Colorado Dance Festival's "Tap Conservatory" and "Fascinating Rhythms" Tap Conference 1992 Kriegsman, Sali Ann performer Kirn, Marda performer Bufalino, Brenda performer Dally, Lynn performer Festival 1992-06-26 Boulder, Colorado. June 26-July 9, 1992 Tap Conservatory July 9-11 1992. Tap Conference: "Fascinating Rhythms" In 1992, Colorado Dance Festival took an activist stance to ensure the continued survival and development of rhythm tap dance, an art form frequently misunderstood and left out of the major support systems of dance in the country. The Festival brought together a community of leading artists, presenters, funders, critics, and representatives from associated research and service organizations to learn about the past, experience the present, and envision a future for the art form. They organized a multifaceted, 2-1/2 week program that included a numbers of "firsts": a 16-day tap conservatory (June 26-July 11, 1992) overlapping a series of 5 showcase performances (July 9-11) overlapping a 2-1/2 day conference (July 9-11) and culminating in a "future of tap" summit meeting (July 12). The artists included master artists, established companies, and innovative, emerging experimentalists who, together, would demonstrate the extraordinary vitality and variety of rhythm tap dance being performed in America. They included: Bunny Briggs, Buster Brown, Eddie Brown, Brenda Bufalino and the American Tap Dance Orchestra, Charles Honi Coles, Lynn Dally and the Jazz Tap Ensemble, the Anita Feldman Company, Chuck Green, Hotfoot, Germaine Ingram, Manhattan Tap, Sarah Petronio, Steps Head, Sandman Sims, Fred Strickler, and Dianne Walker, and schedule permitting, Savion Glover, Gregory Hines, Bill Irwin, the Nicholas Brothers, the Rhythm Masters, and Jimmy Slyde. The Tap Conservatory employed Brenda Bufalino and Lynn Dally as curators to develop the first comprehensive curriculum for the study of rhythm tap and its relationship with music. The faculty included Dally, Bufalino, Coles, LaVaughan Robinson, Walker, Eddie Brown, and Slyde, with musicians from ATDO and JTE. Classes in technique, composition, improvisation and music for dancers designed to provide more of a process-oriented experience for dancers and opportunities for new choreographers. The Conference included a series lectures, lecture demonstrations, slides, video, and film showings, and panel discussions with artists, scholars, and presenters. For the general public, conservatory "students," artists, presenters, and funders in attendance, the conference provided an historical and cultural context for the art form, and for the showcase performances. Lectures and demonstrations included tap's historical evolution, cultural images, various styles and aesthetic concerns, and discussions on how to evaluate the quality of a performance. The performances brought together the largest gathering of tap artists ever assembled in the country: twenty-two artists/companies presented over the course of four performances, with different artists each evening, and one matinee performance presenting a younger generation of artists selected from the "students" at the conservatory. Three days of performances (July 9, "What's Happening': Companies, Comedy & More"; July 10, "Flying Feet of the 90s"; July 11 "The Living Legends and Their Legacy") included dancers American Tap Dance Orchestra, Cholly Atkins, Ira Bernstein, Bunny Briggs, Eddie Brown, James Buster Brown, Brenda Bufalino, Charles Honi Coles, (Sandy) Colton 'n (Chrissy) Colton, Skip Cunningham, Lynn Dally, Anita Feldman and her company, Anita Feldman Tap, Jane Goldberg, Hotfoot (Joe Orrach and Rod Ferrone), Bill Irwin, Jazz Tap Ensemble, Sarah Petronio, Van Porter, Jimmy Slyde, Steps Ahead (Mark Mendonca, Fred C.B. Moritel, Michael Rainey), Fred Strickler, and Dianne Walker; as well as new work by contemporary choreographers Katherine Kramer, Drika Overton, and Baakaari Wilder. In addition, Cholly Atkins and Dianne Walker choreographed a piece called "Remnants of the Four Step Brothers." Future of Tap Summit: During the conference, Sali Ann Kriegsman, Director of the National Endowment for the Arts Dance Program, led a discussion among artists and company managers in residence at the Festival and for those other tap artists interested in attending. The discussion focused on tap's specific needs and the state of the field, including recommendations for the future. Kriegsman and a small group of pre-selected artists/spokespersons brought a summary of the discussion and the recommendations to the day-long tap summit meeting following the conference, conservatory, and showcase performances. With a think tank/task force of funders, presenters, critics, artists, and representatives fro resource and service organizations all present, Kriegsman co-facilitated (with Bill Keens) the discussion of how, together, strategies could be developed to ensure tap's future survival. Documentation/Distribution: Funding permitting, Bill Keens of Keens Company was to document the conference, preparing a booklet of the proceedings for distribution; and would document the summit meeting, preparing a report which could distributed to funders, among others. Also, funding permitted, acclaimed filmmaker George Neirenberg and producer Steve Schmidt would develop a film based on the tap project components, which would be available for television broadcast and video distribution. (Source: ITA, Colorado Dance Festival, The Great Tap Reunion proposal.) Performing Arts Encyclopedia http://www.loc.gov/performingarts Hill, Constance Valis: Constance Valis Hill, personal collection of tap dance materials. (). Tap Dance America http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/ihas/html/tda/tda-home.html Brenda Bufalino (biography) loc.music.tdabio.42 Lynn Dally (biography) loc.music.tdabio.69 tda IHAS 151216 loc.music.tda.999