About
Dirt Cheap Blues
A few years back in early 2005,
fellow dancers Jeff Miller and Chris Crawford were
toying with ideas on how to hold a dance event with possible
live bands in Va Beach affordably. The local swing
dance club has the Virginia Beach Lindy Exchange (VBLX) in
June, but the summer season is long enough that they can
hold two different dance exchanges. One Swing
and one Blues. And do it...cheaply.
They tossed around ideas on
how to afford such an event without having to break into
the piggy-banks of the dancers or especially their
own. Something well, cheap ass. They were coming up with possible ideas how-about-this, how-about-that, but the idea was put on the shelf for another day.
That day arrived at the end of
summer when Jeff and Andrew Jaswa were at the beach enjoying a weekly free Blues concert at the
Natchel Blues Network’s Blues
On The Boardwalk in August. They were discussing the
same idea, “How can we bring dancers here and make
it cheap enough from the to travel?” Meanwhile Deb Hill, the
NBN President, spoke over the microphone reminding the listeners “Don’t
forget to come back in September for our 3-day Blues
At The Beach Festival, featuring 10 bands ABSOLUTELY FREE and open to the public!”
D’oh! Can it be any easier (cheaper)? The NBN pays for the bands. We just invite the dancers for late nites.
BRAINSTORMING
Now Jeff & Andrew -
being in advertising/marketing - they needed to give the event
a catchy name. Trying
for keep the “cheap” theme: Cheap
Ass Blues. Cheap & Easy Blues. Cheap Bastard
Blues. Down & Dirty Blues. Dirty Cheap Blues ...
which eventually transformed into: Dirt
Cheap Blues!
Now armed with a great
idea, but had less than a month to promote it. They quickly contacted swing dance clubs
from various cities, local colleges, and any other dancers to their address books . The event still
had over 65 dancers come out. The
concerts rocked and the dancers had the best time. The
late nites included music by local DJs Andrew Jaswa & Jeff
Miller and (former-local) Duane Grover. They kept
trying to out-blues each other with oh-so-groovy songs and had too
much fun!
2006 - GETTING THE WORD OUT
The following year 2006,
the Dirt Cheap Blues Exchange (DCBE) now was promoted with
along with the VBLX in June to help get the word out. And boy did it!
The registration list kept growing and growing - that's when they knew they had something on their hands. DJs included local faves Andrew & Jeff,
but now added traveling DJs Bryan Spellman (TX) & Chris
Ransdell (OK) to add some new flava to the mix. The event
now brought in over 125 dancers at the late nites from all over
the East Coast.
2007 - WORD GOT AROUND
The event's popularity grew
beyond anyone's expectations. Additional
Blues DJs were invited to keep the music grooving:
Tina Davis (TX), Bryan Spellman (TX), Solomon Douglas (Canada),
Patrick Warren (TX), Jeff Miller and Andrew Jaswa. Dancers
arrived from NY to FL, to CA, to TX and even had international
attendees coming in from Canada, Australia, and even Germany!
A quick count of over 175 dancers in the room at late nites
groovin' the night away.
A NEW BIRTH!
After the ’07 Exchange, Tina Davis and Bryan
Spellman had such a great time with the friendly locals of
Virginia Beach / Norfolk, they asked if it would be possible to come
out for a Blues Dance Workshop sometime. This was the
launch of the 1st Annual Dirt Cheap Blues Workshop in March.
Another amazing sucess with over 80 attendees and Saturday night's dance had live music
by local Bobby Blackhat Blues Band. The DJs Tina
Davis, Bryan Spellman, Jeff Miller, and Andrew Jaswa kept
everyone bluesin' all weekend long.
ON THE HORIZON
FOR 2008
The upcoming 2008 Dirt Cheap Blues Exchange
is already taking shape and a larger studio is already booked
- and a registration cap is eminent.
The
2008 DJ lineup is already booked at the top Blues DJs from
all over the nation: it will showcase Tina Davis (TX),
Bryan Spellman (TX), Jerry Warwick (TX),
Greg Avakian (PA), Jeff Miller (VA), Andrew Jaswa, (VA), and Corey Smith.
So
stay in touch and as they say - history is
in the making!
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