Swing dance festival in Gothenburg

Thank you all participants of Swingin’ Spring 2023 & WCJs 40th anniversary!

From the deepest part of our hearts, THANK YOU! 🥰

We as organizers really felt the appreciation through words and spirit during the festival. We dont think we can or even want to make a more grandious and over the top festival next year, an anniversary is just meant to be more…

With that said we still really want you to come back to an amazing Swingin´Spring 2024 – we want to improve where you think improvements are needed. Please, fill in the survey you recieved in your mailbox. Pictures and films will be shared on our social media and on the website as fast as they are done.

/SIS-crew together with the board of West Coast Jitterbugs

Connecting to the roots of the dance is of great importance. All participants are encouraged to follow and take action on the following values:

– Be yourself
– Be open to improvisation
– Build relationships during the festival
– Have trust in yourself and in each other
– Show respect – to others, to the music and history, and to the space we create together

Teacher lineup

”Jazz & Swing culture – an expression of freedom in the african american society”

All swing dances including lindy hop and vernacular jazz have deep roots in the unique African American art forms, which in turn arose in a culture marked by oppression. The Savoy Ballroom in Harlem, New York, was a unique and at the time controversial place where whites and blacks were allowed to meet on the dance floor.

The dances and music are marked by the racism that black Americans faced and the segregation that existed in society. Jazz and swing were a defiant reaction to the oppression and hardships people faced, a joyous resistance and at the same time an expression of freedom.

Map of the event

Band line up