Tap dance gets its name from the sounds made by special shoes with metal taps. The American art form got its start in the 1800s, as a melting pot of ethnic percussive dances blended African tribal dances with Scottish hornpipes and jigs. It fit especially well with another American art form, jazz, and its influence …
Tap dance, a young student says with a giggle, is “a bit louder than ballet.” Wearing leotards and pale pink tights, she and three other girls skip across the floor at a community center in Albany, California. Their shiny black tap shoes make them sound like a small herd of ponies clattering across cobblestones. The …
Cardi B and Post Malone marked major breakthroughs in the last year, but the rap stars won’t compete for best new artist at the 2019 Grammy Awards. Cardi B, who earned two nominations at this year’s Grammys held in February, was not eligible for nomination because of her previous nominations. The Grammys, which has adjusted …
As an impoverished blind child in Florida, Ray Charles grew up listening to the country and western stars on the Grand Ole Opry broadcasts. That music of his childhood stayed close to his heart for the rest of his career, and it was his landmark two-volume set, “Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music,” that …
Taylor Swift kicked off her week with a rare political post on social media, and at the American Music Awards she continued the conversation by encouraging fans to vote in the upcoming midterm elections. Swift won artist of the year at the fan-voted show on Tuesday in Los Angeles, beating out Drake, Ed Sheeran, Imagine …
The voices of the witnesses are quiet. Their heads are projected on screens behind a chain-link fence in complete darkness at the site of a former monument to Soviet dictator Josef Stalin. Their topic: the most painful moments in the history of Czechoslovakia. A multimedia exhibition is marking the 100th anniversary of the creation …
African-American sports pioneer George Taliaferro — the first black player to be drafted by the National Football League — has died at 91. Taliaferro was a college football superstar for the University of Indiana when the Chicago Bears chose him in the 13th round of the 1949 NFL draft. It was the first time any …
In the year after the downfall of Harvey Weinstein and the rise of #MeToo awareness, women in Hollywood are still processing and evaluating what, if anything, has fundamentally changed in their business — from the nature of scripts to an increase in basic opportunity. Some say that things have absolutely changed, while others struggle to …
For his new WWI documentary film, “They Shall Not Grow Old”, director Peter Jackson was adamant the soldiers should tell their own stories. To do that, the acclaimed New Zealand director hired forensic lip-readers to go through old silent film footage of the war and uncover the conversations that took place in the trenches and …
The cities of Calgary and Stockholm and an Italian bid involving Cortina D’Ampezzo and Milan officially became candidates for the 2026 Winter Olympics on Tuesday after the International Olympic Committee ratified their bids. The IOC Executive Board last week recommended the three as candidates for the Olympics in eight years time, dropping Turkey’s Erzurum. The …