Divine Rhythm News>
Divine Rhythm News

August 17, 2007

MAX ROACH, a Founder of Modern Jazz, Dies at 83 
 
The New York Times 
August 16, 2007 
 
 
By PETER KEEPNEWS 
Max Roach, a founder of modern jazz who rewrote the rules 
of drumming in the 1940's and spent the rest of his career 
breaking musical barriers and defying listeners' 
expectations, died early today in Manhattan. He was 83. 
 
His death was announced today by a spokesman for Blue Note 
records, on which he frequently appeared. No cause was 
given. Mr. Roach had been known to be ill for several 
years. 
 
As a young man, Mr. Roach, a percussion virtuoso capable of 
playing at the most brutal tempos with subtlety as well as 
power, was among a small circle of adventurous musicians 
who brought about wholesale changes in jazz. He remained 
adventurous to the end. 
 
Over the years he challenged both his audiences and himself 
by working, not just with standard jazz instrumentation, 
and not just in 
traditional jazz venues, but in a wide variety of contexts, 
some of 
them well beyond the confines of jazz as that word is 
generally 
understood. 
 
He led a "double quartet" consisting of his working group 
of trumpet, saxophone, bass and drums plus a string 
quartet. He led an ensemble consisting entirely of 
percussionists. He dueted with uncompromising 
avant-gardists like the pianist Cecil Taylor and the 
saxophonist Anthony Braxton. He performed unaccompanied. He 
wrote music for plays by Sam Shepard and dance pieces by 
Alvin Ailey. He collaborated with video artists, gospel 
choirs and hip-hop performers. 
 
Mr. Roach explained his philosophy to The New York Times in 
1990: "You can't write the same book twice. Though I've 
been in historic musical situations, I can't go back and do 
that again. And though I run into 
artistic crises, they keep my life interesting." 
 
He found himself in historic situations from the beginning 
of his 
career. He was still in his teens when he played drums with 
the alto 
saxophonist Charlie Parker, a pioneer of modern jazz, at a 
Harlem 
after-hours club in 1942. Within a few years, Mr. Roach was 
himself 
recognized as a pioneer in the development of the 
sophisticated new form of jazz that came to be known as 
bebop. 
 
He was not the first drummer to play bebop — Kenny Clarke, 
10 years his senior, is generally credited with that 
distinction — but he 
quickly established himself as both the most imaginative 
percussionist in modern jazz and the most influential. 
 
In Mr. Roach's hands, the drum kit became much more than a 
means of keeping time. He saw himself as a full-fledged 
member of the front line, not simply as a supporting 
player. 
 
Layering rhythms on top of rhythms, he paid as much 
attention to a 
song's melody as to its beat. He developed, as the jazz 
critic Burt 
Korall put it, "a highly responsive, contrapuntal style," 
engaging his 
fellow musicians in an open-ended conversation while 
maintaining a rock-solid pulse. His approach "initially 
mystified and thoroughly 
challenged other drummers," Mr. Korall wrote, but quickly 
earned the respect of his peers and established a new 
standard for the 
instrument. 
 
Mr. Roach was an innovator in other ways. In the late 
1950s, he led a group that was among the first in jazz to 
regularly perform pieces in waltz time and other unusual 
meters in addition to the conventional 4/4. In the early 
1960s, he was among the first to use jazz to address racial 
and political issues, with works like the album-length "We 
Insist! Freedom Now Suite." 
 
In 1972, he became one of the first jazz musicians to teach 
full time 
at the college level when he was hired as a professor at 
the 
University of Massachusetts at Amherst. And in 1988, he 
became the first jazz musician to receive a so-called 
genius grant from the 
MacArthur Foundation. 
 
Maxwell Roach was born on Jan. 10, 1924, in the small town 
of New 
Land, N.C., and grew up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section 
of Brooklyn. He began studying piano at a neighborhood 
Baptist church when he was 8 and took up the drums a few 
years later. 
 
Even before he graduated from Boys High School in 1942, 
savvy New York jazz musicians knew his name. As a teenager 
he worked briefly with Duke Ellington's orchestra at the 
Paramount Theater and with Charlie Parker at Monroe's 
Uptown House in Harlem, where he took part in jam sessions 
that helped lay the groundwork for bebop. 
 
By the middle 1940's, he had become a ubiquitous presence 
on the New York jazz scene, working in the 52nd Street 
nightclubs with Parker, the trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and 
other leading modernists. Within a few years he had become 
equally ubiquitous on record, participating in such seminal 
recordings as Miles Davis's "Birth of the Cool" sessions in 
1949 and 1950. 
 
He also found time to study composition at the Manhattan 
School of 
Music. He had planned to major in percussion, he later 
recalled in an interview, but changed his mind after a 
teacher told him his technique was incorrect. "The way he 
wanted me to play would have been fine if I'd been after a 
career in a symphony orchestra," he said, "but it wouldn't 
have worked on 52nd Street." 
 
Mr. Roach made the transition from sideman to leader in 
1954, when he and the young trumpet virtuoso Clifford Brown 
formed a quintet. That group, which specialized in a 
muscular and stripped-down version of bebop that came to be 
called hard bop, took the jazz world by storm. But it was 
short-lived. 
 
In June 1956, at the height of the Brown-Roach quintet's 
success, 
Brown was killed in an automobile accident, along with 
Richie Powell, the group's pianist, and Powell's wife. The 
sudden loss of his friend and co-leader, Mr. Roach later 
recalled, plunged him into depression and heavy drinking 
from which it took him years to emerge. 
 
Nonetheless, he kept working. He honored his existing 
nightclub 
bookings with the two surviving members of his group, the 
saxophonist Sonny Rollins and the bassist George Morrow, 
before briefly taking 
time off and putting together a new quartet. By the end of 
the 50's, 
seemingly recovered from his depression, he was recording 
prolifically, mostly as a leader but occasionally as a 
sideman with 
Mr. Rollins and others. 
 
The personnel of Mr. Roach's working group changed 
frequently over the next decade, but the level of artistry 
and innovation remained high. His sidemen included such 
important musicians as the saxophonists Eric Dolphy, 
Stanley Turrentine and George Coleman and the trumpet 
players Donald Byrd, Kenny Dorham and Booker Little. Few of 
his groups had a 
pianist, making for a distinctively open ensemble sound in 
which Mr. Roach's drums were prominent. 
 
Always among the most politically active of jazz musicians, 
Mr. Roach had helped the bassist Charles Mingus establish 
one of the first musician-run record companies, Debut, in 
1952. Eight years later, the two organized a so-called 
rebel festival in Newport, R.I., to protest the Newport 
Jazz Festival's treatment of performers. That same year,Mr. 
Roach collaborated with the lyricist Oscar Brown Jr. on "We 
Insist! Freedom Now Suite," which played variations on the 
theme of black people's struggle for equality in the United 
States and Africa. 
 
The album, which featured vocals by Abbey Lincoln (Mr. 
Roach's 
frequent collaborator and, from 1962 to 1970, his wife), 
received 
mixed reviews: many critics praised its ambition, but some 
attacked it as overly polemical. Mr. Roach was undeterred. 
 
"I will never again play anything that does not have social 
significance," he told Down Beat magazine after the album's 
release. 
"We American jazz musicians of African descent have proved 
beyond all doubt that we're master musicians of our 
instruments. Now what we have to do is employ our skill to 
tell the dramatic story of our people and what we've been 
through." 
 
"We Insist!" was not a commercial success, but it 
emboldened Mr. Roach to broaden his scope as a composer. 
Soon he was collaborating with choreographers, filmmakers 
and Off Broadway playwrights on projects, including a stage 
version of "We Insist!" 
 
As his range of activities expanded, his career as a 
bandleader became less of a priority. At the same time, the 
market for his 
uncompromising brand of small-group jazz began to diminish. 
By the time he joined the faculty of the University of 
Massachusetts in 1972, teaching had come to seem an 
increasingly attractive alternative to the demands of the 
musician's life. 
 
Joining the academy did not mean turning his back entirely 
on 
performing. In the early '70s, Mr. Roach joined with seven 
fellow 
drummers to form M'Boom, an ensemble that achieved tonal 
and 
coloristic variety through the use of xylophones, chimes, 
steel drums and other percussion instruments. Later in the 
decade he formed a new quartet, two of whose members — the 
saxophonist Odean Pope and the trumpeter Cecil Bridgewater 
— would perform and record with him off and on for more 
than two decades. 
 
He also participated in a number of unusual experiments. He 
appeared in concert in 1983 with a rapper, two disc jockeys 
and a team of break dancers. A year later, he composed 
music for an Off Broadway production of three Sam Shepard 
plays, for which he won an Obie Award. In 1985, he took 
part in a multimedia collaboration with the video artist 
Kit Fitzgerald and the stage director George Ferencz. 
 
Perhaps his most ambitious experiment in those years was 
the Max Roach Double Quartet, a combination of his quartet 
and the Uptown String Quartet. Jazz musicians had performed 
with string accompaniment before, but rarely if ever in a 
setting like this, where the string players were an equal 
part of the ensemble and were given the opportunity to 
improvise. Reviewing a Double Quartet album in The Times in 
1985, Robert Palmer wrote, "For the first time in the 
history of jazz recording, strings swing as persuasively as 
any saxophonist or 
drummer." 
 
This endeavor had personal as well as musical significance 
for Mr. 
Roach: the Uptown String Quartet's founder and viola player 
was his 
daughter Maxine. She survives him, as do two other 
daughters, Ayo and 
Dara, and two sons, Raoul and Darryl. 
 
By the early '90s, Mr. Roach had reduced his teaching load 
and was 
again based in New York year-round, traveling to Amherst 
only for two residencies and a summer program each year. He 
was still touring with his quartet as recently as 2000, and 
he also remained active as a composer. In 2002 he wrote and 
performed the music for "How to Draw a Bunny," a 
documentary about the artist Ray Johnson. 
========================================= 
 
UPCOMING PREMIERE of The Rise and Fall of Miss Thang & 
MORE!  
 
 
The Rise and Fall of Miss Thang, an inspiring tap dance 
drama made in Chicago, will have its Chicago premiere at 
the Black Harvest 
International Festival of Film, Video, & TV. The film will 
screen at 
5:00pm on Sunday, August 19, 2007 at the Gene Siskel Film 
Center 
located at 164 North State Street. Following the screening, 
there 
will be a reception sponsored by Lagniappe Creole Cajun 
Restaurant & C'est Ci Bon Catering in the film center's 
gallery/cafe. The event will be hosted by Chicago radio 
personality, Davante Stone, with a special tap dance 
performance by M.A.D.D. Rhythms Chicago.  
 
Written and Directed by Stacie E. Hawkins, the HD feature 
stars 
Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards, a world renowned tap dancer who 
made history when she became the first female performer in 
Savion Glover's Bring in 'Da Noise, Bring in 'Da Funk on 
Broadway. Also featured in the film is Martin "Tre" Dumas, 
a Chicago-based tap dancer whose stage credits include 
Riverdance and The Tap Dance Kid. Rounding out the cast are 
Chicago-based actors Dori King, Trinia Defourneau, Bryan 
Robert Smith, Moneca Reid, and Shirl Shang. Bril Barrett of 
local tap dance troupe, M.A.D.D. Rhythms, was the tap dance 
consultant on the project. 
 
This just in! The star of The Rise and Fall of Miss Thang, 
Dormeshia 
Sumbry-Edwards, will be in attendance at the 2nd Screening 
on Tuesday August 21rst. There will be a mixer sponsored 
by C'est Si Bon beginning at 7:30pm and the film screens is 
at 8:30pm. 
 
 
Tickets are $9 and available at the Siskel Center box 
office or 
www.ticketmaster.com 
 
http://www.siskelfilmcenter.org 
http://www.missthangmovie.com 
 
 
>>>ALSO: 
 
Miss Thang in the News! 
Chicago's NBC news did a story on Black Harvest last week 
and The Rise 
and Fall of Miss Thang was one of the films highlighted in 
the piece. 
 
Check it out: http://video.nbc5.com/player/?id=140962 
========================================= 
 
Broadway Underground IS BACK! 
 
Friday August 24 
Saturday August 25 
 
8:00pm 
 
St. Clement's Theater 
423 West 46th Street 
New York, NY 10036 
(between 9th and 10th) 
 
Featuring 
Jared Grimes & DeWitt Fleming, Jr. 
The BU Band 
T.A.D.A.H. 
new guest artists  
THE OPEN SESSION 
 
TICKETS $18 
 
RSVP by August 23 at info@projectdance.com 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
Restoring the spirit of entertainment, Broadway Underground 
floors audiences of every age with spontaneous and rhythmic 
comedy. Tappers, Jared Grimes and DeWitt Fleming host this 
"blast from the past" phenomenon filled with amazing talent 
straight off the New York City streets. 
 
Artists move to this city every day to be discovered. 
Broadway Underground sifts through the web of talented 
hopefuls and unleashes sheer raw artistry onto a stage 
filled with live music and packed audiences. Every show 
offers new acts and hilarious skits from the real life 
stories of roommates Jared and DeWitt, who found their 
start singing and dancing underground in the subways of New 
York City. The open session ends the evening where artists 
flock to the stage for their minute of fame as they launch 
themselves into the den of live talent to be seen by all 
the world. 
========================================= 
 
DON’T MISS Harold “Stumpy” Cromer’s Classes at TAP INTO A 
CURE! 
 
Hey there time is running out and so is space! Mr. Cromer's 
Class has 
very few spaces available, so if you are planning on 
attending classes 
are filling and there is a cut off. There are only ten days 
remaining 
until the sounds of steel to wood will be heard through out 
Edmonton 
and surrounding areas. We have lots of surprises and 
giveaways. Come join us for the best 4 days of tap dance in 
Alberta since last years event. 
 
Classes with Josh Hilberman, Robert L. Reed, Bril Barrett, 
Logan 
Miller, Andrew Merrigan, Danny Nielsen, Harold Cromer, Sarh 
Reich, 
Michelle Greenwell, and Lance Liles.  
 
Tap jam at West Edmonton Mall, perform at the Participant's 
Showcase at Festival Place, and share at the panel 
discussion. You can not miss Hoofin' for Hunger at Festival 
Place in Sherwood Park on August 19th a show of the Masters 
and special guests. A night of tap dance that will blow you 
away. And the best part it all goes to charity. The 
Edmonton School Lunch Program and The Africa Project. You 
get a night of entertainment – the community children and 
the children of Africa recieve - it's a winning situation. 
You have nothing to lose!  
========================================= 
 
In case you missed it… 
 
CHECK OUT: ABC 7's coverage of Debbie Allen on 
THE LOS ANGELES TAP FESTIVAL! 
 
Debbie Allen's L.A. Tap Festival 
Hollywood Wrap for Monday 
By George Pennacchio 
 
CULVER CITY, Aug. 6, 2007 (KABC-TV) - The tops in tap! It's 
the fifth annual L.A. Tap Festival. 
 
LINK: L.A. Tap Festival (www.latapfest.com) 
The Debbie Allen Dance Academy hosted Monday night's 
opening jam session where guests could watch, or join in. 
All ages, all levels, all fun. 
 
The L.A. Tap Fest runs through August 11th. 
 
For a schedule of events, go to www.latapfest.com 
 
VIEW THE FOOTAGE HERE: 
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=entertainment&id=5546616 
========================================= 
 
The Maui Tap Experience 
Starr Tendo 
 
3/8/2007 12:00:00 AM 
 
Local couple brings tap masters from across the world to 
Maui. 
 
Most Mauians remember when the biggest musical-type 
production of the year was always Peter and the Wolf at the 
Baldwin Auditorium. Not that Peter and the Wolf was a bad 
gig. I greatly enjoyed it every year—for a decade. But 
growing up, I always wanted more. 
 
I'm sure I wasn't the only Maui keiki that wanted to expand 
my 
horizons in the performing arts department. I lapped up 
everything 
that came my way—ballet classes in the fourth grade, drama 
class at Maui Community College, a really bad audition for 
South Pacific (can you say "tone-deaf?"). I even helped set 
up the 'Iao theater for an all male-review in my late 
teens. Yes, that's right, an All Male 
Review. Ah, good times, good times. Desperate? Who me? 
 
Thankfully, times have changed. Today's kids have it all. 
And I'm not just talking Lunchables, Heelies and the Xbox 
360. I'm talking art,music and dance. In the past 10 years 
or so, Maui has become a hotspot of multicultural activity. 
The Maui Arts & Cultural Center has certainly played a huge 
role in this, but we can't forget the 
individuals behind the scenes who have the vision to bring 
us magic 
like the Maui Tap Experience. 
 
The Maui Tap Experience began in 2002 with the little dream 
of 
bringing some big Mainland tap dance to our island. Over 
the next few years, Maui went from a whisper in the world 
of tap dance to a hotspot. Tap masters from across the 
globe are eager to clippity-clop on stage on Maui. 
 
Tap dance enthusiast Becky Pelissero and her husband, GJ, 
of Kula, 
created the Maui Tap Experience after attending a tap 
festival on the Mainland. At these festivals, professional 
tap dancers from various backgrounds teach and perform. 
 
"We had been to several of these festivals over the years," 
said 
Pelissero, "and I knew that this was something that I 
wanted to bring to Maui." 
 
Pelissero asked festival attendee Mark Yonally from 
Chicago, a 
renowned tap performer and instructor, if he would like to 
come to 
Maui and teach out of her Ha'iku studio. Yonally accepted 
the offer, 
and it went well—The Maui Tap Experience was born. 
 
"The students really loved Mark," said Pelissero. "The 
outcome of the first year was encouraging, and it gave me 
the confidence to seek out more professionals for the next 
year." 
 
So in 2003, Pelissero added another instructor to the Maui 
Tap 
Experience, and held a show at the McCoy Theater, which 
boasted 65 tappers who had participated in the classes 
offered. 
 
In 2004, everything went wrong. "We did three days of 
classes, and 
another show at the McCoy," said Pelissero. "The turnout 
wasn't what we hoped for, because there was a big tropical 
storm going on then, and The MACC brought in Tap Dogs 
Rebooted just two weeks before our performance." 
 
Discouraged but not defeated, the Pelisseros attended the 
Vancouver International Tap festival, where Becky met tap 
sensation and Emmy Award winner Jason Samuels Smith. 
 
"I took his class and loved his vibe," said Pelissero. "I 
introduced 
myself, and he was like, 'You're the lady doing the thing 
on Maui!' It 
was awesome that he had heard about the Maui Tap 
Experience. I asked 
him if he would like to be a guest artist along with return 
instructor 
Mark Yonally, and he told me that Maui was his dream." 
 
Smith introduced Pelissero to Chloe Arnold out of Los 
Angeles. Arnold is the managing producer of the Debbie 
Allen Dance Academy in Los Angeles, and is co-director of 
the L.A. Tap Festival with Jason Samuels Smith. She has 
toured the U.S. as a guest artist and 
choreographer. 
 
The rest, as they say, is history. 
 
Over the next year, Pelissero was contacted by numerous 
professional 
tap dancers who wanted to join Jason, Chloe and Mark. 
 
"I think that it was the draw of working with tappers like 
Jason, 
Chloe and Mark, plus the added bonus of Maui," said 
Pelissero. She and 
her husband spent a year organizing the event... and it 
paid off. 
 
"We had seven world-class tappers come to Maui," said 
Pelissero. "The 
classes were a huge success—people came from all over the 
world to 
participate." The event was so huge that they decided to 
call it the 
"2006 Hawaiian Islands International Tap Festival." 
 
The festival took place in early November and closed with 
The Masters 
of Rhythm tap show at the Castle Theater. The Castle seats 
1,500 
people, and the house was packed. Seven awesome tappers 
from around 
the world put on an amazing performance that earned a 
roaring standing 
ovation from the crowd. 
 
What's in store for the Maui Tap Experience? Pelissero 
said, "More 
tap, of course! Jason and Chloe said that they'd come back 
to Maui 
anytime... even if they had to cancel something to get 
here." 
 
So there you go, Maui. Your very own international tap 
festival. Makes 
me want to dance. 
 
For more information on the Maui Tap Experience, visit 
www.MauiTapExperience.org. 
 
Copyright (c) 2007 The Maui Weekly. 
========================================= 
Burnitdown Music Group, LRG, Akademiks, Palis, and MANY 
more present: 
 
DUNK XCHANGE 
THIS SUNDAY, AUGUST 19th 
@ Crash Mansion (199 Bowery St.) NYC  
1pm - 6pm 
 
Featuring LIVE performances by LOOT, Turnstylz, Selah The 
Great, & 
CONSEQUENCE (GOOD Music) 
 
Music by DJ Peter Rosenberg (HOT 97), DJ G. Brown, and more 
 
Dunk Xchange is THE premier event for any and all sneaker 
aficianados 
and streetwear connoisseurs. DJ AM & Ed Lover (POWER 105) 
were in the 
building for the last one so you never know who might show 
this 
Sunday. If you don't believe me, then click on the links 
below and see 
for yourself what this thing is all about. 
 
http://youtube.com/watch?v=v3r8-XPt8Dg 
http://youtube.com/watch?v=rGCgm8rKWEA 
 
To view flyer and for more information: 
http://dunkxchange.com 
 
LOOT 
"get you some" 
www.lootmusicgroup.com 
www.myspace.com/absulootmusic 
========================================= 
 
Just East of Broadway 
and  
Silent Fire Productions 
present… 
 
Start the Fire! 
 
Thursday, August 23rd @ 6 p.m. 
at the Queens Museum of Art 
(In Flushing Meadows Park) 
 
Come enjoy the FREE show and be part of a music video!!!  
Refreshments after.  
 
For directions check out: 
http://www.queensmuseum.org/information/directions.htm 
 
For more information please call (571) 278-8174 or visit:  
www.myspace.com/justeastofbroadway 
or 
www.myspace.com/silentfireproductions 
========================================= 
 
Tap Olé at Edinburgh's Fringe Festival 
 
A message from Guillem Alonso: 
 
Dear all, 
 
After a hugely successful runs, Tap Olé is now taking the 
Edinburgh Festival by storm. As a headline act for the 
entire month of August at leading venue C 
(www.cthefestival.com) and with major previews published in 
The List magazine 
(http://www.list.co.uk/article/2595-tap-ole) and the 
Edinburgh Evening News, the show is already building a big 
buzz through word-of-mouth and the critics. 
 
 
 
If you are in Edinburgh or have any correspondents in town 
over the next month then please come along and see the 
show. Just let me(+447933758449) or one of my publicists 
(Hugo Fluendy +44 7877 877 511 / hugo_fluendy@hotmail.com 
or Dana MacLeod +44 7866 603 147 / dana@danamacleod.co.uk) 
know and we will be happy to organize complimentary tickets 
for the performance of your choice. I have attached our 
latest press release and some recent production shots for 
your information. 
 
 
I look forward to seeing you! 
 
 
Regards 
 
 
Guillem Alonso 
========================================= 
 
American Tap Dance Foundation Fall Tap Classes for Kids and 
Teens 
 
YOUTH PROGRAM OPEN HOUSES  
Fall 2007  
Drop in and celebrate the start of the ATDF fall term. Kids 
and teens of all ages are welcome -- no experience and no 
tap shoes required.  
FREE! 
*Take a free sample tap class  
*Performances by our Tap City Youth Ensemble  
*Meet our teachers and register for classes! 
Wednesday, September 5, 4:00 - 5:00 pm 
Sunday, September 9, 10:30 - 11:30 am 
Wednesday, September 12, 4:00 - 5:00 pm 
Saturday, September 15, 10:30 - 11:30 am 
At Chelsea Studios 
151 West 26th Street, 5th or 6th Floors, between 6th-7th 
Ave 
 
 
TAP CLASSES FOR CHILDREN 
 
Classes start Sept. 16  
The ATDF classes offer children and teens a chance to 
become immersed in tap culture. Fundamentals of rhythm 
tap, clean technique, classic and contemporary tap 
repertory, improvisation skills, plus tap history, films, 
and jazz music deepen students' appreciation of this great 
American art form.  
 
Year-Round Classes for Kids ages 5+ and Teens  
*All levels beginner through advanced 
*Creative Rhythms Pre-Tap for 3 ½ - 4 year olds 
*Performance Opportunities 
*First class is always FREE! 
All classes held at Chelsea Studios: 
151 W. 26th St. on the 5th Floor  
between 6th & 7th Aves.  
 
TAP CITY YOUTH ENSEMBLE AUDITIONS 
 
Sept. 15  
12:00 - 4:00 
 
Audition for intermediate and advanced tap dancers ages 11 
- 18.  
 
Audition held at: 
Chelsea Studios  
151 W. 26th St.  
between 6th & 7th Aves.  
 
"Past and future come together . . . in the recently formed 
Tap City Youth Ensemble, which performs classic routines 
like the Copasetics' "Chair Dance" with brash adolescent 
energy" (Star-Ledger).  
========================================= 
 
Novisi Productions Presents: 
 
Shakespeare's Sonnets on Tap 
 
Come hear Shakespeare's language like you've never heard it 
before. 
Twelve sonnets, twenty-one performers, three nights only! 
 
FEATURING Varín Ayala, Francois Battiste*, Stephen Bel 
Davies*, Robert Michael Bray*, Ayodele Casel, Frank Harts*, 
Ray Hesselink*, Di Johnston, Stephanie Larrière, Amanda 
McCroskery*, Christina Moore, Parallel Exit (Derek Roland 
and Ryan Kasprzak*), Max Pollak**, Claudia Rahardjanoto, 
David Rider, Ivy Risser*, Dolores Sanchez, Kristyn Smith*, 
David Sochet* and Elisa Van Duyne* 
 
Directed by Awoye Timpo 
Lighting Design by Seth Reiser 
 
* Appearing courtesy of Actors Equity 
** Performing Friday and Saturday only 
 
 
Dates 
Thursday, August 23 - 8:00pm 
Friday, August 24 - 7:00pm and 9:30pm 
Saturday, August 25 - 8:00pm 
 
Location 
THE 411 SPACE 
300 West 43rd Street, 
Ste 411 (at 8th Avenue) 
 
Tickets 
$18 
Tickets available at www.smarttix.com or (212)868-4444 
 
Use the discount code SONNET for $15 tickets 
 
Novisi Productions is dedicated to the production of works 
that 
capture and engage the imagination of the audience. 
Constantly 
exploring the relationship between language, speech, 
movement and music, Novisi is guided by a desire to 
challenge artists and audiences alike to fully experience 
and investigate the possibilities and power of live 
theatrical performance. 
 
www.novisiproductions.org 
========================================= 
 
A message from Rashida Bumbray: 
 
Peace friends, 
 
I am pleased to be hosting the first Hoofers' House 
presented 
collaboratively by The Studio Museum in Harlem & The 
Kitchen on 
Friday, August 24th at 7:00pm. This Hoofers' House in The 
Studio 
Museum in Harlem's courtyard will be a jam session and 
collaboration 
between a few of NYC's dopest tap dancers, and DJ Asho, an 
internationally renowned innovator in the Cuban hip hop and 
social-cultural movements. Following Hoofers' House, DJ 
Asho will spin 
us into the night for Uptown Fridays! 
 
DJ Asho 
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=55377102) 
 
I hope you can make it! 
 
*The second collaborative Hoofers House featuring Jason 
Samuels Smith, 
and the Pheeroan Aklaff trio will be at The Kitchen 
Highline Block 
Party, on Saturday, September 15th at 4pm. 
 
 
Mucho amour, 
 
Rashida 
 
 
Rashida Bumbray 
Assistant Curator 
The Kitchen 
512 West 19th Street 
New York, New York 10011 
212-255-5793, ext. 16 
www.thekitchen.org 
============================================= 
 
CHECK OUT: Melinda Sullivan on BroadwayWorld.com!  
 
Hey ya'll 
Here is lil video of High School Musical on Broadway 
world!!! 
http://www.broadwayworld.com/videoplay.cfm?colid=20581 
 
Enjoy! 
peace and love 
 
Melinda :) 
============================================= 
 
CHECK OUT: Chicago Jazz Philharmonic 
Made in Chicago: Home Cooked Jazz 
 
AUGUST 27, 2007 
Pritzker Pavillion Stage 
MILLENIUM PARK 
 
 
Orbert Davis' 50-plus piece orchestra is one of the most 
versatile 
large orchestras anywhere and certainly Chicago's most 
adventurous 
unit. This concert acknowledges the diverse writing and 
song styling 
originating from the windy city, featuring vocalists Maggie 
Brown, 
Jackie Allen, Terisa Griffin, and Kurt Elling. Also 
featured will be 
Lane Alexander and Chicago Human Rhythm Project's BAM! 
collaborating 
with the orchestra on an original composition written 
expressly to 
integrate tap as a percussive musical voice. 
 
Sponsored By: The Chicago Jazz Partnership - Boeing, Kraft, 
The Joyce 
Foundation, The Chicago Community Trust, and JPMorgan Chase 
Official 
Airline: United Airlines Official Hotel: The Fairmont 
Chicago Program 
Partner: Jazz Institute of Chicago. 
 
CHICAGO HUMAN RHYTHM PROJECT 
2936 N. Southport 
Chicago, IL. 60657 
773.281.1825 
www.chicagotap.org 
 
 
Seats for this event our free are only available on a first 
come, 
first served basis! Thank you very much and we look forward 
to sharing this remarkable event with you! 
========================================= 
Centre East proudly presents: 
 
The 30th Annual Irving M. & Sylvia Footlik Foundation 
SHOWCASE 2007 
 
Performers for Young Audiences 
 
Over 50 new Artists! 
 
TICKETS ARE GOING FAST!!!! 
Hurry now to register; don't miss out on this incredible 
event! 
 
Dates: Wednesday,September 5th & 
Thursday, September 6th 
 
Times: Day of registration begins at 8:00 a.m.  
 
Exhibit doors open at 8:30 a.m. 
Exhibit hall closes between 4:30 and 5:00 p.m. 
 
Located At: The North Shore Center for the Performing Arts 
9501 Skokie Boulevard, Skokie, Illinois 60077 
 
Contact: 847-679-9501 Ext. 3304 or 3100 
showcase@centreeast.org 
 
 
 
Featuring: 
 
*Join fellow teachers, cultural arts programmers and youth 
coordinators at the Centre East SHOWCASE; an annual event 
that 
attracts over 800 cultural arts programmers helping to keep 
the arts 
alive in Chicagoland schools and neighborhoods. 
 
*Over 150 performers, speakers and educational enrichment 
programs seeking to come to schools, libraries, park 
districts, youth 
centers and parties. 
 
*Attendees are encouraged to attend both days of SHOWCASE 
to see 40 LIVE onstage performances during this 
extraordinary two day event and make contact with various 
artists at over 120 different booths. 
 
Two easy ways to register: 
 
Register online at www.centreeast.org 
 
Click on the SHOWCASE Icon 
 
Or 
 
Register over the phone at 847-679-9501, extension 3304 or 
3100 
========================================= 
 
ATT: Dance Director/Dance friends and colleagues: 
 
Interested in performing in Europe? 
BARCELONA DANCE AWARD & DANCE GRAND PRIX ITALY 2008 - 
from 20th to 
24th March 2008 in Barcelona (SPAIN) and in the end of  
June 2008 in 
Italy and in France. 
 
The Directors of Barcelona Dance Awards, present the 
20th 
International Competitions and invite your dance group to 
performing and teaching at the most prestigious dance 
events in 
Europe the next season. 
 
Don't hesitate to contact us for any question at  
<fordancers@tiscali.it> 
 
http://web.tiscali.it/worldancefestival 
 
We are looking forward to hear from you!! 
 
Just in a few days you will receive some advertising 
materials from 
us, the new brochures and posters of the 
Barcelona Dance Award. 
 
Full Name:___________________________________________ 
 
School/Company Name: ______________________________ 
 
Telephone:___________________________________________ 
 
Fax:_________________________________________________ 
 
Email Address:_______________________________________ 
* REQUIRED FIELD 
 
Shipping Address:_____________________________________ 
 
City:____________________ State/Province:______________ 
 
Country:_______________________ ZIP/Postal:___________ 
 
Required disclaimers: the information here in has been 
prepared 
solely for general informational and educational & artistic 
purposes and are not an offer to buy or sell, or a 
solicitation of an 
offer to buy or sell. You are receiving this e-mail 
because I believe you to be interested in developing your 
artistic career. 
If you fell you have received this e-mail by error and 
wish to be 
removed from future mailings, simply reply 
to remove please send to <fordancers@tiscali.it> 
========================================= 
 
TAP CITY Downtown ~ Evening Stars --- Celebration of TAP! 
Sunday, September 9th 
 
 
By Subway: 
1 train: to South Ferry 
4/5 train: to Bowling Green 
R/W train: to Whitehall 
 
 
Battery Park - FREE & Open to the Public!! 
 
New York City's largest free outdoor dance series returns to Battery 
Park with world class dance companies, co-presented with Lower 
Manhattan Cultural Council and The Joyce Theater. 
 
Evening Stars 2007 concludes with a day of activities celebrating tap,the great American dance form. Co-produced by Tony Waag and the American Tap Dance Foundation, this all day-affair invites the audience to join. 
 
Tap City Tap Off 
September 9, 3:30 pm 
 
 
Come see the next generation of tap compete for cash prizes and the chance to perform with the pros in the evening concert. (Soloists,duets, trios or ensembles ages 9-19) 
 
To register visit REGISTRATION FORM/INFO, fill out the required form and fax it or mail it to us by September 4th. For further information or questions call (646) 230-9564. There are a limited number of spots available! First come, first serve. 
 
Tap City Masterclass 
September 9, 5:30 pm 
Feel like Gregory, Fred, and Ginger after this FREE tap dance lesson 
for all ages and all levels. Taught by Tony Waag. Tap shoes optional, hard-soled a plus. A limited number of tap shoes will be available on-site. 
 
Tap City Downtown! 
September 9, 7:30 pm 
 
 
The Mayor of Tap City, Tony Waag brings together an international cast of legendary tap dance veterans, cutting edge soloists, contemporary ensembles, and the hottest new hoofers on the scene today, in honor of one of America's most virtuosic and entertaining art forms. Backed by a live music trio on stage, performers include: Harold Cromer, Michelle Dorrance, Barbara Duffy & Company, DeWitt Fleming, Derick K. Grant, Chikako Iwahori, Kendrick Jones, Mable Lee, Margaret Morrison, Max Pollak's Rumba Tap, the Tap City Youth Ensemble, Tony Waag (as Master of Ceremonies), Karen Callaway Williams, the winner of the afternoon Tap Off and more! 
 
Visit www.atdf.org for more information. 
========================================= 
 
A message from Laraine Goodman:  
 
 
Hi, 
 
I'm happy to announce my upcoming birthday show..... 
 
SAVE THE DATES: 
 
TUESDAY NOV 20 and WEDNESDAY NOV 21, 2007, 8 pm 
 
The Club @ La MaMa e.t.c, 74 E. 4th St., East Village, NYC 
 
Laraine Goodman presents: 
 
"A Brief Look @ Everything and Nothing: Tapping Into the Cosmos" 
 
Rhythmic riffs on our Times and the Interconnectedness of life and 
love, fullness and emptiness.... where are we going? how we'll 
survive...intersection of science, art, politics and faith.... 
pulsing forward....evolving / revolving.... 
 
Be in touch: Laraine Goodman @ 646-263-7926 
hella@mindspring.com 
========================================= 
 
TC + Spike Lee = A New Civics Curriculum.  
 
Join us at the Launch on September 6! 
 
www.teachingthelevees.org/launch 
========================================= 
A message from Ben Nathan: Get Your Jewel On! 
 
First things first... I wanted to let you all in on a tip for looking 
your best for the High Holidays. My friends from Eilat, Omer and Itay Gamlieli, have created a designer fashion line for Jewish men. I love their stuff and highly recommend it. My dad, my step-bro and I all rocked this garb at my dad's wedding this past Sunday. So check it out, and pass it along to your peeps. (Keep reading below for an 
update on Ben Tap Soul.) 
 
Come share the YAMA experience www.yamacollection.com 
 
So you're thinking to yourself, "Man, what ever happened to Ben Tap 
Soul? They totally rocked my neshama, but where'd they go?" 
 
Well here's a little update: My wonderful and talented girlfriend Jenn 
and I are moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico on Monday to teach dance to children through the National Dance Institute of New Mexico (www.ndi-nm.org). I'm still working on music, but am taking some time to work with the kids. Gotta love kids. 
 
Etan is in Israel. He just finished up Marva (Army basic training for 
civilians) and is headed to yeshiva in J-town and will be playing 
drums all over the Holy City, so keep an ear out for him if you're 
over there. 
 
Mike and Kyle are still at UMass for a year or so, so def drop them a 
line if you'll be in the Amherst area. 
 
Hopefully we can all get together soon and rock out with you. We'll 
keep you posted. 
 
Hope all is well with you! Please stay in touch and let us know what 
you're up to. We'd love to hear from you. 
 
All the best! May you and your loved ones and all people everywhere make this coming year and each moment of their lives into a reality of love, peace, inspiration and giving. Many blessings! 
 
Ben 
--- 
Ben Nathan 
E-mail: ben@bentapsoul.com 
AIM: RealHoofe 
========================================= 
 
Dear VLA Friends and Members, 
 
Due to popular demand, VLA is presenting a second workshop on music licensing. 
 
 
Ask the Music Lawyer: Music Licensing Workshop 
 
When: 
Friday, November 9, 2007: 5:30pm - 7:30pm. 
 
Where: 
Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts 
1 East 53rd Street (on the corner with 5th Ave) 
Auditorium 
NY, NY 10022 
 
 
As part of its ongoing Ask the Music Lawyer workshop series, VLA is 
proud to sponsor a workshop on music licensing. Learn about recording 
and licensing agreements, how to analyze them, and how to modify them. 
Most bands and musicians receive a recording or licensing agreement, 
usually prepared by the company's lawyer, which creates a need to 
learn industry keywords and buzzwords. Sample licensing agreements and 
provisions will be reviewed and explained. 
 
If you would like to attend the Friday, November 9th program, a $10 
fee applies to attorneys ($20 at the door), and it is FREE to 
musicians and composers (or $10 at the door). Please complete the 
attached Registration Form and return to Jonathan Tominar via fax to: 
(212) 752-6575, or mail form to his attention to: 
 
VLA 
Music Licensing 
1 East 53rd Street, 6th fl 
NY, NY 10022-4201 
 
 
This VLA program is made possible with the support of the New York 
State Music Fund, established by the New York State Attorney General 
at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. 
 
Since 1969, Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts has been the leading 
provider of pro bono legal services, mediation services, educational 
programs and publications, and advocacy to the arts community in New 
York. The first arts-related legal aid organization, VLA is the model 
for similar organizations around the world. For more information about 
Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, please see www.vlany.org. 
 
Sincerely, Sergio Muñoz-Sarmiento 
 
email: ssarmiento@vlany.org 
phone: (212) 319-2787 Ext. 13 
web: http://www.vlany.org 
========================================= 
www.divinerhythmproductions.com 
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