Breathing with Lester Young: Finding the Soul of Dance
The air in the Savoy Ballroom wasnât just air, dig? It was a thick soup of sweat, perfume, desperation, and the ghosts of a thousand stories. You could taste the ambition, the heartbreak, the sheer need to move. And it wasnât just the dancers making that air. It was the band. Specifically, it was Lester Young.
Now, Iâve been chasing the ghost of Lester Young for years. Not in some misty, romantic way, but in the mechanics of it. In the how of it. Because for a long time, my Balboa feltâŠwrong. Technically proficient, sure. I could hit the breaks, the throws, the variations. But it lacked something. It feltâŠstudied. Like I was reciting poetry instead of living it.
Iâd been obsessing over a particular recording: The Lester Young Quartet â Lester Young at the Town Hall. Not the polished studio stuff, but this raw, live performance from 1941. Itâs messy, beautiful, and utterly alive. And it wasnât the solos that cracked the code, though those are, of course, incandescent. It was the space. The breath.
See, a lot of folks focus on Youngâs phrasing â the way heâd hang back, play around the beat, those languid, almost conversational lines. And thatâs crucial. But what gets lost is how he achieved that. It wasnât just about delaying notes. It was about controlling the air.
Listen closely. Really listen. Young doesnât just play notes, he releases them. He lets them bloom, then slowly, deliberately, lets them fade. Itâs like heâs exhaling the music, shaping it with his diaphragm, his lungs, his entire torso. Itâs a physical act, a visceral one. Itâs not about precision, itâs about flow.
I started to realize this wasnât just about saxophone technique. It was about a fundamental understanding of rhythm, of pulse, of the very act of breathing in time. And that, my friends, is where the Balboa connection hit me like a runaway train.
Balboa, at its core, is about subtle weight changes, about responding to the leadâs slightest intention. Itâs a dance of micro-movements, of almost imperceptible shifts in balance. And for too long, I was trying to force those movements, to think my way through the dance. I was bracing, tightening, holding my breath.
I was playing the notes instead of breathing the music.
So, I started practicing Balboa with Youngâs breath in my ear. Iâd put on Town Hall and justâŠbreathe with him. Inhale on the downbeat, exhale as the melody unfolded. I focused on relaxing my core, on letting my body respond organically to the music, on releasing tension with each phrase.
It felt ridiculous at first. Like trying to learn physics by smelling a rose. But slowly, something shifted. I stopped anticipating the leadâs movements and started feeling them. My weight changes became softer, more fluid. My connection with my partner deepened. The dance stopped being a series of steps and started being a conversation.
The ghost of Lester Young wasnât telling me what to do, he was telling me how to listen. How to feel the music not just in my ears, but in my bones, in my breath.
And itâs not just Young, either. This applies to so much of early jazz. Think about Coleman Hawkinsâ âBody and Soul.â That legendary recording isnât just about harmonic innovation, itâs about Hawkinsâ control of his breath, the way he builds and releases tension over those 27 choruses. Or consider Billie Holiday. Her phrasing, her timing, her entire emotional weight is delivered through the subtle inflections of her voice, the way she holds a note, the way she lets it go.
These musicians werenât just playing notes, they were sculpting air. They were creating a space for the music to breathe, to live, to become.
This isnât some airy-fairy, New Age nonsense, either. Thereâs a physiological basis for this. When youâre tense, your breathing becomes shallow and erratic. Your muscles tighten. Your movements become jerky and unnatural. When youâre relaxed, your breathing deepens. Your muscles loosen. Your movements become fluid and graceful.
So, the next time youâre on the dance floor, or even just listening to jazz, try this: close your eyes. Forget about the steps, forget about the technique. Just breathe. Listen to the music. Feel the pulse. And let your body respond.
Let the ghost in the groove guide you. Let the music breathe through you.
Because that, my friends, is where the real magic happens. Thatâs where the dance truly comes alive. Thatâs where you find the soul of the Savoy, the spirit of Lester Young, and the freedom to move like nobodyâs watchingâŠeven though they probably are. And thatâs a beautiful thing. A dangerous thing. A jazz thing.