Tap Dance - Up and Down
Tap Dance Group - Up and Down Time
This video is our tap dance performance to Up and Down Time - Elevator Operator.... This group dance routine won several awards in the 2009 dance season.
Tap dance steps have to be synchronized between all of the dancers because the judges watch our feet and listen for everyone to be on the beat at the same time. The moves are quite fast, so we rehearse it twice a week from October until competition season starts, usually at the end of March.
Our costumes are a Broadway type of elevator operator. We had to use extra pins to keep the hats on so they didn’t spin off when we did our turns. The dance is interesting because we move around the stage a lot into different formations.
The main difference between tap and Irish dancing is that you use your arms in tap as part of the dance. In Irish dancing, you keep your arms at your sides. Also, tap dancing originated in America, but Irish dancing is an older, Celtic traditional dance.