Preserving and Advancing the Art of Tap Dance.
We’ve just updated The List with a host of new names, and have begun to add names to the Acts that are already listed. There is an interesting challenge here as some acts had multiple inceptions with different members but under the same name. More history to uncover!
Special thanks to all of you who have submitted names. They have been great additions!
We believe that every member of our community should have access to all the information, collected materials, and stories that informs the understanding of our tradition.
In any community it is imperative that every member have access to the material that informs the history of that community. If access is limited, classes emerge. We see this across history as religious, intellectual, and political classes emerge and consolidate power from the rest of the population through the control of information and narrative. In the world of active oral traditions it is normal for a select few members of a community to be tasked with upholding the standard of a particular tradition. They are usually the most experienced and trustworthy, but can also be part of a particular family line or tradition of apprenticeship and specifically trained for the role. Still, the power of these select few should be balanced by the active involvement of the entire community in the tradition, be it a celebration, religious ritual, or other expression of dance, music, or storytelling.
Today the tap dance community is separated by its geography. The lineages of tradition are many and do not always align with regards to approach to the craft. Furthermore, multiple collections of materials – archives of photographs, show programs and posters, audio and moving image recordings, and physical objects – are scattered around the globe, held both privately and by private and public institutions.
Digital platforms like YouTube have done wonders to surface video clips of tap dancers from long ago and spread around the world at the speed of the internet. But access isn’t just about the stuff. Access is about the quality and value of the information. It’s about context. So that what is spread ultimately supports the tradition which in turn supports the community. Learning a single tap dance step from a video is great. Learning the stories that surround that step, who your actually stealing it from, and who was behind the documentation of the clip itself are as important if not more when it comes to the oral tradition. Unfortunately the latter is much more difficult with the platforms we currently have, but we can fix this.
Access is the key. As we develop the Archive of American Vernacular Dance, access is at the heart of our endeavor. We aim to build a platform that is accessible to the entire tap dance community, not just a particular subset. We aim to build a platform that provides access to the material that informs the stories upon which the tradition of tap dancing and American vernacular dances stand. We aim to provide the tools necessary for anyone in our community to learn, understand, and contribute to the body of work that is our collective history.
Access to the stories that make up the history of a community is a matter of social justice. People inside the community should be the primary storytellers, not outside observers. We now have the technology to rectify this situation, which unfortunately has happened often in the world of American Vernacular Dance.
If this resonates with you, we want to here from you here.
If you’re moved to support this endeavor, you can do so here.
The tap dance community today consists of members from many different nations, ethnicities, professions, ages, etc. One of the most challenging things our community has faced over the past years, which actually parallels a global trend, is the setting and agreement of community values, standards, and even common terminology. As an organization that was founded by tap dancers in support of the oral tradition we thought it important to put down a few core values for ourselves and share them. When everything else is pushed aside, these are what remain for us.
We believe that…
When dealing with values, there is always the issue of perfection. Have we achieved these values? Of course not. If we had, our organization wouldn’t need to exist. These values are what we are working towards. They are what guide us as we continue to explore ways of supporting the oral tradition in a cultural landscape that is continually changing.
Over the next few weeks we’ll do a deeper dive into each one of these core values, so you can see why we believe them to be so important to our community. In the meantime, now you can see a little more about what guides us.
In 1989 the federal government of the United States signed a bill recognizing May 25, 1989 as National Tap Dance Day. The date was chosen on account of it being Bill “Bojangles” Robinson’s birthday. Since then celebrations for National Tap Dance Day have spread across the country and internationally. While many tap dancers know about the day and why we celebrate very few know how the date came to be.
A few years ago we put together this resource to share the story of the establishment of what is now simply Tap Dance Day. We hope you enjoy this unique resource!
One of the ways oral traditions are explored is through the people involved. Finding old stories, making connections, watching video recordings, all comes back to the people and their names.
Who’s in the story, who used to dance with who, and who are we watching right now. Knowing the names of the people can help us on our individual explorations of the tradition. For instance, looking through the index of biographies of jazz greats for the names of tap dancers may yield unique stories not found elsewhere. But, we need the names that we should be looking for first.
To that end we are excited to announce a new resource. A community sourced list of tap dancers, individuals and acts, listed in alphabetical order. We envision this list of contributors both large and small, to be a living document that will continue to grow as contributors are remembered, discovered, and newly recognized.
Visit the List here and submit a name using the form at the bottom of the page.
Since our earliest beginnings Tap Legacy™ has been committed to serving the tap dance community. As we have undertaken a major refocusing in the past two years, we’ve come to realize that we’ve been operating in a somewhat opaque manner. We’re changing that today.
Today we’re releasing our 2017 Annual Report, which you can view here, and posting a link on our website that you can share with others.
As we move forward we are committed to having a community based on trust, and a major part of that is sharing what we are doing more transparently.
We’re thankful for your continued support as we navigate the ever changing landscape of the tap dance world, and discover the best ways to support the oral tradition.