Beguine (dance) Beguine (dance) The beguine is a dance and music form, similar to a slow rhumba. It was popular in the 1930s, coming from the islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique, where in local Creole "Beke" or "Begue" means a White person, and "Beguine" is the female form. It is a combination of Latin folk dance and French ballroom dance, and is a spirited but slow, close dance with a roll of the hips (a movement inherited from rumba) After Cole Porter wrote the song "Begin the Beguine", the dance became more widely known beyond the Caribbean. The song was introduced in
Begin the Beguine After Shaw introduced the song to dance halls, MGM brought out the musical film "Broadway Melody of 1940", in which Fred Astaire and Eleanor Powell danced to "Begin the Beguine". In short order, all the major big bands recorded it, including Harry James, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller, often as an instrumental, as in the film. As a vocal song, it also became a pop standard, beginning with Porter and Tony Martin; new interpretations are often still measured against renditions by Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald, and Elvis Presley did an adaptation of his own. "Begin the Beguine"