When we imagine music, we typically think of a song or a musician. But sometimes, music is best embodied by a place. The Apollo Theater, CGBG and Carnegie Hall are just some of the most iconic venues in New York City that have fostered new musical ideas and artists over the decades.
But one oft overlooked place in this pantheon of giants is the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem, NY. For a brief few decades in the 1900s, the Savoy provided a vibrant home for the budding genre of swing, and saw rise to popular dances like the Lindy Hop. At the same time, the venue was one of the first racially integrated public places in the country, making it remarkably progressive for it’s time.
The Savoy Ballroom was a legendary dance hall located at 596 Lenox Avenue, between 140th and 141st Streets. It first opened in 1926. It was owned by Moe Gale, a Jewish man, and managed by Charles Buchanan, a black man. The Savoy was popular from the get-go. After it first opened the door, the African American newspaper New York Age reported “Savoy Turns 2,000 Away on Opening Night – Crowds Pack Ball Room All Week.”
That’s an impressive figure, especially considering the massive scale of the venue. The ballroom stretched the length of an entire city block and could house 5,000 people at a time. There were two separate bandstands and multiple house bands allowing for music at all times of the night and highly anticipated battle of the bands showdowns.
One of the most famous battles at the Savoy was the night the Benny Goodman Band faced Chick Webb and His Little Chicks. Both bands were considered the pinnacle of swing at the time.
Famed dancers and Savoy regulars, Frankie Manning and Norma Miller share their memories of experiencing that battle live in this clip from a Ken Burn’s docu-series.
Aside from the mainstay house bands, there were plenty of guest musicians as well. Stars like Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Art Blakey and Thelonious Monk all played there too.
The music and energy of the Savoy gave way to a massive dance trend of the times called the Lindy Hop (also known as the Jitterbug). The Savoy was appropriately nicknamed, “The home of happy feet.”
As stated, the Savoy was one of the first ballrooms to truly integrate black and white people. It’s estimated that on average about 85$ of the clientele were black and 15% were white, though this number varied greatly by night. It is also reported that over half a million people visited the Savoy annually at the Ballroom’s peak.
Sadly, times changed as ballrooms shrank in popularity. The Savoy eventually shut its doors in 1958 to make room for an incoming housing complex, marking the end of an era.
Count Basie said on the matter, “With the passing of the Savoy Ballroom, a part of show business is gone. I feel about the same way I did when someone told me the news that Bill (Bojangles) Robinson was dead”.
As of 2002, a commemorative plaque for the Savoy Ballroom can be found on Lenox Avenue between 140th and 141st Streets.
But, in a 21st century twist, the Savoy is attempting to make a comeback using new technology. Enter “Welcome to the Savoy”, a current project underway to recreate the ballroom using a mix of virtual and augmented reality. The idea is to create an immersive theater experience, using a mix of live performers and real-life infrastructure alongside 3D photorealistic animated characters and other artificially generated content in an attempt to recapture the original atmosphere in the modern age.
This type of project is not without challenges. For instance, while the Savoy was notably vibrantly colored with lush carpets and elaborate mirrored walls, almost all photos of the Savoy are in black and white. Faithfully re-envisioning the space requires a mix of oral history and original documents such as blueprints and floor plans.
The project was first conceived in 2019, but was delayed by the pandemic. It is currently on pause indefinitely as the team seeks to re-evaluate some of its original VR plans, looking to use shared-VR headsets instead of individual ones to minimize the project’s carbon footprint.
Whether the project finds its footing or not remains to be seen, but the core idea opens doors to reviving other historic places using new technologies. Until then, the Savoy Ballroom lives on in the memory of all who had the pleasure of experiencing it.
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