Claudia Gomez Vorce doesn't just respect her elders, she worships, literally, at their feet.
Vorce is a tap dancer – for my money, the best in town – and, in tap's tradition of revering the masters, she regularly makes pilgrimages to the Las Vegas retirement home where the legendary Bunny Briggs now resides.
Briggs turns 85 this month, but he can still trade licks with 31-year-old Vorce, and, after a career that's included performing with Duke Ellington and Count Basie and in the stage hit “Black and Blue,” he has plenty to teach her.
“Musicality is the main thing I'm learning from him, feeling the music,” said Vorce, whose new group, Groove on Tap!, debuted last month at Hot Monkey Love Cafe.
Briggs will turn on a jazz station on the radio and the two will improvise together. The tap master, known for his audience-wooing style, also gives Vorce pointers about showmanship – “How to let the audience groove with you, how to invite them in,” she said.
DATEBOOK
Groove on Tap!
7:30 tonight, then March 8 and April 12;
Hot Monkey Love Cafe, 6875 El Cajon Blvd., North Park;
$10 (kids free); www.hotmonkey
lovecafe.com
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Vorce displayed her own brand of showmanship, an “isn't this fun?” insouciance – at Groove on Tap!'s debut. And she demonstrated the technical chops picked up on frequent trips to New York, where she's studied with artists such as Dianne Walker and Savion Glover and performed in “Tap City” at the Joyce Theatre and in the film “GETAP.”
Tap dancers think of their bodies as instruments, and Groove on Tap! is a jazz ensemble in which Vorce and drummer-percussionist Toby Ahrens jam with various guest musicians. Keyboardist Irving Flores and bassist Brian Wright join them at Hot Monkey Love Cafe tonight, while on the postage-stamp stage at Sushi's “4x4” on Tuesday, the two will be on their own.
“The idea is to feature jazz pieces that I write and compositions that Claudia and I come up with together,” said Ahrens, who had jammed with Vorce informally and suggested that they put a group together.
Last month, the original numbers included a brisk march and a playful piece in which Ahrens and Vorce donned bibs and kneepads made of grocery produce bags and did a rapid-fire unison body percussion.
Ahrens, whose wife is a hoofer, put on tap shoes and did a few shuffles and ball-changes himself. And, in an exuberant finale to Stevie Wonder's “I Wish,” Vorce invited any tappers in the audience to come up and jam with her. About half a dozen, most members of the California Project, who'd appeared as guest artists, took the challenge.
DATEBOOK
Groove on Tap! at Sushi's “4x4”
8 p.m. Tuesday;
Bluefoot Bar, 30th and Upas, North Park;
$5; (619) 235-8466 or www.sushiart.org
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Groove on Tap! will be performing monthly at Hot Monkey Love, and Vorce and Ahrens want to highlight a different culture each time. In January, Ahrens played djembe for an African-style piece with guest dancer Amy Jo Hearron.
Tonight's show focuses on Brazil, with guest artists doing samba, capoeira and maculele, a gasp-inducing form that involves nasty-looking sticks and what looks like near-death for any dancer who doesn't move fast enough to get out of the way.
They're also interested in bringing in influences from East India, the Middle East, Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines, as well as Vorce's first dance form – folklorico, which she learned from her mother and grandmother, who were both professional dancers in Mexico.
Along with folklorico, she's studied ballet, modern dance and hip-hop. But tap, which she discovered at age 8, remains her first love. “It's the freedom of feeling your own rhythm,” she said.
And it's getting to learn from a virtuoso like Briggs. “He gets up and he will give you some moves. It's beautiful.”
Janice Steinberg is a San Diego writer.
