Jazz Dance

Jazz Dance

1. definition: any dance to jazz accompaniments, composed of a profusion of forms

   • The term is sometimes used more narrowly to describe (1) popular stage dance (except tap dance) and (2) jazz-derived or jazz-influenced forms of modern dance.

2. many forms/influences

   • tap dance
   • cakewalk
   • vaudeville
   • blackbottom
   • charleston
   • jitterbug
   • boogie woogie
   • swing
   • african american vernacular
   • lindy hop
   • african traditional / folk
     • caribbean traditional
   • ballet

3. Jazz dance paralleled the birth and spread of jazz itself from roots in black American society and was popularized in ballrooms by the big bands of the swing era (1930s and ’40s)

   • Jazz dance developed from both 19th- and 20th-century stage dance and traditional black social dances and their white ballroom offshoots
     • Jazz dance has its roots in the folk dances of Africa. Unlike the early Europeans, the African people believed in using the whole body including the hips and ribcage as a means of dance expression

4. Notable Directors, Dancers, and Choreographers

   • Katherine Dunham
   • Jack Cole
   • Bob Fosse
   • Eugene Louis Facciuto
   • Jerome Robbins

5. Philosophy

   • heavily promoted the sense of individuality, spontaneous dancing, free flow dancing and showcase of the skills of dancers.
   • improvisational

6. origins can be trace to arrival of enslaved African people

   • Dances and music they brought were much more free-flowing, experimental and improvisational
   • heavily rhythmic-based
   • “conversation-like” qualities