They call me “The Talking Feet Of Paris”. I’ve learned my tap dancing with some of the greatest american teachers:
Bob Audy
Protégé of the famous Paul Draper. With Bob I learned to be light on my feet and elegant. His “concert-tap” – a mixture of clever tap-combinations and elements of classical dance was just sensational ! His technical and rhythmical combinations fill a large book I still love to open.
Henry LeTang
Choreographer of the revue “Black And Blue” and the films “Cotton Club” and “Tap”, as well as teacher of Gregory Hines and Savion Glover. Henry’s style brings together the best elements of black showbusiness of the golden years of tap dancing: hot jazz-rhythms and fantastic combinations retracing the styles of some of the best black dancers. With Henry I started out learning his famous 20 routines. In many, many privates he created 21 great routines for me, amongst them a fabulous version of the Stair-Dance, the routine that made Bill ‘Bojangles’ Robinson famous.
Chuck Green
An inspiration and a wonderful man. I invited him for a european tour – his last. He knew he was at the end of his life and wanted to take care of giving me all he knew about tap. He taught me his stage routines “Caravan” and “Take The A Train” and his repertory of John Bubbles, his mentor. Often, after midnight or in the hall of any airport, I had to learn new combinations: Chuck’s personal souvenirs of all the tapping people he had witnessed since he was a child: an incredible collection of styles and techniques !
Eddie Brown
He gave me his fantastic Rhythm-Tap. With him I learned his famous “B.S.Chorus”, quite some other routines and an incredible amount of interesting Rhythm-combinations.
Honi Coles & The Copasetics, Danny Daniels, Buster Brown
With these dancers I learned a lot in many workshops: each one had his unique style and contributed to my understanding of the tap culture.
Leon Collins
With several assistants I worked on his 4 Routines to “Aint Misbehavin” as well as a good dozen of other choreographies. I just love his sophisticated Rhythm-Tap !
Through many years of researching tap styles and techniques I gradually became a reference as to classical tap-dancing.
In my tap classes I play the piano for my students.
As a guest teacher I’ve been around for the past twenty years – all over Europe ! As a “teacher’s teacher” I try to help to get the next generation of dancers and teachers ready to move on.
workshops
Aix en Provence – Amsterdam – Angoulême – Arles – Augsburg – Basel – Berlin – Bern – Bremen – Bruxelles – Châteauroux – Compiègne – Dortmund – Eltville – Frankfurt – Freiburg – Gent – Gelsenkirchen – Georgsmarienhütte – Gütersloh – Haarlem – Hamburg – Helsinki – Kiel – Köln – Lausanne – Lille – Linz – London – Luzern – Mannheim – Marseille – München – Nice – Nordhorn – Paris – Rome – St. Gallen – Tours – Würzburg – Zürich
Stage and film / TV
My activities as a choreographer and dancer started with a show in Paris “Tu brodes – Ouai!”. It’s 7 months run established me in Paris (1978). A little later came the feature film “Qu’est-ce Qu’on Attend Pour Être Heureux” (Coline Serreau, 1982) and a new show in Paris: “From Harlem To Broadway” (1984). As choreographer I took care of the Paris production of the comedy Steppin’ Out (“Tempo”, winner of the “Molière” as best musical production, 1989). A new show called “Happy Feet” with Chuck Green as guest star was presented in Paris before touring Europe (1995). TV work included “La Nuit Des Césars”, “Le Grand Échiquier” and “La Nuit Des Molières”. At the Paris Opera house I worked with R. Nouréev, creating and recreating ever since the tap routine of his production of Prokofiev’s “Cinderella”.
Later creations include “Une Etoile et Moi”, a show about the career of Judy Garland with the fabulous french singer/dancer Isabelle Georges, the feature film “Le Chignon d’Olga” and many choreographies for theatrical productions as well as plenty of routines for shows and competitions. I recently choreographed a swiss revival of “Steppin’ Out”, and quite some little routines: for the Molière play “Psyché” at the Comédie Française, for the Sam Shepard play “Cowboy Mouth”, and even for an upcoming production of the Offenbach Opera “The Tales Of Hoffmann”
Now and tomorrow
After “The Nicholas Brothers 1930 Routines”, a research-book dealing with their techniques, combinations and routines, available as a PDF file, I published a complete book about the Maxieford and its multiple variations. I just finished another research-book about the famous Time-Step, a Step every tap dancer knows best, but still: there are a lot of things you might discover! Currently I’m working on short videos for technical and rhythmical tap-training and a research book on John Bubbles.
