A Conversation.

DM: Your recent season at The Joyce was very different from the style you've presented before, beginning with Bring in 'Da Noise, Bring in 'Da Funk. Are you changing the hard-hitting tap you're known for?

SG: The change that you're talking about is the difference between hitting hard and just getting the point across. I was younger when I was dancing harder. I'm older now, I'm more mature. I don't seem to want to dance that hard.

What I continue to do, all I do, is to honor the men who've come before me. My style is changing because my men the guys that grew up under and trained with, are no longer with me: Lon Chaney, Buster Brown, Gregory Hines. I'm a musician, I'm a hoofer, I'm an entertainer from a line of entertainers. I have no plan for a new style. Everything I'm doing, I've been doing all my life.

What does it mean to you to be an entertainer?

My purpose is to be an all-around entertainer: dancing, singing, speaking, monologues, everything. Like the Rat Pack. They were the greatest entertainers. Like Gregory Hines, one of the greatest entertainers all around. I want to be in that line of men

Your purpose is to entertain, and yet you often dance with your back to the audience. Why?

It's totally unconscious. I could care less about turning around or looking at the audience and doing all this stuff. That's not what I'm about. There's a time for that, of course. There's a time when there's nothing to do but sell it and give it to the audience. But after that, its about the music. That's the realm of entertaining You let the audience come to where you are, versus you going there.

You're known as a solo performer. What's it like choreographing for your company of six dancers?

When I perform, it's mainly improvisation. I don't choreograph for myself. Choreographing for a group is becoming a painter and seeing what the picture is going to look like. It's not wholly on me. We all chip in and give each other ideas. Once I give them the information, I like people to play it the way they would play it. Knowing what the melody is, what the lead is, take that and play it like you want to play it.

What do you most want our readers to know about you?

I'm beside myself that DANCE MAGAZINE hasn't honored Gregory Hines for his contribution to dance. This is our dance magazine. It's what represents dance versus Ebony, or any other magazine that's out there, it's just a shame that they haven't done anything honoring this man. That really bugs me. [ed. note: Jane Goldberg's last interview with Gregory Hines ran in DANCE MAGAZINE, December 2003, p. 49.]

Maybe I'm overreacting. I could be overreacting. I mean he was like only the greatest, you know. Maybe I'm overreacting. [He lifts the tail of his t-shirt to reveal a laminated photograph of Hines, like a security ID, that he wears on a chain around his neck.]

Do you wear that for good luck?

I wear it like I wear my woods from my grandmother [He pulls a string of wooden beads up through the neck of his shirt.] They're people who've changed my life and I need to be reminded of them every second.

What's next for you?

I'm just trying to hold down the art form. Keep it present, teach the youth coming up, carry on the tradition of whatever you call it: tap dancing, hoofing, hittin', bringin' it--I'm doing all of that. It's basically just plain old tap dancing metal to the wood. [And he taps the tip of his shoe on the floor].

[Then whispers]Put the article out on Gregory.