Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?

Subject: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Alan Day
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 08:56 AM

Watching tap dancing over Xmas there seems to be many styles of just Tap dancing. Jimmy Cagney for example did not follow the basic tap dancing steps, but created his own style. Rapper seems to be one tap out and back with each foot,but this is only my interpretation of it,
After watching East Anglian Step Dancing, the dancers seemed to be using standard tap dance procedures and is Clog dancing based on Tap Dance basics?
I would be grateful for an explanation of the differences.
Al

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 09:27 AM

Ah!
Who has heard of Jackie Toaduff? Champion Clog Dancer in the 50's. I found, in old pamphlets separated by many years - one reporting on his championship.
And the other was a programme from a cruise liner maybe early 60's. Who should be on the bill (high or top):

"the Toaduff Brothers: Tap Dancers"

I rest my case m'lud.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: RTim
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 09:38 AM

I believe that Gracie Fields was a Champion Clog Dancer before se became a singer and famous for Sally Down our Alley!
Tim Radford.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Alan Day
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 05:30 AM

It doesn't look as if there are many dancers on this site.
Al

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: GUEST,Mikey
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 05:43 AM

Give it time, I'm sure you'll get an informed reply when your posting is spotted by someone wot knows. It's a busy time of the year, many Mudcatters are busy doing other things at the moment.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Marje
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 06:33 AM

Clog and step dancing are far older than tap dancing, which emerged in the US last century, and was developed for the stage and film. Various forms of traditional step and clog dancing had been going on in various parts of England and Irleand for a long time before that. Tap was based on these older, tradtional forms of dance, not vice versa.

Marje

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Alan Day
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 08:41 AM

The Show Riverdance features an interaction between Irish settlers and America Dancers and one perhaps influenced the other.In the same way Clog Dancers and their steps influenced Appalachian dancing and Tap is a mixture of the lot.It is the basic step differences which may sort this out.That is if there is any actual differences.
Al

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 06:43 AM

Wot about Traditional Ontario fiddlers? They step and play at the same time. Fiddle vertical to make the jerking into tremelo, instead of intermittent silence.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 07:34 AM

Google Master Juba, an African-American dancer from the mid-19th century. He was influenced by the Irish dancing in the Irish immigrant communities in New York neighbourhood where he lived, and in fact became a champion Irish dancer. But he also combined these steps with dance steps that evolved in slave communities on plantations, which were African in origin.

By combining these influences, he created a whole new dance style which is thought to be one of the roots of tap dance.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: bill\sables
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 10:31 AM

I knew Jackie Toaduff, he lived in South Moor near West Stanley,Co. Durham. Everyone knew him , he was the region's claim to fame. He even danced with Princess Margaret. He was taught by Tiny Allison who had a dancing school where girls went to learn tap and ballet and boys learned clog from Jackie himself. My mother wanted me to go but I never did.
Bill

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: GUEST,Derek Schofield
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 10:49 AM

Jackie Taoduff is alive and well and living near Sheffield. His autobiography has just been published ... have a google! I have seen film of him dancing at the EFDSS Albert hall Festival in the 60s and also of him appearing on Barrymore's TV programme ... he indeed moved out of the folk dance world and into variety, cruise ships etc ... but his dancing partner wasn't his brother in spite of the billing!
Derek Schofield

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Will Fly
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 10:57 AM

The late Sam Sherry once gave me a demonstration of his stage tap routines, and then his clog dancing, at his house near Lancaster in the mid 1960s. He was a master of both. Tap dancing, as done on stage, is great, but the cloggers are also excellent. The Five Sherry Brothers (1930s and 1940s) were a superb act - danced and did acrobatics while playing violins! Sam was the guitarist in the family.

Here are the Five Sherry Brothers in 1936. Enjoy!

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: GUEST,PeterC
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 11:03 AM

Dereks post reminded me of an arcticle in ED&S several decades ago about Sam Sherry. He was another who crossed over between "folk" step dancing and stage tap.

With regard Alan's comment about "East Anglian" stepping, a lot of what you see now is danced by travellers who often do wear stage taps. That will look and sound very different to somebody wearing hobnails.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Tom - Swords & Songs
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 11:34 AM

I'm not sure as to the origins of clog but I can tell you a bit about the rapper stepping. Traditionally there were many different types of step or shuffle but today, there tends to only be one step or a variant of it. This is the 'Single Shuffle', the most basic step as done by any clog dancer.

The taps come from the ball of the foot, never the heel and the dancer moves from their left to their right foot on alternate beats. Since rapper is only ever performed to 6/8 jigs, then with each beat, there are two extra quavers, the taps are performed as below.

L t t      R t t      L t t      R
1 and-a 2 and-a 3 and-a 4

So the stepping used in rapper came directly from the clog dancers who were around Northumberland/Tyneside at the time of the dances. Some sides did use very complicated Northumbrian clog steps and others used simpler steps. Single shuffles, double shuffles and even more complex stepping patterns were regularly used. Today, you only tend to see single or double shuffles in a rapper dance.

For more info have a look at http://www.rapper.org.uk/

Or for examples of stepping in rapper:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf2gQQjSUtk
or
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu4GDMXjFQs

Ta
Tom

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Alan Day
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 01:07 PM

Thanks Will I enjoyed watching the Sherry Brothers.

Sorry to ask for clarification Tom but are you saying that you start with the left foot tap on the way out and tap on the way back (Two taps total)and then change to repeat with the right foot?
Many thanks for the U tube clips.
This is now starting to get really interesting.
Al

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: GUEST,Bob L
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 01:37 PM

I think I can answer this one.

"Ltt" means step onto the left foot, and move the right foot forward and back giving a tap each time. Then "Rtt", step onto the right foor and move & tap with the left. The beats should be perfectly regular, as indeed they are in both video clips. The first gives you a better idea how it's done though - the second sounds fine but the video quality is a bit primitive.

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Tom - Swords & Songs
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 06:35 PM

Yeah, that's right Bob L.
Most teams actually drop onto their right foot on beat 8 of a phrase before dropping onto the left foot on beat 1 to begin stepping.

In fact, throughout the dance you should always be walking left, right, left, right whether you are stepping or not. Left on beat 1 and right on beat 2 etc...

Regarding which foot is doing the tapping it may have been clearer for me to write:

L tr tr    R tl tl    L tr tr    R
1 and-a 2 and-a 3 and-a 4

Where L means putting your left foot on the floot and tr means tapping with the ball of your right foot. The first one is often seen as tapping away from yourself and the second one is usually tapping towards yourself; kicking out and kicking in.
Each tap should be equally weighted and spaced equally with the music, there should be no dotting of the rhythm.

Hope this is a little clearer!

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Alan Day
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 08:52 PM

Thanks Bob and Tom
Exactly how I thought it was done and I can understand the beats to the music using this method.
The action of using the ball of the foot to tap once out and once back
is in tap dancing terms called a "Shuffle" (Tap Dancing Made Easy by Isolde 1/6d net)The book tells me that this is the basic step of all tap dancing. So Rapper got there first!!
More info please
Al

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Tom - Swords & Songs
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 01:12 PM

Hi Al,

I'm not sure that rapper did beat tap however as I think that rapper dancers borrowed steps from clog dancing. Rapper was only really existing from c1800. If anything, tap may have come about through clog and appalachian step dancing. I don't think there is any connection between rapper and tap. Rapper isn't really something which affected step dance, more that rapper wad honed by already talented clog dancers taking up rapper.

I would suggest that the title of the thread would be clearer as ' Tap, Appalachian, Step, Clog Differences?

I doubt whether there is anything interesting about rapper stepping which cannot be said of clog dancing.

Although maybe someone could disagree?
Tom

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: LesB
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 06:54 PM

If you want to know who to blame, Tom's the one who's in both clips :-)
Cheers
Les

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: Tom - Swords & Songs
Date: 04 Jan 10 - 06:38 AM

To be fair, Les, it's pretty difficult to find a rapper video that doesn't have me in it...
Tom aka 'rapper tart'

Subject: RE: Tap, Rapper,Step, Clog Differences?
From: LesB
Date: 04 Jan 10 - 10:51 AM

Happy New Year Tom.
Cheers
Les