Go-go dancing

Not to be confused with Go-go, an unrelated subgenre of funk music.

Modern go-go dancer Cherry Lei at The Fix, in Honolulu, Hawaii in 2014
Go-go boot

Go-go dancers are dancers who are employed to entertain crowds at nightclubs[1] or other venues where music is played. Go-go dancing originated in the early 1960s at the French bar Whisky a Gogo, located in the town of Juan-les-Pins. The bar's name was taken from the French title of the Scottish comedy film Whisky Galore! [2] The French bar then licensed its name to the West Hollywood rock club Whisky a Go Go, which opened in January 1964 and chose the name to reflect the already popular craze of go-go dancing.[3] Many 1960s-era nightclub dancers wore short, fringed skirts and high boots[4] which eventually came to be called go-go boots. Nightclub promoters in the mid‑1960s then conceived the idea of hiring women dressed in these outfits to entertain patrons.

  1. ^ Mish, Frederic C., Editor in Chief Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary Springfield, Massachusetts, 1984--Merriam-Webster Page 525
  2. ^ Levy, Shawn (2020). The castle on Sunset : life, death, love, art, and scandal at Hollywood's Chateau Marmont (First Anchor books ed.). New York. ISBN 978-0-525-43566-2. OCLC 1111699686.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  3. ^ Russell Hall (12 November 2010). "Showtime! The 10 Greatest Rock Venues of All Time". Gibson.com. Archived from the original on 14 April 2012. Retrieved 13 June 2015.
  4. ^ Baugess, James S.; DeBolt, Abbe Allen, eds. (2011). Encyclopedia of the Sixties: A Decade of Culture and Counterculture. ABC-CLIO. p. 253. ISBN 9780313329449.