Letkajenkka, also known as Letkajenkaa in English and many other languages, is a
Finnish
Finnish may refer to:
* Something or someone from, or related to Finland
* Culture of Finland
* Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland
* Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people
* Finnish cuisine
See also ...
dance
Dance is a performing art form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoir ...
.
History of the music genre letkajenkka/letkis
Letkajenkka / letkis is a music genre and a general noun as well as two songs by the same name ("Letkajenkka" and "Letkis") as proper nouns, after which the genre got its name; jenkka, on the other hand, is a general noun, a music and dance genre like waltz.
The popular music genre and the ensuing dance craze were at their hottest during 1963–1965. Letkajenkka is based on the idea of performing
Jenkka
Jenkka () is a fast Finnish partner dance found in Finnish folk dance, the Finnish version of the schottische. It is danced to music in or time signature, with about 140 beats per minute.
Men and women do similar steps. The initial dance po ...
music using non-traditional
instruments
Instrument may refer to:
Science and technology
* Flight instruments, the devices used to measure the speed, altitude, and pertinent flight angles of various kinds of aircraft
* Laboratory equipment, the measuring tools used in a scientific lab ...
. Traditional instruments for playing the jenkka, a Finnish traditional
folk dance, are instruments such as the
violin
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...
and
accordion
Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...
. In the early 1960s some composers thought of writing jenkka tunes for more contemporary bands with more modern instruments, such as
wind instruments
A wind instrument is a musical instrument that contains some type of resonator (usually a tube) in which a column of air is set into vibration by the player blowing into (or over) a mouthpiece set at or near the end of the resonator. The pitc ...
(for a more swing-like jenkka) and amplified instruments like electric guitars, basses, and drums (a more
rock 'n' roll
Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock 'n' roll, or rock 'n roll) is a genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It originated from African-American music such as jazz, rhythm an ...
or
boogie woogie
Boogie-woogie is a genre of blues music that became popular during the late 1920s, developed in African-American communities since 1870s.Paul, Elliot, ''That Crazy American Music'' (1957), Chapter 10, p. 229. It was eventually extended from pia ...
-like sound). The form of the letkajenkka songs is consistent with traditional jenkka, but where the music is distinctively jenkka, the dance steps are not. Both dances are based on a lightly bouncing and skipping step. A rhythmic component that contributes towards the feel of a letkajenkka and distinguishes a letkajenkka from a regular jenkka tune is a distinctive pattern of either three crotchets / quarter notes followed by a quarter rest or two crotchets / quarter notes followed by a third dotted one in the end of its musical phrases that more or less coincide with the three consecutive hops of the dance steps. Regular jenkkas do not typically feature this rhythm pattern, at least not repeatedly.
Erik Lindström introduced the genre with his song ''Letkajenkka''. A Swedish band called the Adventurers recorded it, and it immediately topped the charts in Finland. Later
Jan Rohde, a Norwegian artist, recorded a version with lyrics with the bands the Adventurers and the Wild Ones.
Half a year later
Rauno Lehtinen
Rauno Väinämö Lehtinen (7 April 1932 in Tampere – 1 May 2006 in Helsinki) was a Finnish conductor and composer. He composed the 1960s hit '' Letkis'' which was based on a folk-dance. Letkis was recorded in over 92 countries.
Lehtinen was al ...
followed with his song ''Letkis''. This has become by far the most popular of all songs in the letkajenkka genre. It was first recorded by his studio orchestra Rautalanka Oy in August 1963, but was made popular in the October of the same year by a group called Ronnie Krank's Orchestra. His chart topper has been re-recorded approximately a hundred times, and the rights to at least 60 versions of the song are owned by Swedish publisher Stig Anderson. One well known recording of the song is by German musician
Roberto Delgado.
For versions in other languages, Lehtinen's Letkis was renamed Letkiss, Let's Kiss, Lasst uns Küssen etc., for easier pronunciation in different languages. The name Letkis has nothing to do with kissing; the idea of kissing was introduced by non-Finnish speakers, who thought that the title of the song
sounded like "kissing". In Finnish Letkis / letkis is merely short for Letkajenkka / letkajenkka, a
diminutive
A diminutive is a root word that has been modified to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment. A (abbreviated ) is a word-formati ...
formed by the beginning of the word and adding "is" in the end.
Also, contrary to what some magazines and single and long play covers had the world believe, there is no kissing or "smooching" during the Finnish version of the dance.
Lehtinen's Letkis made the charts in many European countries, in Latin America, and even in Japan. There are numerous translations including Russian, Swedish, and Japanese. In 1965, four instrumental versions of the tune reached number one in the Netherlands simultaneously. These were by Stig Rauno, Gudrun Jankis, The Wild Ones and the Dutch Swing College Band. All four versions had the English title ''Letkiss'' rather than the original Finnish title. It remained the only Dutch number one to have originated from Finland until 2000, when
"Freestyler" by the
Bomfunk MC's
The Bomfunk MC's is a Finnish hip hop group that was active between 1998 and 2005, before reuniting in 2018. The group's frontman is the rapper B.O. Dubb (born Raymond Ebanks, and formerly known as "B.O.W."), and the main producer is Jaakko Sa ...
reached number one.
Description
The steps of Letkajenkka are like the steps of
Bunny Hop, a
novelty dance
Novelty and fad dances are dances which are typically characterized by a short burst of popularity. Some of them, like the Twist, Y.M.C.A. and the Hokey Pokey, have shown much longer-lasting lives. They are also called dance fads or dance craze ...
from the 1950s. It has been proposed that exchange students returning from the United States to Finland would have imported the steps of the Bunny Hop to Finland, as they had seen them on the TV show Bandstand. Whereas the Bunny Hop starts with a right foot lead, the Letkajenkka / letkajenkka transformed into a dance based on the same step, but starting with a left leg lead. This can be seen from the early recordings for TV and in some movies made during the hottest craze. Also many translated lyrics include advice on the steps: "left kick, left kick, right kick, right kick, forward jump, backward jump, hop, hop, hop".
Steps
The people participating in the dance form a
Conga-like line (that can also be a
circle
A circle is a shape consisting of all points in a plane that are at a given distance from a given point, the centre. Equivalently, it is the curve traced out by a point that moves in a plane so that its distance from a given point is const ...
) so that everyone holds the person in front of themselves by the shoulders or the waist. The steps go as follows (everybody does the same thing):
# kick to the left with the left foot & step back into the middle,
# kick to the left with the left foot & step back into the middle,
# kick to the right with the right foot & step back into the middle,
# kick to the right with the right foot & step back into the middle,
# jump forwards with both feet together (for only a few inches),
# jump backwards with both feet,
# jump forwards three times with both feet,
:(repeat).
1–4 may be enhanced by bouncing with the leg opposite to the kicking side.
International letkajenkka songs
The music genre became popular, and many composers around the world started writing letkis music. Examples of non-Finnish letkis music include "La Yenka" (performed by Johnny & Charley Kurt, 1965), Gemelle Kessler's ''Lasciati Baciare Col Letkis'', "Leaf Fall" (russian: Листопад) by
David Tukhmanov
David Fyodorovich Tukhmanov PAR (russian: Дави́д Фёдорович Тухма́нов, was born on July 20, 1940, in Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union) is a Soviet and Russian composer. People's Artist of Russia (2000), State Prize of Ru ...
and ''Ploem Ploem Jenka'' by
:nl:Pieter Goemans. Lindström's Letkajenkka was translated and covered in Japanese as Retto Kisu (Jenka) / レット・キス(ジェンカ), performed by
Kyu Sakamoto
was a Japanese singer and actor.
He was best known outside Japan for his international hit song "Ue o Muite Arukō" (known as " Sukiyaki" in English-speaking markets), which was sung in Japanese and sold over 13 million copies. It reached numbe ...
.
Original Finnish songs
In Finland, the most well-known letkajenkka songs include
* Letkajenkka by Erik Lindström
* Letkis by Rauno Lehtinen
* ''Doin' the Jenka'' (trad.)
* ''At the Jenka Show''
:fi:Georg Malmstén
* ''Helsinki-letkis''
:fi:Toivo Kärki
* ''
:fi:Minne tuuli kuljettaa''
:fi:Toivo Kärki
* ''Puhelinlangat laulaa''
In popular culture
The movie ''Jamboree66'' (Sampaguita Pictures, Philippines, 1966, directed by Luciano B. Carlos) features a scene where the song "Letkis" is being played at a club.
There are at least two Letkajenkkas by
Mimis Plessas
Mimis Plessas ( el, Μίμης Πλέσσας; born 12 October 1924) is a Greek composer born in Athens. He began his career in 1952 and has written music for over 100 films, television and radio programs, and theatrical events. He has worked wit ...
that appear in the Greek movie ''Mia Trelli, Trelli Oikogeneia'' (Crazy, crazy family) that is directed by Dinos Dimopoulos (
:el:Ντίνος Δημόπουλος). There is a scene with people dancing around the pool. The steps are not strictly jenkka, but the music is in the style of letkis. In another scene, Katerina Gogou and Alekos Tzanetakos are dancing a letkajenkka variation as a couple to letkis music. The choreography is John Flery's.
In the Hungarian movie ''Patyolat akció'' (1965),
Mari Törőcsik
Mari Törőcsik (born Marián Törőcsik; 23 November 1935 – 16 April 2021) was a Hungarian stage and film actress. She appeared in more than 170 films from 1956 to 2020. She won the award for Best Actress at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival ...
and Gyula Bodrogi perform letkajenkka. The dance also appears in the Polish film ''
Małżeństwo z rozsądku'' from 1966 (en. ''Marriage of Convenience'').
In the final scene of the Italian film ''
Io la conoscevo bene
''I Knew Her Well'' ( it, Io la conoscevo bene) is a 1965 Italian comedy-drama film directed by Antonio Pietrangeli and starring Stefania Sandrelli.
In 2008 the film was selected to enter the list of the 100 Italian films to be saved.
Plot ...
'' (1965) directed by
Antonio Pietrangeli
Antonio Pietrangeli (19 January 191912 July 1968) was an Italian film director and screenwriter. He was a major practitioner of the Commedia all'italiana genre.
Biography
Pietrangeli was born in Rome. He started in the film industry by writing ...
, the protagonist Adriana (
Stefania Sandrelli
Stefania Sandrelli (born 5 June 1946) is an Italian actress, famous for her many roles in the ''commedia all'Italiana'', starting from the 1960s. She was 14 years old when she starred in '' Divorce Italian Style'' as Angela, the cousin and love i ...
) plays the record of the version of Letkiss by Robert Delgado (
Horst Wende Horst Wende (5 November 1919 – 23 January 1996) was a German bandleader, arranger and composer. He made easy-listening records under his own name as well as under the name Roberto Delgado. He was part of the wave of German-based easy-listening art ...
).
in 2015, on its 150th anniversary, the Finnish telecom company
Nokia
Nokia Corporation (natively Nokia Oyj, referred to as Nokia) is a Finnish multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications industry, telecommunications, technology company, information technology, and consumer electronics corporatio ...
broke the world record of the letkajenkka line. 1393 persons in blue Nokia shirts stood in line forming the digits "150" when, in a surprise from the management, the music started to play. The previous record of 1354 dancers was held in
Kokemäki
Kokemäki (; sv, Kumo) is a town and municipality in the Satakunta Region of Finland. The town has a population of () and covers an area of of which is water. The population density is .
Finland is constitutionally bi-lingual with a Swedis ...
in 1995.
"VIDEO: Nokialla juhlavat 150-vuotispäivät – henkilökunta teki letkajenkan maailmanennätyksen"
* ,
December 12, 2015
See also
*Jenkka
Jenkka () is a fast Finnish partner dance found in Finnish folk dance, the Finnish version of the schottische. It is danced to music in or time signature, with about 140 beats per minute.
Men and women do similar steps. The initial dance po ...
References
External links
History, discography extracts, and links to Letkajenkka video and sound files
{{Circle dance
Finnish dances
Group dances
Circle dances
Dance in Finland
fi:Jenkka#Letkajenkka