A COLE JAZZ DANCE COMPANY styled after Jack Cole's original Company of dancers. It was on nightclub stages that Jack Cole and His Dancers performed world and vernacular dances to Swing music of the era, sparking a new era of American Jazz Dancing.
Beginning in the 1930s, as the era of prohibition ended and the nightclub scene sprang to life once again throughout the country, choreographer Jack Cole and His Dancers dazzled New York and Chicago’s nightlife with a new provocative style of entertainment. On the booze scented, thundering nightclub dance floors at the likes of the Rainbow Room, history began. Used to cheap performances meant for their drunken peripheral, nightclub patrons were enraptured by Cole’s unique immersion of cultural dance styles that played with all aspects of dance - rhythm, tempo, levels, patterns - and offered an intriguing and nuanced 'high art' experience. This cross pollination of cultural movement ultimately fed into Cole’s own unique motor idiom and technique, and paved the way for the future of American Jazz Dance.
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The first seed of this phenomenon was seen at New York City’s Embassy Club, where Cole originally put East Indian Classical Dancing to modern Swing Music of the era. Known as an “American Nijisky” Cole's eccentric allure and his authentic, yet fresh, interpretation of world dance was something patrons here in America had never seen before. Cole's work had a unique way of speaking to the general public while also drawing them into the more sophisticated realm of classical and intelectual dancing.
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Cole and his dancers originally put Benny Goodman's iconic ‘Sing Sing Sing’ on the map, an exultant big band hit that would later be best associated with Fosse’s legacy and his Broadway show Dancin'. Bob Fosse’s own wife and muse, Gwen Verdon, first began her career assisting Jack Cole and could be seen swinging and grooving in his nightclub acts years before meeting her future husband and becoming a Broadway legend in her own rite.
With his company of highly trained dancers, Cole’s work continued to thrill nightlife audiences for three decades. His club acts offered exhilarating and virtuosic dance numbers filled with knee slides and drops, hinges, back flips, rhythmic footwork and high energy partnering, pushing the boundary of what commercial dance could offer. Who wouldn't have been captivated by seeing this majestic work up close for cheap with a drink in hand?
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The NEW Jack Cole Dancers revives the style of exciting, dynamic, and legitimate work that was seen in Cole's original company, and showcases high caliber Theater and Jazz Dancing that is accessible to the general public. The company brings this work back to immersive spaces like nightclubs and cabaret bars, and transports its audience to the timeless age of classic Jazz dance, all the while looking through a relevant and current lens. Jazz dance with the level of grit, authenticity and thrill of Cole’s has not been seen for quite some time. Today, the art form is widely misunderstood, associated only with the tourist ventures of contemporary Broadway theater. But it is time to give it new life and understanding, and what better space than where it all began... in the invigorating nightlife scene here in New York?
Taking on the namesake of Cole's own company, our company reflects that of the original Jack Cole Dancers, incorporating dance and music pieces inspired by Cole’s essence and performed by a group of artists from Broadway, Alvin Ailey, TV and Film, trained in the Cole method and technique. With our diverse company and creative team, and our gender-fluid approach to casting, The NEW Jack Cole Dancers bring this work into the 21st century and challenges how we perceive this art form today.
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