject: Reply to Ryan's statements by Marcus Koch

Statement by Marcus Koch:

Dear readers, please forgive me any spelling or grammatical errors because English is not my native language.

Therefore a bunch of emails were spread around attacking me in person I have to clarify some topics. After reading some of these emails that were started by Ryan Fran�oise I have mixed feelings. Im upset, disappointed and very much shocked. Ryan made a lot of statements without proofing them. He himself wrote Let me give you some background as far as I UNDERSTAND it., which means he didnt proof what he understood or wanted to understand. People reading these emails have to get a very bad prejudice about me, which seems he aimed for. Because some of the attacks were on topics most people dont have enough background information to understand what was going on. This reply became quite long, but it will clarify everything for you. Even if it will take you some while to read everything, please do it completely.

I respected Ryan always as one of the very best dancers. I also totally agree with Ryan in a lot of points and his opinion about how things around Lindy shouldnt be shaped. Because of my long experience in dancing and dealing with organisations of any kind I for myself had always a lot of fear that Lindy will be taken over by the wrong people and get pushed in the wrong direction. So I can understand that Ryan is very heated because he seems to believe his statements. But from anybody of good character making such strong attacks to anybody, I expect that this person talks first to the persons he is attacking to proof his opinions. I myself never got a message by Ryan! I even wasnt on the distribution list to get informed about the attacks against me which gave me no chance to comment on these attacks. I also dont know what other information went around the net. I just got to know about whats going on because friends forwarded me a few mails. The way Ryan was doing this shocked me a lot and Im very disappointed by him as a person. I thought the days of resort to lynch law have past where you consider somebody guilty without giving him any chance to defend against a reproach.

Before I will comment on these attacks with concrete information I want to appreciated Joe Gerrits statement all information pertaining to the matter should be completely factual. He also said I want to further commend Ryan for not using his high profile status as leverage to make his position known and valid. Thank you very much Joe! I hope you help spreading this answer around, too.

Now lets dig in the reproaches Ryan made. For anybody who didnt follow the earlier email conversations I attached the emails that may be important to follow the argumentation.

Ryans statement #1:

This left an open door for the World R & R federation spearheaded by Marcus Koch

Im NOT a leader or spearhead of the WRRC (World Rock n Roll Confederation). Im not in the presidency or any committee of the WRRC, nor do I follow any order by the WRRC. I also have nothing to do with organisation or the ruling of the World Lindy Hop Championship.

To understand the role that the WRRC plays and how Im connected to the WRRC I have to give you some background information. The WRRC was founded 1974 and it is a non-for-profit body organisation. All people do their work voluntary and without payment and are elected by their members which are the national organisations of each country. Therefore it only deals with international issues and is not involved in any national matters. So they will be never involved in what Ryan said standardising the movements and dictating to teachers how they should be taught so that we did the exact same things. What they deal with is to set up international competition rules which have to be agreed on by its members and the education of the international judges. If you want to get some more information about the history and the foundation of the WRRC you can get this at there Web site at http://www.wrrc.org/wrrc/history/. You will find also other information about the WRRC.

I dont know how it is in America and in all of the other countries, but in most of the other countries in the World the government supports sports. Mostly the government deals (accept and/or support) for each sport with only one non-for-profit national body organisation where all clubs and individuals have to be member of to receive the benefits (which can be a lot). In France the law is as far as I know the strictest. There, only members of the national organisation are allowed to run championships with the title French in it. In other countries it is not as strict, but the national federations are well established, so nobody would have a chance to succeed with a private competition. The WRRC - to make it short - is member and recognised by the International Dance Federation (ISDF) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC). In general it means that the whole sports structure is based on non-for-profit organisations.

I hope you have a little picture about what the WRRC is. It doesnt tell why the WRRC does Lindy Hop now. I will explain this to you later in the answer to Ryans statement #2. Now I want to clarify my connection to the WRRC:

I started dancing learning a style of swing that now is called Boogie Woogie and has its base in the Lindy Hop/Jitterbug that the GIs brought over to Europe after the war. Later it was mainly influenced by the Rock n Roll music of the 50s. (comment: I want to put up some more information about Boogi Woogie and Rock n Roll on our web site www.worldofswing.com in a couple of weeks). 15 years ago people started again to organize competitions in this style, but they were mainly ruled by a privately connected group of people. There were many complains about how the competitions were run and how some dancers were cheated. So different people came together and founded the non-for-profit German Boogie Woogie Association (GBWA) which worked on an election base. I was one of these founders. Now everybody who wanted to be part could be. Because an other style called Rock n Roll was already well organised in the German Rock n Roll Association, which was the recognized organisation by the government, the German Boogie Woogie Association joined the German Rock n Roll Association which is now known as the German Rock n Roll and Boogie Woogie Association. This means through my membership in my national organisation Im an indirect member of the WRRC.

I put a lot of volunteer work without any payment in the development of the Boogie Woogie in Germany. This is were I got my background information and experience and also met many people organisations like the WRRC or the ballroom organisation. My motives were always pro the dancers and the dancing. I fought against anything were money or power tried to force the ruling. And there is always somebody who tries to influence things to give himself or herself an advantage. So in this point I can fully understand Ryans fears and concerns. I never changed my motives because Im an idealist, which many people can confirm. I stopped doing work in the committee of the GRBA after everything was quite established because I wanted to concentrate on my own dancing and also didnt have time anymore because of my studies.

Ryans statement #2:

A few years ago the World Lindy Federation was founded much to the dismay of the main Lindy community of the time. at first it's goals were well intended but it had no support from anyone who would be considered to be the main core of the Swing revival - myself included - therefore it didn't quite work.

To give you some background information about the World Lindy Hop Federation I quote the article that was written by Porl Smith and appeared in Hoppin Volume 2 Issue 4 September 1995.

To paraphrase Frankie Manning, getting involved with setting up a World Lindy Federation (WLHF) is your opportunity to help make history happen just as the dancers in the twenties and thirties did.

Steven Mitchell and Freddie Haugan first suggested a federation for Lindy Hop at CANT TOP THE LINDY HOP celebration in New York 1994.

Freddie wanted a universal structure for competitions and Steve, recognising Lindy Hop was once again spreading around the world, wanted to join together the worlds Lindy Hop communities.

These two contacted Lennart Westerlund, Marcus Koch and Deborah Huisken (comment form me: publisher of Hoppin) to talk about forming a federation. At the first Lindy Hop Championship in Oslo in early August, 1995, thirty people attended one or more of the four initial meetings.

Later in the article it says: Existing dance competition sponsors, such as the International Dance Organisation (IDO) and the World Rock n Roll Confederation (WRRC), were discussed and it was concluded that workshops should run in conjunction with Lindy competition.

The WRRC was brought in discussion by Freddie, who was in the board of directors of the Norwegian WRRC member. I also had a talk with Wolfgang Steuer, the president of the WRRC, because he wanted to know whats going on. I told him about the WLHF and the competition. He said he would be pleased, if the WLHF takes care about the Lindy Hop by themself. He said they have enough work with the Rock n Roll and the Boogie Woogie. He thought it may be also more appropriate for the free character of the dance.

The IDO is another international dance organisation that organises international dance competitions for dances that are not covered by the WRRC or the international ballroom organisation, like Mambo, Argent. Tango, Hip Hop, Disco, Hustle, Tap, etc.. They came in discussion because the secretary of the IDO called Freddie Haugan at his dance school at this weekend and claimed to be THE organisation for international competition, which meant also Lindy Hop. They are known for a lot of cheating at the competitions, I can talk out of my own experience. Freddie and Baerbl, my dance partner, confirmed my statement. So nobody wanted to work together with them. A couple of month later they organised a World Lindy Hop Championship on their own, which had 7 couples competing. They also invited Frankie ones and gave him an award. ...The IDO is still doing swing competitions. I would describe it at a mixture between Hustle and West Coast Swing to fast music. I heard there is even a World championship in Florida this year. Therefore it mostly addresses their own community most people never heard about them.

Comparing to these organisations the purpose of the WLHF was: To encourage recognition of Lindy Hop as a world-class, international performance and social dance, to honour its roots in improvisational Jazz, and African-American dance traditions, and to foster cooperation among all participants in its growth and evolution.

The list of the volunteered people for the working committee was also published. Frankie was named as a spiritual leader. My name therefore was under the competition resort, but I was not the main person. I didnt have the time for it, but I wanted to help with my knowledge and experience in competitions, statutes and laws. I was and I am addicted to Lindy, so I was very interested to support the idea of a world wide Lindy Hop organization and to help spreading the word of this fantastic Lindy. Other people at the board of directors were Freddie Haugan from Oslo, Deborah Huisken from London, Christine Nelson (now Walker Sampson) from Seattle, Lindy Farr from Germany, Steve Mascioli from Edina, MN, Brian McGill from Washington. Keith Huges later volunteered for taking care of a Web site the WLHF Archives. On the picture that was shot at the last meeting you can see beside Catherine from the Rhythm Hot Shots, Kenneth and Helena also Ryan and Julie (his dance partner at this time). Beside Freddie there was no professional in the committee. The main reason was that nobody of them wanted to volunteer for unpaid work, which definitely had to be done a lot.

What Ryan was right was that it didn't quite work. Although there was a great feeling of spirit and connection at these meetings, these feeling didnt seem to hold very long. Beside Keith, who did an incredible job putting up the Archives on the Web, almost no work was done by the others. The first year was meant to do the base work, so a federation can be set up with by-laws, structure and concrete aims and support for the Lindy the next year. It also would give everybody who wasnt at these meetings a chance to bring in his or her opinions and help. To make it now shorter, every of the three additional meetings had good spirit and people volunteered for work, but nothing ever was done. Its a big difference between saying to do something and really doing it.

In the meanwhile the Swedish Dance Sport Federation made a proposal at the general meeting of the WRRC to admit the Lindy Hop to the WRRC. To understand, at this time Lindy was very small in the whole World and Sweden was the only country with a established competition scene for Lindy Hop. Almost all the trainers and performers came from Sweden at this time. Their aim was that the other countries accept their rules and education system. Now after the proposal, Wolfgang Steuer (president of the WRRC) had to discuss the Lindy Hop topic in the WRRC. But he invited the WLHF to come to the general meeting of the WRRC, because he knew through me about their existence. At this time I had the most knowledge about organisations and the meeting was close to my home, so I was chosen as the representative of the WLHF for the general meeting of the WRRC. I was able to stop the proposal and a committee was formed consisting of members of the WRRC and members of the WLHF with the aim to find a solution how it would be possible to work together. Sharing the benefits of the WRRC, but still be independent. The aim of the WRRC was mainly to have their dancers compete at the competitions. Unfortunately the moral for work of the other members didnt get better, so I mainly tried to let the WLHF shine as a strong organisation, to have good negotiation stand point. I spend so much time of my life till I cancelled at a certain point.

At the fourth general meeting in Herrang 97 the by-laws finally should have been established. There was a six hours discussion period were different topics were discussed. Everybody could participate and talk. It was meant to set up the direction the majority want to go and to solve problems that can be solved beforehand. After a break there was the voting period with the voting on the single paragraphs of the statutes. Unexpectedly there were only a few people at the discussion and a lot more at the voting. So most people didnt know what this all was about. Unfortunately there was a lot of misunderstandings at this meeting and also some intrigues in form of deliberate misinformation. So a new discussion was brought up. Ivan Berggren, dancer, competitor, teacher from Sweden, partly representing the Swedish Dance Sport Federation wanted that the WLHF only works on the social scene in form of a loose network and that it shall not have any influence on competitions. His aim was still to set up the international Lindy Hop competitions in the WRRC with the Swedish rules. He also considered competitions as pure sport, which has nothing to do with any social aspects. But people didnt understand because the WLHF was made out to be the big danger. Finally the WLHF broke apart and some other trials didnt succeed either.

On the 20th of November I wrote a letter and sent it to Jaana Leppala, who was heading the ILHA (International Lindy Hop Federation), the new. I wanted to get this email out to get everybody informed. Unfortunately it was never sent. You can get some more background information about what happened and about my thoughts and my opinions out of this email. I hope that all of my explanations and also this email make clear that I was always working for the dancers. I was one of the persons who were concerned about having everything ruled by an organisation where it is hard to get influence. I warned the people many times about the things, that would be happening like what Fred Hunt reported from England. So I dont know where Ryan got the idea that Im the spearhead of the WRRC. I never talked to him about the ILHA or the WRRC since the meeting in Oslo 1995!

Ryans statement #3:

This left an open door for the World R & R federation spearheaded by Marcus Koch to attempt to take over the Lindy Fed and impose their rules and regulations into the dance form.

Email from John Hudson to Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen in Minneapolis
Apparently in reply to questions offered by Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen

From: John Hudson Hudshop@aol.com
To: "Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen" gertj001@maroon.tc.umn.edu
Subject: Re: A message from Ryan Francois
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 1999

Wendy, you are very special!!!! It seems that Ryan is missinformed and he has some missinformed recruits new to this whole scene....

I am sure that Marcus will sort this out in the proper way. Marcus is one of the most honest people I know in the intire scene...He is a genuine good sport and is always happy to see the dancers improve and challenge or beat him on the floor.He and Baerble are the the first ones to shake the hands of the winners..

I was there when the federation formed, I don't recall seeing Ryan there. Frankie was there as were several of the dancers from Sweden and other parts of the world..FYI Marcus is not a dancer nor did he make his tapes to make a living from dance..What he is doing is for the love of the dance and to publish what he spent the last 15 years and countless thousands of dollars researhing..He is passing it on to save a lot of people a lot of time and I believe that the tapes Marcus and Baerbl have made do the best to accomplish that goal....

Marcus is a computer expert. He is a trained and certified teacher..He teachs large workshops all over Germany for Microsoft,earns up to 5000. per day..He is a published writer for Microsoft and computer tech...He has no agenda other than to be the best at whatever he does and is very happy when challenged..It is not nice to insult and slander anyone with a one sided slant and with bits and pieces of a story...Perhaps these other people feel thier livelyhood theatened? Without rules and guidelines, there could only be confusion...

I have been dancing continiously for 53 yrs. and have won over 500 first places in dance..Many were audience applause...To have a WORLD COMPETETION takes a lot of work and all should be thankful that people like Marcus step up to the challenge to help things along..He is there and being singled out by Ryan,I don't understand this since Marcus is only helping,hence the word FEDERATION, I am sure Ryan is welcome to be in the FEDERATION and his expert input would be apprieciated and welcome.....

In my intire relationship with Marcus I have never heard him say a bad thing towards Ryan, he has only spoke with admiration.....I really love seeing all the younger people out dancing and enjoying the old music and the new swing music..It is happy and we should keep it that way......for the love of the dance and music,John Hudson..........please forward this to the needed people,thanks

Email from Joe Gerrits in Chicago to Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen in Minneapolis
Apparently in reply to questions offered by Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen

From: Hep Cat Swing (Joe Gerrits) info@hepcatswing.com
To: "Wendy Jo Gertjejanssen" gertj001@maroon.tc.umn.edu
Subject: Re: A message from Ryan Francois
Date: Fri, 17 Sep 1999

This message was removed on Friday, September 24 at the request of Joe Gerrits

A Message from Nathalie Gomes of Hop, Swing & a Jump in NYC
Received directly from Nathalie Gomes

From: Nathalie Gomes ngswing@earthlink.net
To: Larry Kang larry@yehoodi.com, Manu Smith spuds@yehoodi.com
Date: Monday, September 20, 1999 1:03 AM
Subject: My answer to Ryan

TO ALL THE SWING/LINDY LOVERS OUT THERE!!!! (Please take the time to read this message and forward it. It is only 2 page long)

This week, a pinnacle point in an attempt to slander the World Lindy Hop Championships has been reached. As the founder of Hop Swing & a Jump, Ive labored intensely for 4 years to help promote and revive the Swing/Lindy scene in NYC. Throughout this time, I continued to endorse an inclusive open minded philosophy to all the people and all styles of Swing.

As in any public capacity I have battled my share of individuals with malice intent. This week's attack against me has been of a personal nature which strikes the essence and core of everything I have worked for. I would like to share my anger with all who are involved in the Lindy community.

The World Lindy Hop Championships (WLHC) was created to showcase and promote Lindy by introducing some of the greatest dancers in the world to the general public. The Last two WLHC were held in Europe (1996 and 1997) and organized by "Lindy People". The organization of such an event is a difficult, time consuming, voluntary task. Taken upon by people who truly love the dance. 1998 the event was not held due to lack of driving force from the Lindy community. I recognized the need for an event which will bring a years work into a climactic celebration. I believe the WLHC could be such an event. When I realized that for the second year in a row the WLHC was not going to happen, I flew to the General Meeting of the World Rock n Roll Confederation (which I am not a member) in Switzerland, knowing they were asked by Lindy people (Swedes and more) to take Lindy under their wing. My intentions were to represent the American Lindy community and ask them to host the WLHC in New York, place where Lindy was born. I sacrificed my personal time and money to make this happen.

Much has happened in my life since the meeting (March 1999). I shot an independent swing feature film for over a month. Now, the majority of my time is consumed with running a dance studio that I just opened last May, teaching and other related matters but I still made time for the organization of the WLHC because of my strong belief in its necessity. So if Ryan believes that "true Lindy hoppers" should take care of the matter, why hasn't he taking the time to do so in the last 5 years instead of seating on the side, criticizing and attracting attention?

On September 17, 1999 I received an email from a friend notifying me of a circulated message by Ryan Francois calling for the boycott of the WLHC and attacking Marcus Koch and myself on a personal level. The same Ryan who I invited to be a judge or competitor in the event. Ryan never bothered to answer my invitation instead he cowardly opted to present the facts as he perceived them over the net.

In his concerned cry to the Lindy public, Ryan alleges that non "true Lindy hoppers" with the help of the WRRC are taking over the Lindy community and are going to standardize the dance. This could not be further from the truth (ref. Marcus answer to Ryan).

Our intention is to hold a competition on the highest level of Lindy under all its forms (including Hollywood style Lindy). The only restrictions will pertain to length and speed of the music. Improvisation remains the key element in the performance. Prior to the event, the WLHC committee will hold a special conference in order to educate the judges, not the dancers, on how to evaluate the performances. A meeting will be held at the end of the championship to encourage feedback and constructive suggestions to improve next years championship.

Ryan in his letter claims "the pure among us found this to be an intolerable idea. A dance based on improvisation standardised?" He claims he is a purist. Ryan contradicts himself by the sheer use of the word "purist". As we all know a substance that is pure is free from any external influences. Is Ryans style the only way to dance Lindy, the "pure" way??? Just by using the word "pure" he, himself, standardizes Lindy Hop. Lindy is a free flowing adaptive, improvised form of body expression. Frankie himself at the time was innovative, for example when he introduced airsteps into the dance.

In my view the only pure thing about Ryan is the idea of self preservation under the auspices of protecting Lindy. I believe this to be a petty and destructive form of expression. In this great yet fragile time for Lindy, his actions could have had severe consequences which only proves his selfish mind set. If Ryan is such a purist, how is it that he finds himself in a Broadway Swing Show performing as the only Lindy dancer amongst a company of jazz dancers who will perform "neo-swing" including salsa, hustle, country and more ? I guess when it comes to money and narcissism the purity of Lindy is quickly forgotten. Ryan mysteriously fails to mention that his two so claim championship titles (US Open and American Swing Dance Championship) have been awarded by West Coast Swing organizers. In addition he conveniently fails to mention that Jenny, his wife and Lindy partner is formally a trained jazz, ballet and tap dancer. Does that make her an untrue Lindy hopper ? If so, than yes I am an untrue Lindy hopper and many of us are. It appears as if Ryan could have stared and co-stared in the movie Face Off.

I could go on with the rhetoric until my fingers bleed. However, I choose the high road. I believe we are embarking a time that will determine the longevity of Lindy. My hope is to focus and generate positive energy to a dance style which represents non-conformity and freedom of expression. It is not important under what flag we march whether ILHA or WRRC or WWF or the ASPCA but that we march together seeking a joint and positive outcome for Lindy.

A journalist once asked Frankie Manning "What was Savoy Lindy?" He replied: "Which day of the week?"

I look forward to seeing all of you on Sunday, November 7, 1999 at the Supper Club, NYC. http://www.hopswingjump.com

Nathalie Gomes

Email received directly from Baerbl Kaufer

BaerblKaufer@worldofswing.com
Subject: WG: Full record of Francois, Koch, Gomes debate...
Date: Mon, 20 Sep 1999 17:58:54

Hello Lindy Dancers,

at the end of this mail you will find a statement of Dominique de Coster (Fred Hunt was writing the first letter to him which never arrived because of a wrong e-mail-address. This was the beginning of everything).

In the meanwhile Ryan Francois called Marcus Koch on Sunday morning and apologized for the things he has written (a big stone felt from my heart because I like Ryan). He really felt sorry for this. He knows now that he was wrong. It was a big bad missunderstanding of things. But Ryan promised he will send out an e-mail into the net where he will apologize official. Please watch out for this mail. I will mail it to everybody as soon as I have it.

I think everything will work out fine without any war or boycott.

If you are interested in all the debates you can read them under http://www.uvswingdance.net/debate.html (see the following mail with some information from John Tomeny.

Let's swing together

Baerbl Kaufer

Ed: Dominique de Coster wrote to me on Tuesday, Sept 21 requesting that I correct spelling and grammatical structure in his letters, since English is not his native language. At his request I have made spelling corrections and only very minor changes to sentence structure because I felt it is best to allow readers to "hear" his thoughts the way he has written them.

Also, the following letter was originally posted here on Monday, Sept 21 in an incomplete form. The complete letter was forwarded to me by Mr. de Coster and is here now as of Tuesday, Sept 22.

Von: de Coster Dominique ddecoster@arcadis.be
Gesendet am: Sonntag, 19. September 1999
An: live2jive
Cc: Wolfgang Steuer; AnneBritt Neman-Kilgren; Marcus Koch; Nathalie Gomes
Betreff: Let's work together instead of making war.

Dear Fred,

You might have received the answer from Marcus Koch to Ryan's letter. I hope it opens your eyes more on the subject and it helps you to understand that I am in no way trying to mislead neither you or anyone.

By reading your email "that has been also circulated around the world before I got it", I realize that you are talking about my message to invite people to join my Yahoo club. I think you are here acting like Ryan did, it is to say you have made an assumption, and without checking, you have built your self a story up about it. I am afraid you are totally wrong. This Lindy-Hop Europe Club is a totally public club set up by me in the Yahoo environment which is purely designed to get the people in contact with each other to make friendship, to share ideas, or stories, or pictures, AND NOTHING AS EVIL AS YOU ARE SUGGESTING. The yahoo privacy system ensures all people that their true identities are not communicated to any one if they don't want to. You can become a member under a fake name without permitting publication of your email, real name, gender or any info about your self. So even if I had any bad intention like you said, it is impossible to do.

So I have never "conveniently omitted to give any info about my involvement in WRRC" because the fact that I am a small figure in the WRRC is absolutely irrelevant with this Lindy-Hoppers club. Please do me a favor and visit it before you make any new comments about it. Here is the address http://Clubs.yahoo.com/Clubs/lindyhopeurope.

I also confirm what Marcus is saying, WRRC is not a commercially based organisation and has "per se" no direct interest in Lindy-Hop. Only a part of its member counties are interested in having a Lindy-Hop competition scene organized world wide. As no other international organisation is dealing with it and as many Lindy-Hoppers have knocked at the door of WRRC to do so, WRRC gave in to their demand. But WRRC is giving to the Lindy-Hoppers the possibility to organize it inside the frame of its non profit oriented organisation. My humble work is to make it come true. Please visit the WRRC web site at http://www.wrrc.org.

I will organize a meeting with everybody interested to discuss the competition rules after the American Lindy-Hop Championship and after the WLHC. And from what I will hear there,I will make proposals for changes to the WRRC General Meeting. It will be held the second week of March in Stockholm.

By the way, Lenarts Westerlund will come to make a presentation to the WRRC delegates. I really hope that you will be part of the UK Lindy-Hop committee that needs to be built-up to make it possible for your country to participate in the world competition scene and thereby influence the WRRC decisions.

I remain yours faithfully,

Dominique de Coster

A small standing and acting body in the Lindy-Hop world that has no private interest but making things moving forward.
"Where ever there is a will there is a way"

Email received directly from Ryan Francois
I have included the email header that I wrote to everyone as I forwared this message on to the seventy or so people who have either actively participated as primary or secondary parties to this debate or have sent email inquiries to me.

Date: Tue, 21 Sep 1999; 01:00 GMT

Hello All,

Following is a message I received this evening from Ryan Francois. Ryan asked me to forward this message on to all interested parties. He is currently in London and having some difficulty establishing solid connections for email and internet access.

The full text of this document and all pertinent preceding documents can be found on my web site at: http://www.uvswingdance.net/debate.html

I send this to all of you with hopes for growth and understanding among all of our swing dance communities, and an encouragement to think intelligently as we move ahead.

Best wishes,

  John Tomeny, Upper Valley Swing Dance Network
  http://www.uvswingdance.net/debate.html


===== QUOTED MATERIAL FOLLOWS =====

From: Ryan Francois

Important quote from Ryan's last document.

"I am asking you NOT to take me at my word but find out for yourselves about the intentions of this Federation".

Email received directly from John Husdon

From: Hudshop@aol.com
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 1999 03:12:46 EDT
Subject: Re: My answer to Ryan
To: ngswing@earthlink.net

Nathalie, Your answer as to the truth as I personally Know it is right on as is Marcus report.....Hip Hip As Ryan would have said it in the past...Yours for a dance, John Hudson

Email received directly from Marcus Koch

Date: 99-09-20 16:17:11 EDT
From: MarcusKoch@WorldOfSwing.com (Marcus Koch)
To: TCWrites@aol.com

Hi Tanja,

fortunately things are not eaten as hot as they are cooked. I was very shocked when I received the email Ryan spread out to the Internet. It holds a lot of mistakes and misinterpretations and was totally wrong about the position I should have played. I wrote a long statement and Nathalie wrote one, too. You can follow the conversation on http://www.uvswingdance.net/debate.html where you also find the statements. It's quite some to read, but I hope it will clarify the background.

Ryan called me yesterday and apologized. We had a nice talk for almost an hour. He wants to send out a written excuse per mail today. So he will speak for himself. You will most likely be able to read it on the same website that I mentioned above.

I hope we can spend the time with more valuable things again, which help the dance and the people.

If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to write me again.

Yours Marcus

Email received directly from Dominique de Coster

Date: Tue, 21 Sep 1999 03:02:59 -0700 (PDT)
From: Dominique de Coster blocry_dancer@yahoo.com
Subject: Let's work together
To: John Tomeny

Thank you for putting up this web site that gives to all parties the possibility to express their view and comments.

English is not my mother language so I know I am making a lot of spelling mistakes and also some time I might use words that have a different meaning to the people than what I wanted to express. But I guess, this is a risk I have to face. Could I ask you nonetheless to correct my English spelling before publishing my text.

Also you published a letter from me to Fred Hunt which was truncated. The last paragraphs where apparently lost. I attach my original text to this email so that you can add the missing part.

So here is my current contribution to the clarification that you are allowed to publish.

QUOTE

I am afraid to understand from a 2 hours phone call with Fred Hunt in the UK and from a 3:30 hours phone call with Marcus Koch that I involuntary am the starting cause of all this debate. If this is the case I take the entire responsibility of this quarrel on my shoulders.

I guess it is up to me now to give an explanation and I will, but as I feel it is of utmost importance to stick to the facts and to document strongly any statement, I will take a little time to gather the information that will give credit to my explanations.

In the mean time I want to express my thanks to Fred Hunt, despite what he published about me, for our recent long phone call. Although we still have some disagreements, especially on the role of WRRC, we are both open minded and both dedicated to make the Lindy-Hop grow World Wide.

Thank you Fred for having recommended to your UK championship winner to be one of the UK representatives to the WLHC.

I also want to announce that I will be in the Sates the end of October at the American Lindy-Hop Championship organized by Paulette Brockington and I will be staying one week in New-York till after the WLHC, I would like to take the opportunity to organize a forum where all people interested in the building of an international Lindy-Hop competition scene could meet and discuss this issue. I think one meeting during ALHC and one after the WLHC should be possible to arrange.

CLOSE QUOTE

Email received from Angel Whitworth as posted to the Swingtown (Atlanta) Public Forum

From: Angel.Whitworth@weac.com

This whole thing with the championships is a serious thing if you are a competitor. It really does not affect anyone here in Atlanta (at least right now). There are no world class competitive Lindy Hop dancers here in Atlanta. It does however affect the swing communities where there are representatives competing. This whole thing has been under debate for a long while. But, it has basically just been a debate within the "competitive community". Ryan has valid objections to having the R&R federation involved in LINDY HOP. But, I am not getting into all of that. If you are a COMPETITIVE dancer or teacher. You would be wise to get all of the facts. Just so you know!

Angel

PS. For those who will be in New York during the championships, make sure you go see the new Broadway show "SWING". Starring Ryan & Jenny! I am definitely going! My sis is going to go to the premier. I will get a review from her and let everyone know what she says about it! If anything you know the dancing will be great!

Email received from Judy Pritchett
Judy Pritchett is the author of the Archives of Early Lindy Hop and well known authority and historian on Lindy Hop.

Ed: Judy wrote this message after Ryan's first lett