Jazz Tap Ensemble
AMERICAN TAP MASTERPIECES
The Hollywood Journey

Saturday, October 13, 2007 at 8pm

Irvine Barclay Theatre (949) 854-4646
Online: http://www.thebarclay.org/custom/events/event10.asp?eventID=932

"It will make you jump out of your shoes and beat your feet."
- Wall Street Journal-


This vivid, action portrait captures memorable dances from the big screen with Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Fred Astaire, Eleanor Powell, and the Nicholas Brothers interspersing live dance and film sequences. It also takes a fresh look at the theater works of contemporary tap masters Jimmy Slyde and Gregory Hines. This company of 6 dancers, performing to live music, reflects the vibrancy of American tap dance, the brilliance of choreography and improvisation, and the dancers' ability to draw on the past as they create the future.

JTE was commissioned by the California Arts Council as part of the National Endowment for the Arts' American Masterpieces Program to create this work as part of a project to celebrate the best of American cultural and artistic legacy. Funding by the CAC and NEA are enabling us to offer this special event for just $10 per ticket.

JAZZ TAP ENSEMBLE (JTE), founded in 1979, is the first American dance company to bring the art of rhythm tap dance and live jazz music to the concert stage. JTE's vision of excellence, innovation, and collaboration, along with a deep respect for the masters, has inspired a repertory of virtuosity, wit, and far reaching musicality.

Renowned for its stellar artistic personnel, original choreographies, concert presentations, worldwide touring, residencies and workshops, and dedicated to community service through their Caravan Project for gifted teen tappers (since 1991), and JTE Goes to School (for K-12 throughout Los Angeles and Orange Counties, CA), JTE has been honored to present and work with living tap masters Jimmy Slyde, Dianne Walker, LaVaughn Robinson, Brenda Bufalino, Savion Glover, and late greats Charles "Honi" Coles, Cholly Atkins, Fayard Nicholas, Harold Nicholas, Steve Condos, Eddie Brown, and the beloved Gregory Hines.

Los Angeles-based JTE has appeared at the Kennedy Center, the Smithsonian, London's Riverside Theatre, Paris' Theater de la Ville, Lyon's Maison de la Danse, Salzburg Jazz Festival, as well as Jacob's Pillow, Spoleto USA, several seasons at New York's Joyce Theater, Playboy Jazz Festival, Hollywood Bowl, and major tap festivals in New York, Boulder, Denver, Portland, Houston, Boston, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

The Ensemble has toured extensively in Southeast Asia and Latin America under the auspices of USIA's "Art America" program. Performance highlights include Gregory Hines' Evening of Tap at Carnegie Hall, Dancin' in the Streets at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, Madrid en Danza festival, and Lyon's 4th Biennale, An American Story.

Television and film credits include London's Channel 4 TV special, JTE Live in Concert (on BRAVO in the USA), San Francisco's KQED special with Honi Coles, Los Angeles' KCET Holiday Special, and Christian Blackwood's award-winning film Tapdancin'.

LYNN DALLY (Artistic Director, Choreographer) co-founded the Jazz Tap Ensemble with Fred Strickler and Camden Richman in 1979. She has created a large body of original tap choreography for the concert stage and has performed worldwide with JTE. She has appeared often with tap legends Honi Coles, Eddie Brown, Steve Condos, the Nicholas Brothers, Brenda Bufalino, Dianne Walker, Sarah Petronio, Jimmy Slyde, and Gregory Hines in venues from Carnegie Hall to the Apollo.

Lynn Dally has received multiple grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Irvine Fellowship in Dance, City of Los Angeles (COLA) Fellowship, and was the first tap dancer/choreographer to receive the Guggenheim Fellowship in Choreography.

Her long list of commissions includes Ruby, My Dear (Thelonious Monk) and Black Iris (Duke Ellington) for Seattle's Pacific Northwest Ballet; The Moment (Kenny Barron) for Chicago's Human Rhythm Project; Tribute: A Valentine to Tap Dance in the Movies for the Palm Beach Festival; Tribute to Fred Astaire for the Getty Museum, Los Angeles.

She received the 2006 Hoofers Award for her choreographic contribution to tap dance from American Tap Dance Foundation at NY Tap City Festival. She is an Adjunct Professor in UCLA's Department of World Arts and Cultures, and continues to teach and perform internationally. Recent delights include Tap Divas at the Duke; Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl, Salzburg Jazz Festival, Lyon's Maison de la Danse, and NY's Joyce Theater with Jazz Tap Ensemble. Her first published article, "No Maps On My Taps: An Appreciation," appears in the book Envisioning Dance.

Her first DVD, SOLEA, explores cross cultural rhythms in new choreography for a quartet of diverse soloists in Bharata Natyam, Flamenco, Modern, and Rhythm Tap Dance. Her next project is Women in Tap, a national conference of leading tap dance artists, scholars, writers, and documentary filmmakers, scheduled for Feb, 2008, at UCLA.