Swingers take heart! It’s coming back.

According to Bob Hickman, band leader and former director of the S.C. Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism, the hit TV show “Dancing With the Stars” has caught the ear of young Americans under 30. They’re tuning in to enjoy the “swing music” and, who knows, pretty soon they may be shagging to Glenn Miller’s “In the Mood.”

Nothing could please the “older crowd” more. They say, “We never listen to radio. The only dancing it offers is to hundreds of youths jammed into a hall, jigging in place, up and down, over and over.”

Not that “swing” was ever completely dead. The Moonlighters of Elloree have been beating it out since 1955, and come Oct. 4, will do it again for the Low Country Boil fund-raiser at the Elloree Museum on Main Street. Two of the players will be from the original four, Milt Felder (Korean vet) and D.W. McEachern (WW II vet).

In their mid-twenties, they came home from the service and started jobs: Milt in his father’s warehouse store and D.W. at his brother’s, “Bill’s Esso Station.” Neither had any musical training to speak of, although Milt had fooled around a lot with his granddaddy’s old cornet, and D.W. and sister, Frances, (he five, she eight) had played the guitar together. They needed both her two little, stretched-out hands to make a chord, and D.W.’s to strum the strings. Sticking to it, they played “Jimmy Crack Corn and I Don’t Care” and such for years.

The kids parked outside

Milt and D.W. got together at the station late Friday nights with young Donnie Boone, a drummer, to jive a couple of hours. In no time, kids and friends parked outside to listen. When Donnie told his Daddy, Dan, about their music, he invited them over to the Santee motel he managed to add his electric organ. Word of the “orchestra” got around and soon they had a first “gig,” the 1955 high school New Year dance. Before long they took a title, The Spotlighters.

“Wasn’t that a heck of a name to eventually get rid of?” says Mrs. Louise Lyons, one of their loyal 50-year fans.

Next came a first professional engagement for, believe it or not, the Elloree Minuet Dance Club. One of the most popular numbers, “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore,” proved dead wrong. More and more gigs began coming. The Orangeburg Elks Club booked them. The Elloree Jaycees, really digging the music, hired the now-renamed Moonlighters to play every Friday night at their clubhouse, an engagement that lasted seven years.

“I don’t remember exactly how much we got paid. I believe we split the 200 or so dollars with the Jaycees,” D.W. says. “Meanwhile, we signed for more dates in Orangeburg, Columbia and Charleston.”

“When Dan Boone moved away in the 1960s, Mary Harrison, wife of our lead guitar, Arris Harrison, took over the keyboard and stayed with the boys for 20 years,” says Milt. “Val Dyches from Easley came all the way down here to play the drums.”

Rehearsals: they never happened

“Our rehearsals never happened. We didn’t. And never had special charts or arrangements or a conductor. Dan called the tunes for our repertoire of 100 or more songs which really ‘turned on’ that era.”

In the early 1970s, some of the players became more involved in their work or family matters and had to resign. Travel weariness helped persuade them to disband, and for three years none played anywhere. Then Bob Hickman moved to Santee in 1973.

“I had studied music all through my schooling, particularly the saxophone and clarinet,” he says.

“Performing with bands was a longtime avocation and I started recruiting a group to play at local hops. Several of us, including D.W., Milt and Val, and I suggested, ‘Why don’t we reorganize the old Moonlighters and make some money? You all know everybody around Santee. We’ll talk it up and see if some of the motels or organizations wouldn’t like to book us for an evening.’ Within a few days we heard that a well-known local family was staging a wedding. Getting with them, we had made an agreement in no time.

“Then, somebody told me of Bill Cantey, a retired mail carrier across the lake in Summerton who had thumped the ivories for years. I called and asked if he was interested. He said, ‘Yes, definitely,’ and what a player he turned out to be! We took some dates and the Moonlighters gave new birth to local swing.

“Through the rest of the 70s and 80s as we played on, a bunch of talented guys joined us including Dan Boone who returned for a few years. Also two Orangeburgers, Elroy Myers, a piano genius so far as I’m concerned, who performed with us until his death, and Lawrence Cuttino, another stellar trumpet player. Then, one engagement night, the highway patrol came to tell us he had died in a car wreck. Our shock and grief lasted a long time.”

This Moonlighter’s serenade teased and pleased swing fans at the Orangeburg Country Club, Columbia’s Maxy Gregg Park, in fact across the state, reaching a climax at the famous Grove Park Inn in Asheville in the late 90s.

“We decided not to go along with the popularity of rock-and-roll because so many dancers still liked the likes of ‘Satin Doll’ and ‘Hey, Good Lookin,’” Bob says.

“We kept performing until 2002, then decided to play only for special events. Such an event will come again at the Elloree Museum on Oct. 4 and we are excited,” Bob says. “Come swing with us.”

Retired editor and public relations executive Thomas Langford’s column is titled “Some Edisto stories.” Let him know if you have stories to share: 803-534-2097.

You must be logged in to comment.