Side Note on Dunning’s Article (see below): Passing Down Dance

On another note regarding Dunning’s piece “Twisting and Chatting the Alvin Ailey Way,” Dunning is completely right when she writes that dances are handed down from older to younger performers.  I was really drawn to this idea when I first heard it– I like its traditional element, the concept of the hours logged in passing along an exact choreography, and the sort of old-world apprentice-sense of it.  One of my subjects Karin Baker, an older-generation tapper and a strong-minded traditionalist, has so far handed down some of her earliest tap routines– Ernest Carlos routines– to a young protege named Kathy Callahan.  

In fact, Karin’s last performance (which she refers to as her “Swan Song”) is a dance interpretation of this hand-me-down tradition.  In this performance, Karin dances with Kathy.  Karin performs a set of steps and Kathy imitates her.  The sets get more and more complicated, and overlap each other more and more, until Kathy and Karin are doing the routine together, their taps completely in unison.  The choroegraphy is great, and so is the sound of it. 

Karin was kind enough to loan me a DVD of this performance, and I’m working on ways to get it up on this blog.  So, hopefully, accompanying video to come.