A quick postscript to last week's post about the hand jive performed on the Johnny Otis Show in the late 1950s:
Towards the end of the song, there are three clapping sequences that can be used for an extremely low-key hand jive. These can be seen in the video embedded in the earlier post. Here are descriptions of each:
(1) Johnny himself! At one point he stops playing the piano and simply sits there clapping to the music, accenting the even beats:
one CLAP three CLAP five CLAP seven CLAP
He briefly transitions to a finger-snap instead of a clap, keeping the same rhythm.
(2) One of the McKinley sisters (sadly, I don't know which is which, but the one at the back), gets a slightly more complex rhythm going on beat 1, 3, 4, 6, and 7:
CLAP two CLAP CLAP five CLAP CLAP eight
(3) The other McKinley sister and leader Marie Adams have an even more interesting beat going, with pairs of fast claps on "2&" and "6&" in a 1-2&3-4-5-6&7-8 count:
one CLAPCLAP three CLAP five CLAPCLAP seven CLAP
This one can be a little bit tricky to get. It matches the first four beats of the music very well but there's a slightly different syncopation on the second four beats, so it feels odd at first until one gets used to clapping with a different accent.
The second and third sequences are done simultaneously on the show to very nice effect. It would be interesting to split a group in thirds and have all three going at once.
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Previous hand jive posts:
Hand Jive Basics (includes the Grease sequence)
Hand Jive Style: Three Tons of Joy (includes the video from which these clapping sequences were taken)
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