History Of Jazz Dance - Weebly

History of Jazz Dance By Susan Gehringer , Rev 3/24/2017 Jazz dance is an umbrella term that can refer to several related dance styles. All of them are connected via common roots namely; immigrant traditional dance, jazz music, tap, ballet and African-American rhythms and dance. As we look at the dance landscape today it is exciting to recognize that jazz dance in its many manifestations is a truly American dance form that is deeply ingrained and ever-present in our culture. Short History: Quick snapshot Jazz dance is generally accepted to have originated from a combination of the African-American vernacular dance and immigrant folk dance of the late 1800s. Some people are loyal to the authentic jazz of the “Jazz Era” started in New Orleans in the 1900-1930s (pictured left) when dance and music were inseparable entities that stood firmly in West African roots. Meaning jazz dance could not be done without jazz music. Other people identify jazz dance as a theatrical style heavily reliant on ballet-based movement and suited for Broadway and concert dance stages. This style came through the tap and vaudeville influences of the 1800s. The term "Jazz" was first applied to a style of music and dance during World War I, specifically out of the jazz south. Long History: Evolution of American Vernacular Dance Tracing the beginnings of many of our dance forms we use the term “vernacular dance” (meaning of, relating to, or characteristic of a period, place, or group). An abbreviated understanding of the term would be to call it social dance or cultural dance. It relates back when music and dance were functional aspects of everyday life; celebrating joy, sorrow or specific passages of time. So using that term we are tracing the beginnings of dance that made an impact on American culture.

All dance forms are interrelated. Jazz in its dance form, originates from both the immigrant cultures, specifically Irish, British and the African cultures during the early 17th century. One academic observation was that slaves were exposed to the national dances of British culture like the jig, reel, hornpipe and others, during their voyage from Africa to the West Indies. The Captains would force the slaves to dance on the ships to keep them healthy, being that dance was active and it was known to the sailors. These European dances would blend with the native religious dances of their African cultures. Most of the ships would stop in the West Indies to give the slaves a chance to regain their health before heading to American slave auctions. There they would be exposed to European social dances and native West Indies dances which created a bigger melting pot of the origins of American vernacular dance. Opportunities to share these new found dances, loosely called performances, started early as small slave or immigrant gatherings that allowed people to share. These were still mainly improvisation dances, with a heavy storytelling quality. Slowly opportunities to perform for others started in the form of traveling “Medicine shows” or “Gilly Shows” (pictured above) which started in the 1700s and expanded into tent shows, or “Jig Tops” of the early 1800s. Medicine shows combined various forms of popular entertainment with sales pitches from a fake doctor selling an astounding cure-all medicine or device. A popular performer in Vaudeville; Dewey “Pigmeat” Markham (1904-1981) explained show business and the increasing importance of various performance venues in this way; “Kindergarten would be a Medicine show, elementary would be a Gilly Show. You’d work through high school in Carnivals, Circuses then Minstrel Shows. College was Vaudeville and then you graduated to Broadway”. (Pictured left, seated in the center) Not very many dancers made it all the way to Broadway. Most never made it out of the tent shows. This was a descriptive way to understand all the different early performance options for dance. Irish jigs and clogs started appearing on stage by 1840. All sorts of social dance started to creep into the performances at that time but were still heavily influenced by the AfricanAmerican culture. It was not until after the Civil War that audiences started to see more blending of styles and a more integrated cast and audiences. And segregation still remained to some extent until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.

Burlesque, Vaudeville and Broadway Soon the country was scattered with talented dancers using all kinds of movement. The venues were starting to gather into circuits for control of the better performers and the more successful locations. This also encouraged the growth of agents to help control the talent. The largest: T.O.B.A.; Theater Owners Booking Association or “Toby” for short started in 1920. TOBY booked for hundreds of theaters in the U.S. The performers had to get in with the booking agents to work. The shows provided the music. It came in many forms for the early performers. It was not until around 1910 you started to have recognizable songs as danceable songs. This allowed, in some part for dance to make its way to Broadway. The European social dances, ball room and smooth dancing, were still dominating Broadway. The strictly vernacular dance styles of the African-American performers was considered too rough for the Broadway audiences. But acrobatic dance and Russian dancing were being slowly added to the choices. Soon ballroom style partners started to make their way from the vaudeville to Broadway. Specifically around 1910 came Vernon & Irene Castle (pictured left); a famous dance duo that dominated Broadway early in the twentieth century. They started to set a dance standard that utilized songs of the day and styles beyond the European social dancing. The so called “animal dances”; Turkey Trot, Buzzard Lope, Grizzly Bear (pictured right), Bunny Hug, Fishtail, Foxtrot, among others used many patterns of the African movement. The Castles’ took some of the exciting dances of African roots and smoothed them out making them more dignified for Broadway audiences. Jazz dance transformed from this African based vernacular form into a theatre-based performance form of dance that required a highly trained dancer. This blending with multiple sources and influences allowed the development of jazz dance throughout the first half of the twentieth century. Broadway Revolution Broadway really pushed the need to use dance directors, or choreographers as they are now known. Up until that time most performers worked up their own dances. Some found the use of dance directors’ extremely limiting or irritatingly unknowledgeable. But the push for big shows and larger choruses needed these people to help get the shows ready.

Early twentieth century saw variety shows and spectacles hit Broadway. Ziegfeld Follies (pictured right) and the like utilized dancers in increasing numbers. Early on they were little more than slightly moving lines, very unimpressive. These dance directors would pull from acts they had seen or their own dance styles to try to make the shows work. As they incorporated different dance acts into the whole, you started to see style categories: eccentric, buck & wing, flash & grin, legomania, just to name a few. Large precision dance presentations were becoming common forms of dance too. These groups were much like The Radio City Music Hall Rockettes of today. The Dyerettes, (pictured left) the Roxyettes, the Cotton Club Chorus Line and the Whitman Sisters were only a few of these large precision dance groups that cropped up during the 1920s. (The Whitman Sisters were at one time the highest paid act in the Vaudeville circuit). The 1920s – 1930s Broadway had a marked increase in the African-American musicals. Most notably Shuffle Along (1921). It was generally accepted that the African-influenced dancing was more exciting, spectacular and the dancers more energetic than the safe, traditional chorus dancers of the era. This was a star packed musical (Eubie Black, Josephine Baker among others) that was a smash hit! The show's energetic dancing and catchy jazz score drew enthusiastic and famous audience members. The show was credited with helping to unite the white Broadway and black jazz communities. It was a landmark musical for two reasons. It was not only the first all-black musical to open on Broadway but would become the gold standard of excellence by which all other musicals were compared. Recently the show would see another generation. The revival, of sorts, was called: Shuffle Along, or, the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed. It used much of the original score and script. Based on the original book of the 1921 musical Shuffle Along, the story focuses on the challenges of mounting the original production of Shuffle Along and its effect on Broadway and race relations. The 1920s-30s saw fast changes. Nine black musicals followed Shuffle Along but none compared to the original. Even Bill “Bojangles” Robinson’s hit Blackbirds of 1928 couldn’t sustain. The decade

also gave audiences a choice. Radio and “talkies” were making their way into Middle America. By the early 1930s vernacular dance, jazz and tap were fading from Broadway shows. Tap, jazz and vernacular dance could no longer carry a musical. The advent of the “dream ballet” in shows, started by the 1936 On Your Toes choreographed by George Balanchine and Oklahoma! choreographed by Agnes de Mille (pictured left) in 1943 pretty well closed the chapter for a while on the strictly American dance form of tap and jazz. This era of dream ballets is credited, or blamed depending on your viewpoint, for the demise of tap and vernacular jazz dance on Broadway for the next 40 years. Development of Jazz Technique During the mid-twentieth century, several prominent figures in dance made their mark and technical stamp of style on movement that still remains today. Syncopated rhythm is a common characteristic in jazz music that was adapted to jazz dance in the early twentieth century and has remained a significant characteristic. One important dance trail blazer was Katherine Dunham (pictured right). Katherine was a pioneer in taking the traditional style and essence of Caribbean folk dance, including the isolated torso, and bring it into a dance performance art. Dunham was the trail blazer to research and document the beginnings of the Afro-Caribbean movement. When she applied for a fellowship to try to find the roots of this style of dancing she was thwarted by the men who didn’t understand there was a difference between ballet and this other type of dance. She demonstrated a bit of ballet movement and then a tribal war dance to show the difference. She commented; “I want to go where they dance like that. I want to find out why, how it started and what influence it had on the people. I want to learn something that will help me teach people”. She would go on to bring this style of dance back to America and develop what would be called the Dunham Technique. The Dunham Technique blends polyrhythmic Afro-Caribbean movement, modern and ballet with a focus on strengthening the core and creating a versatile torso. Isolations of the head, shoulders, torso and hips occur frequently as do back undulations and contractions. It would become integrated with other new jazz forms for the newly emerging genre.