I think somewhere in the back of my mind I've always wanted to make a whole swing album.
We used to play the Savoy Ballroom, and we always had a boogie tune in the set. Bands like Tommy Dorsey used to do a little boogie woogie. The big bands.
The Big Band Era is my era. People say, 'Where did you get your style from?' I did the Big Band Era on guitar. That's the best way I could explain it.
I love swing, jazz, blues, standards. I love the American songbook, Gershwin, Berlin. It's all that. So I'm born in the wrong era and I just don't fit into the 21st century at all.
My father was a part of that generation, and my mother, too - the late-'30s, early-'40s big-band generation. Frank Sinatra, Art Blakey, Gene Krupa, Billie Holiday - all that stuff was in my background.
When I first started out, I was really attracted to having my own sense of style because I started swing dancing, lindy hop, and jitterbug.
My father danced a lot. He was called 'the French Fred Astaire.'
There are dances you can do separately - your charleston, your jive.
I literally post swing videos. Like, how is that interesting? But I've created such a following, and they're loyal fans. It's really cool to create a community around something I love, and that they love, too.
My mother was really into big band. It was played in the house all the time.
In black culture, you know, we used to go swing dancing. We used to go out to go dance and actually have fun.
Swing will never sound as good as it did in the '40s.
I studied dancing for 13 years. And loved to dance. Always wanted to dance with Fred Astaire.
Where I grew up, Bob Wills and his western swing was very popular. And western swing is not that far from jazz and blues.
I always felt it was weird, that retro thing where guys showed up in zoot suits and tried to talk as if they were from some other time.
I was still in school at the time and Cab was very popular and everybody was doing Cab Calloway so I did.
I came out with my five-piece group and opened at Billy Burke's Swing Oar. This was when Hollywood was really jumpin'. This was when Frankie Laine used to come in and ask if he could sing a number.
Rock bands don't really swing... a lot of rock is stiff. They don't understand the feel, the movement, you know, the jungle of it all.
Of course I danced a lot when I was making 'Swingers.' The swing music scene was big in Hollywood, and I went to places like The Derby. And, after I wrote it and was trying to get it made, I would go every week so I'd be good at dancing.
I love the '40s. I love the '50s. I love the style, I love the clothes. I love how the women looked. I love the dances. I love the music. I love the amber of the light. I'm just in love with the cars. I'm in love with all of it.
Frank Sinatra taught me how to do him. It took me seven years to master him. He would tell me, tap your foot, Rich, and don't forget to grasp your sleeve.
I was always looking at footage of dancers from Nicholas Brothers to Ralph Brown to Sand Man to Miller Brothers and Lois, and I grew up looking at old footage.
I wish I was born in that era: dancing with Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, going to work at the studio dressed in beautiful pants, head scarves, and sunglasses.
My favorite way to dance is being swept off my feet by somebody who doesn't know how to dance.
I grew up doing all that stuff because I was obsessed with the '50s. I had sock hops for birthday parties. So I've always done The Twist and stuff. It was pretty natural and, with my parents doing it all the time, I'd just copy them. Not very pretty.
