Last week live band the Firebirds drew crowds from Edinburgh, Oxford, Lancashire and Wakefield to Easington Social Welfare Centre.

>> View larger photos in our gallery

Organiser Billy Elwell, 63, started hiring bands for the dance hall in 1958 – aged 13 – and said business was still booming.

"You couldn't move in here last month," he said. "We had to turn people away.

"It's really something when you have 200 people dancing in here. The whole place moves."

Billy said the sprung dance floor, bought for £3,000 in 1935, is the best of its kind in the North East making the refurbished hall the perfect hop venue.

When the DJ started up the floor quickly filled with men in drapes, drainpipes and beetle crushers and women in petticoats, ankle socks and Alice bands.

As soon as they started dancing the teddy boys become the kings of cool and the floor was filled with flying skirts.

Billy said: "Most of the people here tonight were coming in the 1960s. It's a passion and a way of life. It's the type of music you never go off."

Billy Oswald, 61, a retired postman of Henderson Avenue, Wheatley Hill, and his wife Marlene, 61, have been rock 'n' rolling since they were 14. Said Billy: "It takes me back to my young days, to the old times. The music was better than it is nowadays.

"Dancing now is just standing, jumping up and down and shaking about. This is real dancing and if you have a long-term partner you can read each other's minds and you know exactly what to do next."

The hall is not just full of older people – there are plenty of young people around and their dance moves are equally impressive. Richy Duggan, 20, of Ryhope, and his partner Natalie Marsh, 18, of Tunstall, went to their first hop to keep Natalie's mum company.

Since then they have started dance classes at Spennymoor and regularly go dancing in Easington and Houghton. Natalie said: "I like the atmosphere and I like watching everybody. People love it when they see people in drapes walking down the street, but when you come to a place like this they look even more fashionable."

Standing out from the crowd of rock and rollers were Lindyhoppers Tony and Paula Scott.

Rather than drapes and full skirts, the couple from Southwick, Sunderland, were dressed in 1940s garb.

Paula wore a button-up dress and her hair in a hair net and Tony had his hair slicked down and wore braces and brogues.

Their style of dance, the Lindy Hop, was totally different to the spinning and stamping of the jive and the couple were a mesmerising sight.

Scott said the dance was named after aviator Charles Lindbergh, who "hopped" the Atlantic in a solo non-stop flight from New York to Paris in 1926.

It was coined by a contestant in a dance marathon in Hatrlem, New York and is a fusion of many dances mainly based on jazz, tap, breakaway and the Charleston.

On the same night, not so many miles away, another group of rockabillies, teddy boys and dancing girls are swinging to their favourite songs.

Houghton Welfare Hall is decorated with Union Jacks, American flags and pictures of Elvis Presley.

Houghton Rock and Roll Club's chairman Bob Thompson is behind the decks, dressed in purple drapes, fuelling the crowed with the 1950s' finest tunes.

He said: "We've been into this since we were teenagers and even though we have been through other phases we've always come back to rock and roll.

"When I was a kid – 13 or 14 – I used to see the older lads all wearing drapes, beetlecrushers, white ankle socks or pink ankle socks and I wanted to dress like that.

"We all love it just as much today. We just want to get dressed up and have a really good time."

The club was formed in 1973 and ran successfully for 10 years before and eight year gap between 1983 and 1991.

It started up again after one of the lads had a rock and roll themed silver wedding anniversary and everyone remembered how much they enjoyed the dancing.

Bob and fellow chairman Alan Crompton run Houghton Rock and Roll Club together and hold the fortnightly record hops in the same dance hall they jived in as youngsters.

Many of the members went to school together at either Houghton Modern or St Michael's Catholic School, off Durham Road.

They have knocked about with each other since they were children and known each other for more than 40 years.

Bob's wife Ann, 62, of Meadow Close, Houghton, said: "We are like one big family, really.

"We can't dance as much as we used to because we are all a bit older but the music keeps us young at heart."

The club has lost a few friends along the way, which is why its members do so much work for charity and have raised more than £20,000 since their first fund-raiser 13-years-ago.

Glen Darran and the Krew Kats will play at the hop on December 20.

* New faces are always welcome and tickets are £5. For more information call Bob on 584 3718.