Chuck Davis and Dance Africa

Dance Magazine, April, 2004 by K.C. Patrick

Chuck Davis, guru of Dance Africa, is the final profile in our Dance Magazine Awardee series, following Anna Halprin, Chita Rivera, and Jose Manuel Carreno. The annual awards ceremony will be held April 26 at Merkin Concert Hall in New York City.

At any performance of the African American Dance Ensemble, artistic director, Chuck Davis, a supertall, joyous presence in vivid robes, entices you into the experience of the bantaba. You honor the elders and the rituals of nature and spirit--and then the drumming and dancing begins. Children dance in the aisles, and critics lose themselves in the rhythm of the moment.

What you are doing is walking a bridge--a bridge constructed through the years by Davis to connect the roots and branches of African and African American dance. He shows the whole spectrum, from traditionalists to the avant-garde. It wasn't always so; what now seems sell-apparent exists because Davis started building the bridge twenty-five years ago.

The idea to start DanceAfrica was triggered by an old Tarzan movie Davis happened to see on television in 1977. "None of the 'natives' in the cast were Africans and it was all just fantasy, and not a good one. 'We are not about ooga-booga,' I thought, 'and we must show that we aren't.' That's how DanceAfrica started." The first year, it was just his company, but by the second, he had gathered together Charles Moore and Dances and Drums of Africa, International African-American Ballet, Nana Dinizulu and his Dancers, Drummers and Singers, and Arthur Hall Afro-American Dance Ensemble to perform at the LePerq Space at Brooklyn Academy of Music.

Normadean Gibson, who was then a member of Chuck Davis Dance Company and is now Director of Programs of the Davis organization in Durham, North Carolina, says, "The idea was to bring people of all races, creeds, and colors under one roof to see that African American dance was half traditional and half contemporary-usually a fusion of techniques. Chuck has always been about peace, love, and respect for everybody, but he still includes lots of education and entertainment."

DanceAfrica has been celebrated in Philadelphia, Newark, Minnesota, and Los Angeles. But with the reductions in funding, the permanent locations have narrowed to just Brooklyn, Chicago, and D.C. (see sidebar below).

"Baba Chuck" has influenced many black dance group in the United States. He participates in countless Kwanzaa celebrations, tours with his Durham-based African American Dance Ensemble, performs at American Dance Festival, and leads tours to African countries during the off-season.

When Davis adopted a troupe of orphaned boys from the streets of Port-au-Prince and brought Haiti's Resurrection Dance Theater to DanceAfrica, he acknowledged that he could teach them only so much in the time he had them. "They needed more, so I called Mamma Cleo [Cleo Parker Robinson, whose school and company is based in Denver] and she arranged a scholarship to her school," relates Davis.

Born in 1937, Davis grew up in then-segregated Raleigh, North Carolina. "I had a wonderful childhood," remembered Davis, sitting across the table at Roy's Country Kitchen near his home in Durham last January. "I was never abused or mistreated. All of the elders in 'the bottom' looked out for every child--and if you were ever disrespectful, they told your parents. Parents never questioned the word of an elder because they would never lie about or harm a child. I was an only child and lily mother taught me to cook, to do laundry, to sew and crochet and knit. I can't tell you how often I have used those skills for the company's costumes."

Davis came to dance as a young adult. The then-slim 6'5" giant served as a Navy medical corpsman stationed at Bethesda, Maryland, and hopped a bus every weekend to D.G.'s Latin Club at the Dunbar Hotel. What began as social dancing progressed to demonstration and performance as he danced with more proficient dancers like Jean Early, then known as "Queen of Mambo."

"As I hung out with the dancers and danced, I began to learn about the arts--a whole different language," says Davis. "Then 'the man' came." The man was Geoffrey Holder.

"I had started attending Howard University and taking class," adds Davis. "My teachers were about 5'3", and nay fifth position was about here (he raises his arms to his hairline). Geoffrey was taller than me and when he stretched out his arms, they embraced the whole room. He wore all white and had such a presence. When he stepped off the curb, traffic stopped! I wanted to be just like him. He taught me not to use size as a barrier and to use gestures as he did with those arms and hands."

In the early 1960s Davis moved to New York City to perform with drummer Olatunji at his Harlem Cultural Center. He had three days to learn five complete ballets, rehearsing at Jerry Leroy's studio on Eighth Avenue.

"I had to catch tip, so I built strength by running up stairs, then going down backwards. It was a great time: Buster Brown; Chuck Green; Hines, Hines, and Dad; and Wil Maston Trio all rehearsed at Leroy's studio. I attended the New Dance Group, where Alvin Ailey, Talley Beatty, and Donald McKayle were. Katherine Dunhaln's school was down the street, but I went to Syvilla Fort's for Dunham technique and jazz--Bob Fosse was in the class just before me. The energy was very intense."