the.com/tapdance
Percussion you wear on your feet, turning sidewalks into snare drums and stairwells into solos.
means To perform a style of dance in which metal-soled shoes strike the floor to create rhythmic, percussive sounds, often used figuratively to mean nimbly evading or improvising one's way through a tricky situation.
from A compound of "tap" — an imitative word echoing the light striking sound, related to the old "tap, tap" of knocking — and "dance," which entered English from Old French "danser," itself of uncertain (possibly Frankish) origin. The dance form as we know it took shape in 19th-century America, where Irish jig and English clog steps collided with African rhythmic traditions, and the metal taps that gave the style its signature clatter came later, fixed to the soles to make the foot itself an instrument.
- african roots
- Born from Irish jigs meeting West African step dance
- hidden rhythm
- Each shoe taps independently, like two drummers per dancer
- national holiday
- May 25 is officially National Tap Dance Day
- metal mouth
- Taps were once nails or coins screwed onto soles
- silent sound
- Dancers count out loud since their feet make the beat
bill robinson — african american dancer who invented the rhythmic tap style in the 1920s-30s, performed on broadway and in films
gregory hines — revived tap dancing as an art form with his 1978 broadway show 'sophisticated ladies' and subsequent performances