Musical theatre dance

Ancient Theatre

Musical theatre dance started with ancient Greek dramas that included dancing and singing as a part of their acts. The Romans evolved those dramas and grew the dance part of the dramas. They had pantomime dancers who used their bodies and words with music to put on elaborate performances.^[6]

Minstrelsy

During the colonial era in America, white men would paint their faces black and put of shows to mock African Americans and glorify the horrors of slavery. These kinds of shows were called minstrel shows that were some of the earliest shows to combine singing and dancing to create a story. Many key dance components of musical theatre dance derived from these shows, like the shuffle, buck and wing, the soft shoe and cakewalk.^[7]

The Black Crook

The Black Crook was an unexpected musical theatre performance that spawned from a ballet show and melodrama set to perform on the same day.^[7] The ballet show was supposed to have it's show at the Academy of Music, but it burned down leaving them with no where to go. The manger of the drama Thomas Wheatley took them in and added them to the drama to create The Black Crook, a five hour musical theatre performance that became incredibly popular.^[8] This performance become know as the first musical, and started musical theatre in the United States.

Vaudeville

Vaudeville was another form of performance that consisted of many different unrelated acts that consisted of song, dance, puppetry, illusion, acrobatics and other various performances.^[9] The dance element led to the popularity of tap, which was thanks to prominent vaudevillians such as Bill "Bojangles" Robinson using it in their shows. ^[7]The dance form has heavy influences on musical theatre dance and has become a staple in the genre.

Ragtime and Ballroom

The combination of European and African music elements birthed the ragtime genre, defined by its syncopated rhythms. The African American dances such as the two-step and the cakewalk were primarily used with ragtime music, but new dances evolved such as the one step during this era. ^[10]These ragtime dances were co-opted by Irene and Vernon Castle to create a new genre of dance called Ballroom dancing. Here they created what became known as the Castle Walk and popularized various dances such as the Grizzly Bear, Bunny Hug, Fox Trot, and the Maxixe.^[7]

As musicals evolved since their first appearance in America as "The Black Crook", the dance aspect has become a defining factor. It went from being an after thought to the thing that guides the direction of a musical. As director-choreographers take a bigger part in the creation of a musical show compared to writers, such performances became more seamless and greater than the individual aspects of the show.^[11] This is what makes musicals so unique since "spectacle" is an important. Compared to music theatre, musical theatre has a visual aspect that invokes emotion in the audience and is an essential part of the story. ^[12] So dance, as part of the big three aspects of musicals (Acting, singing and dancing) has a big role in the genre.