LA
SOCK HOPS
If I said those two words to our sixteen year granddaughter Sloan I am not sure she would not know what I was talking about. (I also might add knowing her, she would have liked.)
This week I started reading Rick Bragg’s newest book, Jerry Lee Lewis, His Own Story.” I love his dedication. It is eight simple words. But if you are a product of the late 1950s’ immediately a picture should come to your mind. The dedication reads:
“To anyone who ever danced in their socks.”
When I read this I smiled. I smiled and then I smiled again. Thoughts, memories and pictures came back to me. Oh, for just one more Friday/ Saturday nights.
This coming February 2015 my wife and are going on an eight day cruise to the eastern Caribbean. But for me that is not the important part. The cruise is billed as “Rockin’ the Caribbean.” On this cruise there will be ten to twelve old rock-n'-roll acts from the late 1950s’. Groups like the Platters, Tokens (Lion Sleeps Tonight) Johnny Tillotson, Freddy “Boom Boom” Cannon, Gary Lewis and the Playboys, Gary Puckett and the Union Gap, Peggy March and numerous others. There will be what they call a Prom night and various nights of Sock Hop dances.
According to Wikipedia “The sock hop was an informal sponsored dance event at American high schools typically held in the high school’s own gym. The term came about because dancers were required to remove their hard-soled shoes to protect the varnished floor of the gymnasium. The hops were a culture feature of the 1950s’ and early rock-n’-roll. The music at a sock hop was usually played from vinyl records, often brought by students themselves or maybe a DJ.”
Some kids would be dancing, others just sitting, standing, talking and enjoying the evening. As the time neared for the end of the sock hop it might be announced, “One last dance.” The lights would be lowered and rest assured the song to be played would be a slow one. Maybe something like the Spaniels doing, “Goodnight Sweetheart” or Freddy Parris and the Five Satins closing out the evening with “In The Still of the Night.”
You got any Friday/ Saturday night memories…… or dancing in your socks memories?
November 29, 2014
Keep on,
Larry Adamson