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The shimmy goes way back to the "Haitian
Voodoo " dances with the rapid shaking
of hips and shoulders. The Horon dance
of the Black Sea has one of the most characteristic
movements, in horon dances, there
is a fast shoulder shimmy and a trembling of the entire
body, which imitates or suggests the movements of the
hamsi (type of anchovy) as it
swims in the sea or struggles in the nets for its life.
When men and women perform together as a couple, the
dance is often referred to |
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as theRahat, (comfortable horon.)
The Nigerian's had a dance called the Shika
which is said to have come to the states through slavery
and later transformed into the 'Shake and Quiver' around
1900. The Ahselroten of Germany was
a shoulder shaking dance of the 1400s as well. So, I
guess we are really talking about the "style of
the shimmy" that was created here in the States.
It may have been known prior as the
"Shimmy Sha-Wabble also written
in Bradfords song "Rules and Regulations in 1911."
The Shimmy was mentioned in sheet music called the Bulfrog
Hop back to 1908 (probably referred to the shake
and quiver version but Bradford called it the shimmy)
and can be seen all the way back in an old edison film
entitled 'Princess Rajah' dated 1902 but wouldn't become
popular with white America till the 1920s with Gray
and West.
The Shimmy has been claimed by many, but it was Gilda
Gray (1901-1959) who could never keep
her body still while she sang. When she moved her shoulders,
her audiences loved it so much she kept it in her act.
The Shimmy (chemise) is said to be a part of
her dress (Straps) and when she shook her shoulder
her chemise would always show. The New York Times reported
that: Around 1918, at John Letzka's Saloon, a patron
watching her do this yelled out while she was performing
and said: "What do you call that dance,"
she replied, "I'm shaking my chemise, that's
what I am doing." Gray later refuted ever saying
this in "The Dance Magazine." Gray also did
the shimmy in the Ziegfeld's Follies of 1922 and was
said to be much smoother than West's.
Mae
West (1893-1980) also laid claim to the
shimmy and in 1918 she sang " Everybody Shimmies
Now" and added the Shimmy to her act in Hammerstein's
"Sometime" (1919) while she sang the song:
"What do I Have to do to Get It." In the Ziegfeld
Follies of 1919, the song "You Cannot Make
Your Shimmy Shake On Tea" was performed. Bee
Palmer danced the Shimmy to the song 'Shimmee'
(by Shelton Brooks) in the summer of 1918 in
Ziegfeld's Midnight Frolics. However in 1908 in a song
entitled "The Bullfrog Hop" the shimmy was
mentioned. So in reality, these ladies may have only
added to the dance and its popularity. The Shimmy was
to become very popular in the 1920's Ragtime
Era .
Striptease thru Burlesque
is indirectly related to the Shimmy. In 1875 Le Divan
Fayouau, in the 'Rue des Martyrs,' France performed
a sketch that required her to remove most of her clothing
one piece at a time. Stripping on stage had been around
long before the Shimmy, but it had not yet come full
scale which leads us to Hinda Wassau, who won a dance
contest at Chicago's State Congress Theatre in 1928
and a chance to dance professionally for a week doing
her shimmy solo dance. During one of her solo's, her
zipper got stuck in her costume and was not able to
zip it all the way up before her solo, and you guessed
it, during the act she shimmied it loose and exposed
herself, as her costume fell apart to the floor, one
piece at a time, while she shaked, shimmied and gyrated
to the unsuspecting audience who went wild with applause
and instead of bowing at the end, she gave a wink and
walked off stage. She was embarressed to no end and
thought she would be fired but the manager loved it
and paid her to do it more, and more and more... others
would follow and the strip-tease was born.
The Shimmy believe
it or not, actually became a couples dance in the 1930's,
however it is mainly a solo dance that is still popular
today, although it is not really considered a dance
anymore, but a dance movement. In the late 1950's a
dance called the Freeze became popular and was easy
to do, you struck a pose and made your whole body quiver
and shake like the shimmy. During the 1960s, many women
would wear a "tasseled type dress" and shimmy
or shake the tassels while dancing (Go-Go dancers,)
this became very, very popular and would be called the
Shimmy-Shake. The Shimmy-Shake can
be seen in many beach cult type movies such as Beach
Blanket Bingo, etc. of the 1960s. |
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