Pacific Swing Dance Foundation

01/23/2026

This weekend we’re reuniting with friends at California Balboa Classic ! On Sunday, PSDF and CalBal are paying tribute to Marge Takier.

https://facebook.com/events/s/celebration-of-life-for-marge-/1546038413182005/

If you’re at CalBal, please stop by the PSDF booth (across from the registration booth), read a bit about Marge and sign our memorial book. Our PSDF archive team did a wonderful job paying tribute to a woman who helped keep the swing dance fire burning.

12/19/2025

We received word from Augie Freeman that Marge Takier passed away this evening. She was 91 years old.

Marge had been in a senior care facility for the past couple of years and spent her final days in the company of friends and family.

If you knew Marge, you know what an important person she was to our modern swing dance and, in particular, Balboa scene. Although she was not one of the original Southern California swing dancers, she was the primary force behind the swing dancing that happened at Bobby McGee’s in the 80s and 90s and was the primary DJ there. She was Hal Takier’s wife and dance partner in the latter half of his life and became involved in swing dancing through that connection.

She was a wonderful person, a lover of music, full of happiness, a great conversationalist, and a great friend to many, many swing dancers of all ages. She is deeply missed.

In 2019, PSDF sponsored an interview with Marge on Ryan Swift’s the Track podcast (https://www.thetrackpodcast.com/episodes/043)—it’s a great listen.

Our hearts go out to her family and friends.

12/09/2025

Thank you to everyone who made our FIRST ANNUAL Winter Swing: A Fundraiser Gala! a success! In case you missed it--the silent auction will be open for bidding through end of day Tuesday!

12/04/2025

Join us this Saturday, December 6 to celebrate the spirit of generosity and community together!

Or don't! Unused tickets will be treated as a donation to PSDF and all proceeds support our non-profit mission.

Send a message to learn more

11/07/2025

❄️Winter Swing: A Fundraiser Gala ❄️

Pacific Swing Dance Foundation presents Winter Swing! We’re celebrating all things swing with live music from JONATHAN STOUT & HIS RUGCUTTERS, specialty drinks, silent auction items, and other prizes! Step into the rhythm of a bygone era at Winter Swing, a dazzling evening of music, movement, and community!

Join dancers, music lovers, and vintage enthusiasts for a glamorous night featuring:
✨Live music and social dancing
✨Performances by local and visiting swing dancers
✨Elegant gala atmosphere with light refreshments and raffle prizes
✨Special showcase of rare vintage dance clips
✨Special meet-and-greet reception for Patron ticket-holders

All proceeds benefit Pacific Swing Dance Foundation to support ongoing projects that keep our shared dance heritage alive — including scholarships for dancers in need, archival preservation of historic film footage, and community outreach programs that bring swing to new generations.
Dress to impress and let’s dance the night away for a cause that connects past, present, and future!

Date: December 6, 2025
Location: Arcadia Woman’s Club: 324 S. First Ave, Arcadia, CA 91006
Event Schedule:
7:00 PM - Patron Reception: Patron ticketholders are invited to attend a special VIP
reception. See pass pricing listed below!
7:45-8:15 PM - FREE swing dance lesson!
8:15-11:00 PM - Live music with JONATHAN STOUT AND HIS RUGCUTTERS, plus
special performances!

Patron Passes available starting November 6!
Legacy Patron: $500
Top tier sponsorship! A Legacy Patron pass includes access to the patron reception, PSDF swag bag, your name listed as the sponsor of a vintage dance tape in the Legacy Library, and early access to silent auction items!
Champion Patron: $150
A Champion Patron Pass includes access to the VIP reception, a PSDF tote bag, and
early access to silent auction items!
Community Patron: $75
A Community Patron Pass includes access to the VIP reception, a PSDF pin, and
early access to silent auction items!

General Admission tickets available starting November 16: $50

Come for the music, stay for the magic — and help keep the spirit of swing alive this winter!

10/20/2025

Great news! The digitizing process is well under way for the Legacy Library.

Thankfully we’ve raised enough money to digitize the collection.
Help us get to $15k by Friday!

In order to get footage like this into the library, we have a lot more fundraising to do.

Any contribution you can make helps. $5, $10, $15. Every little bit makes a difference.

Donations:
https://pacificswingdancefoundation.org/campaigns/legacy-library/donate/

Give today. Inspire tomorrow.

09/01/2025

Help us get to $6k by the end of Camp Hollywood!
Legacy Library needs at least $6k to get started on the process of digitizing all the footage.
This isnt then end of what we need to raise, but it is the first step to making this project a reality.
Donate here:

https://pacificswingdancefoundation.org/campaigns/legacy-library/

08/31/2025

We are having a reception today for the Legacy Library at 7pm at Pacific room 4/5 here atCamp Hollywood. If you’re curious to know more, stop by and we can talk all about it!

08/28/2025

Become a LEGACY CLIP GEEK!
Sponsor a tape for the Legacy Library!

Supporters at or above the $500 level will have the option to choose a specific tape to sponsor from among Nick Williams’ collection and to join Legacy Clip Geeks — a group for nerds who like to geek out about clips.
* Sponsors at or above $500 will have the option to choose a tape to sponsor. Sponsoring a tape helps pay for that tape to be digitized, catalogued, and curated.
* Sponsors will be given their choice of tape on a first-come, first-served basis.
* Tape sponsors will receive sponsorship credit for the clips contained on “their” tape and in the Pacific Swing Dance Archive.

Donate today!
https://pacificswingdancefoundation.org/campaigns/legacy-library/

08/27/2025

LEGACY LIBRARY Campaign Launch!

We are officially launching the Legacy Library Donation Campaign! We need your help to make this a reality.

Give today. Inspire tomorrow.
Donate here:
https://pacificswingdancefoundation.org/campaigns/legacy-library/donate/

Legacy Library is a new initiative of the PSDF Archive specifically focused on preserving and curating audio and video from the 1920’s through the 1950’s and beyond, and includes dances such as Lindy Hop, Balboa, Charleston, Swing, Collegiate S**g, and Vernacular Jazz. The video collection draws from films, soundies, home videos, dance events, and rare private lesson footage. In collaboration with Nick Williams, our first effort focuses on digitizing and preserving Nick's extensive personal collection of video clips collected over decades.

The Legacy Library is dedicated to preserving the history of our beloved swing dances and honoring the legends of those individuals who shaped them. It is also intended to serve as an educational resource for the historical and ongoing cultural impact of both the swing dances and the dancers who brought them to life.

Best of all, the PSDF Legacy Library will be accessible to all!

We have ambitious goals and need the financial support of the community to realize them. Donated funds will be used to secure the expertise of archivists, historians, editors, and film transfer specialists to create and curate the Library. Wherever possible PSDF intends to contract with professionals from within the greater swing dance community in order to continue investing in our collective future.

We also need your help to boost the signal. Please share this everywhere you can!

More details:
https://pacificswingdancefoundation.org/campaigns/legacy-library/

Thank you for supporting the Legacy Library!

Follow our other socials!
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61579579892196&mibextid=wwXIfr
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/legacylibrary.archive?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ%3D%3D&utm_source=qr

Artwork: Augie Freeman

06/22/2025

Spent this past week in NOLA with an amazing group of people who poured everything into learning, training, and building community. Look out for Next Generation Project dancers at an event near you! And we’ll be back in NOLA for Swing Legacy Week 2026 with an expanded program including three days of -public- events. .whitmore

01/14/2025

Thank you to everyone who has been supporting the rhythm relief fire relief effort. We’re almost to $30k, net!

https://pacificswingdancefoundation.org/rhythm-relief-the-la-fires/

We’ve had a lot of people asking how they can help and not everyone can make a financial contribution. We do have some specific staffing needs (temporary and long term, volunteer and paid, in-house or not) to help us over this hump.

Send BRIEF responses to: [email protected]

F

eel free to include resume and portfolio links as well as any requirements or limits.

Almost all of these depend on using digital tools, so facility and comfort in that realm is needed.

- help organizing and administering programs (NGP, scholarships, rhythm relief, PSDF Archive, travel coordination, small event coordination) [email, Google Workspace, social media]

- “executive” assistant [email, Google Workspace, social media]

- staff and volunteer coordination [email, Google Workspace, social media]

- content production: written, video, audio, images.

- PR, marketing, social media

- fundraising

For those with technology skills, our technology stack is:

- Web: LAMP, Wordpress, doses of react and the like and Python.

- Cloud Sorage and Dev: Chiefly the Google ecosystem.

- Office: Google Workspace, quickBooks online 

- Design: Chiefly Adobe Creative Cloud