‘The Hippest Trip In America’: Join World’s Longest Soul Train Line In Raleigh Aug. 24
Raleigh, NC – The City of Raleigh, in partnership with the African American Cultural Festival, is attempting to break the Guinness World Record for the longest Soul Train Line. The current world record is 426 people.
The event will take place on Saturday, August 24th from 9 am to 11:30 am at the John Chavis Community Center (505 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. Raleigh). You do NOT have to be a Raleigh or Wake County resident to participate. The Guinness World Records’ officials will be present to certify the results. This is a free event, but registration is required to be counted.
Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/join-the-worlds-longest-soul-train-line-dance-tickets-65448541349?aff=efbeventtix
Soul Train is a music-dance television program that aired in syndication from October 2, 1971, to March 27, 2006. In its 35-year history, the show primarily featured performances by R&B, soul, dance/pop, and hip hop artists, although funk, jazz, disco, and gospel artists also appeared. The series was created by Don Cornelius, who also served as its first host and executive producer. There was also the popular “Soul Train Line” (a variant of the 1950s fad then known as The Stroll), in which all the dancers form two lines with a space in the middle for dancers to strut down and dance in consecutive order. Originally, this consisted of a couple—with men on one side and women on the other. In later years, men and women had their own individual lineups. Sometimes, new dance styles or moves were featured or introduced by particular dancers.
The African American Cultural Festival of Raleigh and Wake County is an annual celebration of African American culture as expressed through art, music, food, and community. This year’s event festival takes place August 31st – September 1st. Over the past nine Labor Day weekends, the two-day festival has connected diverse people and families from across our region with local, national, and international artists, performers, food vendors, area business owners, and our local media outlets. The festival has become Raleigh’s premiere destination for teaching, sharing, and celebrating the distinctive folk and cultural traditions of African Americans here in North Carolina and from around the world. http://www.aacfestival.org/
Guinness World Records, known from its inception from 1955 until 2000 as The Guinness Book of Records and in previous United States editions as The Guinness Book of World Records, is a reference book published annually, listing world records both of human achievements and the extremes of the natural world. For the City of Raleigh and the African American Cultural Festival to achieve their goal, they must surpass the previous record of 426 people and the following rules must be adhered to:
The Rules for Largest Soul Train dance:
- The dance must be performed in the traditional manner, following the norms of a Soul Train dance.
- All the dancers must complete their turn to dance down the center of the two lines from the beginning to the end.
- A maximum of two people may dance down the line, side by side, at the same time.
- The dancers forming the two lines must also continuously dance or move to the music.
- Only people who take a turn to dance down the center of the two lines will count towards the record.
This event is sponsored by the City of Raleigh Parks Recreation and Cultural Resources Department, African American Cultural Festival, Z-Fitness, Hot 97.9FM, National Pan-Hellenic Council Greater Raleigh Area, and the Southeast Raleigh Assembly.