This is a video of my friend, Mano, doing Killer Boogie at 100% speed, 256 beats per minute.
killer boogie [2020-11-29] @256bpm
Manogna Mano's Killer Boogie
Mano learnt Lindy Hop about 2 years ago. At that time he was 35 years old. He didn't just learn it, he made it a priority to practice consistently. If Mano was one of those people who learnt dancing as a child, I would have like-ed his non-stop crazy speed dancing, at best I would have written a comment on his YouTube channel. End of story.
But this video stayed with me for a few hours. It wasn't about how well he danced in those two minutes, it was about the effort and time he invested in making dance a serious hobby. It took him about 5 months to become a 'promateur'(in his words) at Killer Boogie. 5 months of 4-5 times a week of practice, with an infant at home during the pandemic. That's dedication and commitment.
He is one of those people who is really good at finding serious hobbies - a few years ago, he spent a gazillion hours designing keyboards for his personal use. Madness, the earlier me would have thought and dismissed, but I have fallen in love with this kind of madness. If you take conventional work away from my daily life, I'd be mostly clueless. Recently, I read about the benefits of finding unrelated hobbies and I've been on the lookout to build a few hobbies.
I was very tempted to try out Killer Boogie, give it chance to see if dance will stick as a hobby. In general when I learn anything new, I go all guns blazing and with time, be it days, weeks or months, the enthusiasm wanes. To master Killer Boogie, especially as a beginner I need to be consistent first and then focus on intensity. I almost always lose the battle with consistency. This time, I want to choose consistency first.
I will try to record my learning experience in this journal.