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What
is passion? It is surely the becoming of a person. Are we not, for
A woman lies awake on a tattered and flat mattress supported only by the old creaky floor beneath her. The one-room apartment is surrounded by those familiar sounds and smells that permeate the senses of thousands of people who live in dilapidated high rises around the country. Yet, she hears only the sensual sounds of the worn disc spinning on the old phonograph that her mama gave her when she was a child. She smells nothing but the sweetness of the musical castles built by Grappelli and Menuhin. Porter, Gershwin, Berlin, and Carmichael are her saviors from the reality of life. No smell of urine in the hallways. Her passion is classical music.
When I talk about passion on this page, this is what I am talking about. Sure, one often thinks of sex when hearing that word; God knows I do. And I will talk about it sometimes, but that is not all passion pertains to. It is that strong emotional drive or overmastering feeling or conviction that is often beyond all reasoning. It is that strong desire or devotion to some activity, object or concept. It is synonymical to words such as fervor, zeal, enthusiasm, ardor, and zeal.
On this page, I want to talk about and share with you what stirs and awakens mine and many others' souls, what it feels like; what gives us that kick when drudgeries of life consume us. I will talk briefly about anything that inspires me and welcome you to do the same. Sometimes it may be a picture; other times, a story, a poem, etc.
This
is what we all need to connect to; hold onto. So, visit often and
feel and embrace the warmth wherever it hits you, including what turns
you on erotically.
This is a cool story about a young tap dancer, Jared Grimes, who turned his passion for tap dancing into a profession.taken from http://www.news-record.com/photo/tap/ . Check it out.
Tap
dancer turning a passion into a 9-7-01
By TINA FIRESHEETS, Staff Writer GREENSBORO -- To hear Jared Grimes tap dance is like listening to a well-choreographed fireworks display. The metal pieces, or taps, on his shoes pound the floor in perfect rhythmic correlation to whatever music is on the stereo. Torso bent, arms hanging loose like a rag doll, he taps -- toe, heel, heel, toe, spins, slides and spins again. As he glides across the floor of the studio, he drinks from a bottle of Dasani water he carries in his left hand. Gray and white athletic pants that snap line the sides of his legs. One pant leg is pulled above his knee, the other has fallen to meet white ankle socks. Grimes, 18, thrives on dispelling any preconceived notions of someone who tap dances. He doesn't carry a cane or wear a top hat. And he tap dances to everything from classical music to show tunes to R&B and hip hop. "When people think of tap, they think, 'Oh, you're soft,' or 'Oh, you wear a leotard.'" Grimes says. "I like to prove people wrong." Tap is more than a childhood past-time for the Southwest Guilford High graduate. As a member of the North Carolina Youth Tap Ensemble, he's performed in Austria, Finland, Rio de Janeiro and throughout the U.S. This will be his first week of classes at Marymount Manhattan College in New York. The performing arts college is about 45 minutes from where he took his first dance steps. His mother, Doreatha Grimes, performed with dance companies until she started her own dance school in New York about 20 years ago. "Dance was something that I was always around," Jared says. "I can remember going to the studio when I was 3. She'd give me a ball and I'd play around with that, but I'd be watching her and the girls and just trying to do their routine." Leslie Nagle, of Greensboro Dance Theatre, says Grimes is now the one whom aspiring dancers watch. "Everyone who walks into my studio just looks at him and says, 'Wow, he's just amazing.'" She first saw him perform as a judge at a dance competition three years ago. Dancers are judged on technique, facial expressions, costume and showmanship. "He cleaned the house out, basically," Nagle says. "It's not only that he has excellent tap technique, but he also was born a star. It's quite clear to see.He just has the presence about him that, when he steps on stage, he really captivates the audience." Jared Grimes describes the style of tap he performs as rhythmic tap, where most of the movement is in the lower body. "With this style you really have to know how to tap and it has the ability to run through people's soul," he says. "With rhythm tap, you can swing, you can funk it and you can get real choppy with it. You can take it wherever you want to go."
Not that Grimes doesn't recognize the older tap tradition. It's just that he's part of a movement of young tappers trying to bring the dance form to a newer, more modern level. He likens Gregory Hines, star of the 1989 movie, Tap, as the Magic Johnson of the dance. Savion Glover, most known for his dancing and choreography of the Broadway smash hit, Bring in Da Noize, Bring in Da Funk, would be the Michael Jordan of the tap world. And Grimes thinks of himself as Kobe Bryant. He uses these basketball analogies because there are a lot of similarities between basketball and tap, he says. Grimes taps his feet the a way a Harlem Globetrotter spins and dribbles a basketball. In one exercise, the toes of his right foot taps a circle around his left foot, quickly and precisely. Then he takes his heel, and repeats the path. He does this with both feet, with tongue out and dreadlocks bobbing. On days he doesn't tap, Grimes plays pick-up basketball games at Deep River Community Park or N.C. A&T University. Basketball also helps build stamina, he says. While Grimes would rather be compared to Savion Glover, he still calls the early pioneers his heroes. American slaves communicated with each other, over long distances and in code, by using drums. When slaveholders throughout the South prohibited the use of drums and other instruments, slaves transferred traditional rhythms to their feet. The tapping out of complex rhythmic passages was developed and by the mid-nineteenth century, African Americans had combined their footwork with Irish and British clogging steps to create a style called "buck and wing," which became modern tap dance. Grimes admires Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, a popular tap dancer of the early 1900's. Robinson is most remembered as Shirley Temple's dance partner and the subject of a Fred Astaire dance routine, "Bojangles of Harlem." He was the first black single dancer to star in white vaudeville circuits, a headliner for nearly thirty years. Grimes got the opportunity to perform with another hero, Gregory Hines, at a tap festival in New York. Grimes took a class with Hines and gave a five-minute performance. To his surprise, Hines joined him on stage. "We were just improvising -- making music together. We were just feeding off of each other, coming up with some crazy stuff. It just doesn't get any better than that," Grimes says. Like Hines, Grimes hopes to add acting and singing to his tap dancing career. He's already been cast in Cheerwine and College Fund commercials and has had several auditions for television shows. He has an agent in Raleigh and in the past two years, he's had three private auditions with Dawson's Creek. Grimes says his acting talent comes from watching a lot of television, not drama classes. His only local acting venues have been through the Community Theatre of Greensboro. CTG director Mitchel Sommers has known Grimes since he was in middle school and says there's no doubt he'll be a star. "He's a very unique talent. A lot of people can learn steps, but very few dancers can dance with the improvisational skills that he has," Sommers says. "When he stars in his first Broadway show, I've got dibs on front row seats."
Contact Tina Firesheets at 883-4422, Ext. 228, or
11/21/2002 2001-2002
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The
tap, the metal pieces on the heel and toes of tap shoes, are designed
to sound like drums. The heel resembles the sound of a bass drum
and the toe replicates the snare. Most people think of Fred Astaire
or Gene Kelly when they think of tap, Jared says.He'd rather they
think of NBA star Kobe Bryant of the L.A. Lakers. (Picture:
Jared Grimes practices in his garage at his High Point home.
Nelson Kepley@News & Record)
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Worth the Read!
