The Chicago Tap Theatre (CTT) appeared at the Center for Performing Arts on March 28, celebrating its 23rd anniversary, coinciding with the Center’s theme for the season: legacy.
Mark Yonally, the artistic director at CTT, was unable to dance due to a dancer injury. However, he made multiple appearances throughout the show, in which he discussed the history of tap dance, upcoming performances, and the pieces included in their show which focused on the astrological concept, “Saturn Return.”
Tap dance has inspired multiple forms of modern dance, such as jazz, house, and voguing. Yonally said that the best thing about tap dance is being able to teach it, due to its influence. The show was split into two acts with a 20-minute intermission. It incorporated a live band with background colors and lights.
A student, who attends most shows at the Center, felt that the show was beautiful. “Today, this show has been really fascinating. It’s my first time seeing a tap show, so it was really fun and a very different theater experience for me. I loved all the different sounds that they were able to create. Overall, their presentation was beautiful,” the student says. She urged others to support the Center and the arts.
“Chicago Tap Theater’s mission is to share the creativity, history, and joy of tap dance,” says Jennifer Yonally, the Executive Director of the program. She manages administrative elements of the company, such as pay, fundraising, and the board and committees. Tap dance is described as creative and joyful, and Yonally insists that, “It’s such a multidimensional art form, you know you’re both a musician and a performer. And you’re so integral, working with live music and musicians.”
The pieces in the performance were choreographed by multiple people, but about half of them were choreographed by Mark Yonally, whose job is to direct the artistic vision of the program. Yonally said the audience should experience a journey and a range of emotions when they attend a show, attempting to achieve that in their own performance.
He describes the process and inspiration of choreography as sometimes being about making a statement, or just including a beautiful piece of music.
“Sometimes it’s just a piece of music that I think is intriguing, beautiful, moving, and I want to contribute to it with our sonic score,” he said. “Once I’m choreographing, I also like to think about how moving the bodies through space help make the music become visual. Sometimes we’re trying to say something very specific, and in that case, I look at it more from the perspective of what it is I’m trying to say and how best I can say it so that it hits the audience.”
Dancers in the performance choreographed their own pieces and had to discuss improvisation during Act I due to a dancer being unable to perform.
Roxy King, who choreographed “We Never Agreed Once” and did an improvisation piece, felt that the performance was alive, “Tonight’s performance was very much alive, tap is very much lived in an improv state of mind. Tonight, we had to improv some of our choreography, because we lost a dance in the beginning, but we had to make stuff work.” Greta Sorensen and Chris Matthews agreed and discussed their experiences with the improvisation in the show.
The dancers were discussing the plans they had to remedy the missing dance act. “The beauty of it is that we really trust each other. This company is very tight knit and we believe in each other to make anything happen and to keep the show going,” said Matthews. He explained that the dancers are always communicating with each other through the movement of feet and body language.
“Tap is a language, so it’s just like having a conversation of what did we decide to say today.” King said, describing the act of improvisation and tap dance as a conversation where each dancer can come in and add their thoughts. King said that improvising is fun because someone can add onto the conversation with their own movement.
“When you grow up tap dancing, you also grow up improvising. Like Roxy said, improvisation is very knit into the fabric of tap dance,” said Sorensen, adding that they focus on doing what feels natural in the moment.
Check out the upcoming show for Chicago Tap Theater to support the arts and their mission of showing the creativity of tap dance as an art form!