The contribution of Black Americans to American culture has been widely recognized. Black dance — from its roots in Africa through Broadway, Hollywood, and the serious dance stage today— has been arich ingredient in our Cultural life. This book traces Black dance from the Carribean, through Southern Plantations, the North, Minstrelsy, Music Hall, to the concert dance of today. Memorable portraits are given of Bill Robinson, Alvin Ailey, Pearl Primus, the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and many others. The new edition has been updated, and includes a chapter on Black dance during the last 15 years.
LYNNE FAULEY EMERY teaches choreography at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.
BRENDA DIXON STOWELL (=BRENDA DIXON GOTTSCHILD) is Professor of Dance at Temple University where she teaches performance history, theory, and criticism.
Author(s): Lynne Fauley Emery, Brenda Dixon-Stowell, Katherine Dunham
Edition: 2nd, Revised
Publisher: Princeton Book Co
Year: 1988
Language: English
Commentary: scantailor + ocrmypdf
Pages: 397
City: Princeton, NJ
Tags: black dance;african amercian dance;dance history
BLACK DANCE From 1619 to Today
Contents
Foreword (Katherine Dunham)
Preface (Lynne Emery)
1 The Slave Trade
2 Black Dance of the Caribbean, 1518-1900
3 Dance on the Plantations
4 Dance in the North, on the Levee, and in New Orleans
5 Jim Crow and Juba
6 From Minstrelsy to “Darktown Follies”
7 From Dance Hall to Theatre
8 Concert Dance Pioneers: 1920-1950
9 Concert Dance: 1950—Today
10 Popular Dance in the Twentieth Century (Brenda Dixon-Stowell)
Bibliography
Index
Illustrations
John Barbot visiting the king of Sestro to procure slaves, from Churchill, A Collection of Voyages and Travels, … (1732)
Plan for loading slaves on HMS The Brookes ? from Abstract of the Evidence. … (1791)
“Manner of Playing the Ka,” a large drum played with hands and heels of feet; probably the same drum called by many the “gomba”; from Hearn, Two Years in the French West Indies (1890)
West Indian “Carib Drummer” from Theatre Arts Monthly (January, 1933)
“Negro Dance on a Cuban Plantation,” from Harper’s Weekly (1859)
“Jaw-Bone or House John-Canoe,” from J. M. Belisario’s Sketches in Lewis, Journal of a West Indian Proprietor (1929)
“A Negro Festival drawn from Nature in the Island of St. Vincent,” in Edwards, The History … of the British West Indies (1819)
“The Voodoo Dance” by E. W. Kemble, in Century Magazine (1887)
“In the Store” by E. W. Kemble, in Century Magazine (1887)
Slave sale, in Bibb, Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave (1850)
“A Negro Ball, Charleston” by Eyre Crowe, in his With Thackeray in America (1893)
“The Shucking” by W. L. Shepard, in Century Magazine (1882)
“The Dance” immediately following the corn shucking, by W. L. Shepard, in Century Magazine (1882)
“The Sabbath among Slaves,” from Bibb, Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave (1850)
“Unloading by flags” on the levee in New Orleans, in Harper’s Weekly (1867)
“The Love Song” drawn in Congo Square, New Orleans, by E. W. Kemble, in Century Magazine (1886)
“The Bamboula” drawn in Congo Square, New Orleans, by E. W. Kemble, in Century Magazine (1886)
“A Voodoo Dance” drawn by John Durkin to illustrate an article of the same title by Charles Dudley Warner, in Harper’s Weekly (1887)
In Dahomey, from Theatre Arts Monthly (August, 1942)
Juba at Vauxhall Gardens, London, from Illustrated London News (August 5, 1848)
Josephine Baker in the Folies Bergéres, taken from a French postcard
Bill “Bojangles” Robinson
Asadata Dafora (Horton)’s Kykunkor
Katherine Dunham with Vanoye Aikens
Katherine Dunham in “L’ag’ya”
Pearl Primus
Alvin Ailey in “Rite” sequence from his “Cinco Latinos”
Alvin Ailey Company in “Revelations”
Dance Theatre of Harlem
Arthur Mitchell
Talley Beatty in A Study in Choreography for Camera by Maya Deren and Beatty
Geoffrey Holder in Metropolitan Opera production of “‘Aida”
Louis Johnson in “House of Flowers”
Donald McKayle
Eleo Pomare
The Eleo Pomare Dancers in “Burnt Ash”
Rod Rodgers
Garth Fagan
Carmen de Lavallade in “Bele”
Mary Hinkson as Joan the Warrior in Martha Graham’s “Seraphic Dialogue”
Janet Collins
Jean-Léon Destiné in “Spider Dance”
Percival Borde
Lavinia Williams Yarborough
The African-American Dance Ensemble
Norton and Margot Ballroom Team
Handbill for Harlem’s Apollo Stage showing featured dance acts
Whyte’s Hopping Maniacs perform Lindy styles
Michael Jackson
