Palais (Palais Royal) on North Terrace, city, among many Adelaide dance halls at the peak in the 1920s and 1930s
Dancers at the opening night of the Palais (later Palais Royal) on North Terrace, Adelaide city, in 1920. The ceiling is decorated with lines of little lights that converge behind the dance band in the far left.
Image courtesy State Library of South Australia
The Palais de Danse (later the Palais Royal), next to Ayers House on North Terrace, city, was the most popular of dance halls hit their peak of popularity in Adelaide in the 1920s and 1930s.
With the flow-on effect of demanding many musicians and dancing classes, the city dance venues, some operating several nights a week, included the short-lived Floating Palais (1924-28), the Australia Hall, later Royalty Theatre, opened in 1929; The Astoria Ballroom (corner of Waymouth and Young streets) opened 1941; and Kings Ballrooms (briefly Legacy House) at 318 King William Street. The many suburban venues included Woodville and Goodwood Institutes (still giving quadrille classes in the 1920s), Maison de Danse in Colley Terrace, Glenelg, and the Semaphore Palais and Burnside Town Hall, with the Wonderland on Belair Road, Unley, the last to operate regularly.
The Palais de Danse (later Palais Royal) opened in April 1920. By September that year, the weekly program was dancing on Monday, Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday nights, with attendances up to 2,000. On Wednesday, there was twilight jazz (subdued lighting all evening and moonlight effects), Thursday had a fancy dress carnival. Saturday afternoons from 3 to 5.15 had The Dansant. For 5/-, or £1 on Thursdays, dancers could hire a box with room for 12-14 people.
Music styles Adelaide played in September 1920 included Bubbles Waltz, Oriental Memories Waltz, You'd Be Surprised Foxtrot, Dardanella FoxTrot, Vamp Foxtrot, Shirley Jazz Foxtrot, Oh! Helen One Step, the Sandunes OneStep, Kissing Time Waltz, My Baby's Arms, I've got my Captain working for me now, Big Brass Band, Tripoli, Hawaiian Moonlight, Kismet Fox Trot, Dreamland Brings Memories of You, The Barber's Beano, Californian Nights. The sheet music could be bought from Miss Gertie Campbell's, Bowman's Arcade, Adelaide.
In tails and white gloves, Harry Boake-Smith was leader of the Palais Orchestra from 1929 (when Hubert George and Clarrie Carmichael became Palais proprietors) for about 30 years. Before World War II, the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission) broadcast music from the Palais on Saturday nights. No alcohol was available so the Palais Royal in 1920 offered tea and coffee, aerated waters, individual cakes or a plate of assorted fancy cakes, sandwiches, or fruit salad.
The palais lease was taken over by Aubrey Hall, a ballroom dancing champion, dance teacher and promoter of The Sea Breeze Ballroom (Glenelg Town Hall), the Kings Ballroom and the Windsor Ballroom. Hall and Nell Teesdale gave demonstrations of the rhumba and tango in the 1930s to keep Adelaide up with new dance trends. Hall had started teaching dance at 21 with classes at the St Peters Masonic Hall but quickly becoming one of Adelaide's foremost dance promoters for nearly 50 years. At the 1966 Adekaide Festival of Arts, he and his wife presented a festival of ballroom dancing at Elder Park.
The waning in popularity of ballroom dancing styles in the 1950s saw the survival of the Palais rely on the switch to a new era with bands including Adelaide's “king of rock’n’roll” Barrie McAskill. But it didn’t save the ballroom that was converted into the Palais Parking Station in 1967 before being demolished in 1972.
