Gaines has a quip about how he started tapping: ‘Well,I was sittin there doin nothin with these chains on my feet…’Jazz tap has become, almost overnight, and an art form in this country - yet we’ve had a veteran like Will Gaines living over here in Rotherham since 1963,largely unrecognised. He jokes around a lot, but he’s a serious enough performer to enjoy danced with Duke Ellingtons band during the Ellington Mass at Coventry Cathedral - and photographer Denis Thorpe caught him this week appearing in the unlikely environment of Cartwright corridor, and Bradford’s art gallery.
Willie Gaines,whos worked with jazz legends like Basie, Ellington and Holliday in his prime, and is a grizzled 53-year-customary black American tap dancer,who favours fire engine red shirts and frenzied footwork on a small, beat-up square of chipboard: “I’m gettin too ole to be actin the fool on concrete - you need a springboard, and thass why I carry this ole piece of wood aroun.”
Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com