I've Got Rhythm: Tribute to William Robinson

Ella Fitzgerald sings I've Got Rhythm.

Bill "Bojangles" Robinson (May 25, 1878 -- November 25, 1949) was an American tap dancer and actor of stage and film. Audiences enjoyed his understated style, which eschewed the frenetic manner of the jitterbug in favor of cool and reserve; rarely did he use his upper body, relying instead on busy, inventive feet and an expressive face.

A figure in both the black and white entertainment worlds of his era, he is best known today for his dancing with Shirley Temple in a series of films during the 1930s.

At the age of six, Robinson began dancing for a living, appearing as a "hoofer" or busker in local beer gardens. He soon dropped out of school to pursue dancing as a career. In 1886, he joined Mayme Remington's troupe in Washington, DC, and toured with them. In 1891, at the age of 12, he joined a traveling company in The South Before the War, and in 1905 worked with George Cooper as a vaudeville team. He gained great success as a nightclub and musical comedy performer, and during the next 25 years became one of the toasts of Broadway. Not until he was 50 did he dance for white audiences, having devoted his early career exclusively to appearances on the black theater circuit.

In 1908, in Chicago, he met Marty Forkins, who became his lifelong manager. Under Forkins' tutelage, Robinson matured and began working as a solo act in nightclubs, increasing his earnings to an estimated $3,500 per week. In 1928, he starred with Adelaide Hall on Broadway in the hugely successful musical revue Blackbirds of 1928 written by Dorothy Fields and Jimmy McHugh, in which he performed his famous stair dance. In 1930, he returned to Broadway to star with Adelaide Hall in Brown Buddies.

The publicity that gradually came to surround him included the creation of his famous "stair dance" (which he claimed to have invented on the spur of the moment when he was receiving an honor from the King of England, who was standing at the top of a flight of stairs -- Bojangles' feet just danced up to be honored); his successful gambling exploits; his bow ties of multiple colors; his prodigious charity; his ability to run backward extremely fast; his argot, most notably the neologism copacetic; and such stunts as dancing down Broadway in 1939 from Columbus Circle to 44th St. in celebration of his 61st birthday.

Little is known of his first marriage to Fannie S. Clay in Chicago shortly after World War I, his divorce in 1943, or his marriage to Elaine Plaines on January 27, 1944, in Columbus, Ohio.

Robinson served as a rifleman in World War I with New York's 15th Infantry Regiment, National Guard. The Regiment was renamed the 369th Infantry while serving under France's Fourth Army and earned the nickname the "Harlem Hellfighters". Along with serving in the trenches in World War I, Robinson was also the 369th "Hellfighters Band" drum major and led the regimental band up Fifth Avenue on the 369th's return from overseas.

Toward the end of the vaudeville era, a white impresario, Lew Leslie, produced Blackbirds of 1928, a black revue for white audiences featuring Robinson and other black stars. From then on, his public role was that of a dapper, smiling, plaid-suited ambassador to the white world, maintaining a tenuous connection with the black show-business circles through his continuing patronage of the Hoofers Club, an entertainer's haven in Harlem.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• William Robinson
• Bojangles Robinson
• William Bojangles Robinson
• Ella Fitzgerald
• Gershwin
• Lena Horne

[ElizabethGeez]

Im doing my ballet dance dance to thisss <3 (ballet/jazz)

[Shabannie]

@ElizabethGeez Your teacher picked a wonderful song for you to dance to. Thank you for making comments.

---------Ellen

[Saleogri]

Is it still possible to add "Ella Fitzgerald" to the tags? (I've never uploaded a video before so I wouldn't know). I ask because I couldn't get to this video by searching Ella.

[Shabannie]

@Saleogri I just added some names to the tages. I also added some biographical information. Thank you for watching this video!

---------Ellen

[GATHORAX1800]

It makes me dance ;D

[Shabannie]

@GATHORAX1800 Thank you very much for watch this very special video.

--------Ellen

[JuvieFirst]

Ella...what more is there to say?

[Gimmal1492]

@Shabannie Well thank you for posting this remarkable video. Pardon my sly attempt at profundity, but truly: I think that the video serves to illustrate the lively character of the history of the arts and artists today. It must be hard to represent the dynamic nature of the works of a performing artist, in a museum - I think your videos illustrate that dynamism, superbly, in the perfect medium for it, in all honesty. Thank *you*

[Shabannie]

@Loleq86  Thank you very much for watching my video.

-------Ellen

[Loleq86]

It's the best version of this song I've ever heard

[Shabannie]

@Gimmal1492 Thank you for your thoughtful remarks.

--------Ellen