Frankie's 95th Birthday Festival

SPECIAL GUESTS Bring your camera and lots of questions! Some of the legends of Lindy Hop, Tap and Jazz music will be joining the ranks to pay homage to Frankie for his birthday. Special guests include: Norma Miller, Chazz Young, Dawn Hampton, Sugar Sullivan, and more, including Harvest Moon Ball Champions and members of Whitey's Lindy Hoppers. Check back here as the list of confirmed special guests grows! Can you imagine spending a week with all these greats?
		Norma Miller Website \| YouTube \| Wikipedia Known to many as the Queen of Swing, Norma Miller is an author, choreographer, dancer, comedian and actor whose career spans over seven decades. Discovered at the age of twelve by the Savoy Ballroom’s legendary dancer Twist Mouth George, Ms. Miller has been in show business ever since. Honored with a 2003 National Heritage Foundation Fellowship from the National Endowments of the Arts for her role in creating and continuing to preserve “the acrobatic style swing dance, known as the Lindy Hop,” Ms. Miller (at a young 85 years of age) continues to be an inspiration to all who know her. "The NEA's National Heritage Award is a great honor," says Ms. Miller. "It has put me on track to become a film producer and I intend this one should be just the first of many." Norma Miller's future projects will also be drawn from her swing dance experiences and, as she likes to say: "If you don't dig swing - you don't dig fried chicken!" The author of several books, Ms. Miller’s latest book, Swing Baby Swing is set to be released later in the year and chronicles the evolution of the swing culture into the 21st century. Ms. Miller’s biography, Swingin’ at the Savoy: A Memoir of a Jazz Dancer, recollects her youthful encounters with Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Ethel Waters and other jazz legends. Ms. Miller has also been the subject of many documentaries including National Geographic’s Jitterbug (1991) and the Smithsonian Jazz series on NPR. In Ken Burn’s documentary Jazz (2001), her recollections provide a first hand account of the Harlem music and dance scene in the 1930s and 40s. Ms. Miller’s film credits include the Marx Brother’s A Day at the Races (1937) and Hellzapoppin (1941); Spike Lee’s Malcolm X (1992); Debbie Allen’s Stompin’ at the Savoy (1992) and John Biffar’s Captiva (1995.) In the sixties, she began working with Redd Foxx at his comedy club and later joined him on the 1970’s television series, Sanford and Son, serving as a stand up comic, actor and choreographer. A new 90 minute documentary, Queen of Swing by Florida filmmaker John Biffar, takes an inside look at Norma Miller’s influence in the globalization of America’s jazz culture and her and her fellow artist’s role in racial integration; and features interviews with Bill Cosby and the late Leonard Reed. The documentary is scheduled to premier at the Smithosian in Washington DC on Sunday, April 9. Ms. Miller is finalizing plans for her 2006 summer Swing Baby Swing Tour, which will kick off on Wednesday, March 15 at Paul Bush's Blue Pepper Gourmet Foods and Bakery in Fort Myers, Florida. Joining Ms. Miller at Blue Pepper is author and historian Al Governor, whose recently released children's book, Stompin at the Savoy tells the story of Norma’s childhood in Harlem; and Florida filmmaker John Biffar, who will show a sneak preview his documentary Queen of Swing.

		Sugar Sullivan Article \| YouTube Sugar Sullivan started her career as a performer, choreographer, teacher and professional dancer at the age of nine. Sugar was a member of the Original Jazz Dancers, a distinguished group of Lindy Hoppers and Hoofers from Harlem's heyday. Sugar has been featured with the Harlem Blues & Jazz Band, Cab Calloway's Hi-De-Ho Orchestra, Duke Ellington Orchestra, Count Basie Orchestra, and Panama Francis and his Savoy Sultans among others. Sugar learned to dance at home and started Tap dancing at age three. She was instructed in Tap by Buster Brown of the Copasetics at age seven. Sugar toured the United States and Canada for fifteen years with Sonny Allen and the Rockets (Song and Dance Revue).

		Chazz Young YouTube Chazz Young, a spectacular dancer with a long and successful stage career, was first inspired by his father, Lindy Hop master Frankie Manning. Today he tours worldwide, spreading the gospel of Lindy Hop and Tap. In addition to his work as a choreographer and performer, he teaches Lindy Hop in his home town of Las Vegas to the most important dancers of today: the young people who are just now learning to partner dance. Chazz became serious about dancing at the age of 12. Had it not been for his mother taking him to see his father perform, he may not have ever followed his father into the business. He enrolled in the famous Harlem dance school, Mary Bruce, and was with the school until he was seventeen. His father introduced him to a dear friend, Norma Miller, who was looking for some dancers. He performed with Norma Miller's dancing troupe at the famous Apollo Theater with famous bands like Count Basie. He traveled extensively with the Norma Miller Dance Troupe to the likes of London, Australia, Hong Kong and Taiwan. In the 50's and 60's with the influx of Rock and Roll, partner dancing slowed down in the United States. Chazz married a dancer from the Norma Miller Dance Troupe and fathered four children. Like his father, Chazz taught dance while working for the New York postal service for 26 years. Currently Chazz lives in Las Vegas and teaches at the Austin Dancing School, which originated in New York. He continues to actively perform, choreograph and teach internationally. He has traveled to the famous Herräng Dance Camp, Sweden, to teach for the past ten years.

		Dawn Hampton YouTube \| Swing Time Dawn Hampton was born in 1928, in Middletown, Ohio. Her father, Clark Deacon Hampton, Sr., had a family band and vaudeville act that was part of a traveling carnival. She grew up listening to the music of the family band, Deacon Hampton's Pickaninnys, sitting on an orange box behind her mother Laura's piano. It wasn't long before the infant Hampton was making a contribution. She began performing at the tender age of three, and two years later sang "He Takes Me to Paradise". Dawn is one of twelve children. Slide Hampton, the well-known jazz trombonist, is the youngest. Two of Dawn's older sisters, Aletra and Virtue, live in Indianapolis and are still performing and there are many more musical Hamptons scattered around the country. After the war, the family band reunited for several years. There were fourteen pieces and nine Hamptons; Dawn played alto and tenor sax. They traveled under the leadership of her brother, Duke, and played throughout the Midwest and South. Finally, in 1950, the band achieved its dream of performing at Carnegie Hall (along with another well-known, although unrelated Hampton - Lionel). Once the Big Apple got a taste of the Hampton Family, they were featured at the Apollo Theatre and the Savoy Ballroom. The Hamptons became the house band at the then-famous Sunset Terrace in Indianapolis, and then moved on to the Cincinnati Cotton Club. Sometime in the mid-1950s, several brothers left to study music and Dawn and her sisters Aletra, Virtue, and Carmelita continued to perform as The Hampton Sisters.

		Savion Glover YouTube \| Website Savion Glover^®, Tony Award Winner, Hoofer, Choreographer, and Producer is celebrating his 28th year as a Hoofer in show business. Broadway and Film credits include The Tap Dance Kid, Black & Blue, Jelly's Last Jam, Bring in 'da Noise Bring in 'da Funk, the movie Tap with Gregory Hines and Sammy Davis, Jr., Spike Lee's Bamboozled, and the acclaimed Academy Award Winning 2006 Warner Brothers release of Happy Feet choreographed by Savion Glover. Mr. Glover dances on concert stages throughout the world and recently formed Savion Glover Productions, which produced / production credits include Classical Savion^®, Savion Glover's Bare Soundz, Visions of a Bibile, Savion Glover's SOLO IN TIME, Invitations to a Dancer, Savion Glover and The Otherz, and assistant segment producer of Savion Glover's Bare Soundz appearance on Dancing With the Stars. Savion Glover continues to celebrate the art form of Tap and is honored to be known amongst some of the greatest entertaining Hooferz to date.

SPECIAL GUESTS