And then disco came to my life…
An essay…
Missed last week’s post? No worries. I did too. We decided to watch Saturday Night Fever with our daughter. The dance club she founded, USA Ballroom Club, will start teaching hustle this coming semester. By the time we were done, I was tired. I thought I would write about it later but well, it has been a very busy week.
Given that she will be doing hustle this coming semester, I had to introduce her to the movie. Though there are many other songs and the discography of the 70s is not only ample but varied, this movie is the one I think of when disco or hustle is discussed.
When the movie came out, I was 13 years old. This movie and its music are ingrained in my brain as one of the most salient experiences in my life. My mother took us to watch on a Friday afternoon. If memory serves, it was Good Friday. That would make it April 8, 1977. It was a sunny afternoon.
Right after watching the movie, I bought the vinyl and memorized almost all the songs in it. We lived across the street from a music store, Centro Musical Los Andinos, owned by one of my grandfather’s musician friends from el Trio Los Andinos. I would go weekly to buy a new 45 or a LP vinyl record.
Each song in the album brings a different memory to me. Not to mention, I did the dance and I used to be able to do the splits. I would start running in my house’s hallway, jump in the air, spin, and land in a split. Ruined many socks in the process but I learned to land very nicely.
Watching the movie with my daughter made me realize how much exposure I had both visually with the limited technology of the time and thematically. Though the scenes were not explicit, the actors’ intensity was enough that my daughter felt offended. I had to take a moment to explain some things that were contextual of the 70s as a cultural, social, and political phenomenon. And yes, things have changed and yet in many ways they have stayed the same.
The disco era was unlike anything else that came after. As a teenager, the music, the outfits, the dances, the sounds, the rhythm, and the shoes, it all coalesced to create a distinctive and iconic cultural moment. I know that in the macro sense there were issues with the disco scene such drugs and others. But, I was a kid. For me this music was not about any of those issues. This music was about coming of age, finding my voice, finding something that felt mine. Teenage years are a period where finding something to connect with is formative. I had many reasons to like disco music.
I grew up with music. My grandfather was a radio show producer who loved music. His sister was a dancer and a singer. He gave my brother and I guitars for one Christmas. No, we did not know how to play them. I used to go to sleep with an orange hand sized portable radio in my ear. Almost all the songs that came out during that time were hits. Donna Summer’s music broke new ground in combining her voice with a synthesizer in the song I Feel Love. Not to mention, the Bee Gees, Gloria Gaynor, The Village People, Diana Ross, and others. Yes, sometimes disco music had very suggestive sounds and/or lyrics. Yet, there was an inexplicable and appealing combination of rhythm and music that was hard to resist. I would get lost for hours listening to disco. Not to sound too cheesy but I would listen to this music looking out to the ocean. My house was across from the ocean.
Because our music in Puerto Rico was a partnered dance, free style dancing did not make sense to me. As much as I liked Rock & Roll, it was not always a partnered dance. Disco had that appeal for me. It was danceable, it was something one could do with a partner. And I loved it. I had a partner and we would practice multiple times a week. All I wanted to do was dance to disco and I became really good at it.
There was more to disco than the dance moves. There was the clothes, the shoes, the colors, and of course, the disco ball. The ideal outfit was the leotard in a pastel blue color with a flowing wrap around skirt in the same color, with nice shows to match. Yet, it is not something I owned. I did have the shoes. But I could not dance with them. I danced with socks. And because I was not allowed to wear leotards, shorts had to do. But I still loved it. The male pants did not have a seam on the side which gave the guys a nice and sleek look. The shirts had prints in colors, were lightweight, and they had long and pointy collars. They had to be left open enough to show off a bit of chest hair if there was any to be shown. Their shoes had heels too, but they were chunky platform shoes. Every one was dressed to impress and people cared for their appearance.
Socially, disco music attempted to be a cultural equalizer. It meant that race or social status did not matter. And yes, it was also part of the sexual liberation cultural movement. As a kid though, none of that touched me. To me it was simply a way for a kid to find a lane and connection to something that tangibly gave me a sense of self in many ways. I was sad when it faded. With its fading, my dancing also faded. It was not until almost 15 years later that dancing found me again. Then, I learned to dance to everything and as a result, my appreciation for a greater range of music grew and my steps too.
Love,
Alma