Miss Ludie Jones…Tap Dancing At 92
Each year, the St. Louis Tap Festival honors outstanding hoofers from the past. This year Ludie Jones was honored and invited to teach routines from her historic performances.
“It was very gratifying to be asked to teach at this festival because I had only taught senior citizens,” Jones said. “I didn’t expect anything like this. These adults and children can really tap. There is a warmth and family feeling here.” Ludie Jones, 92, likes the steps of today’s tap dancers, but feels that “it’s all footwork with no projection. They lose consciousness of what they are doing. They just don’t project.”
At the gala performance concluding the festival, Jones was honored and was presented an award by Karen Callaway Williams on behalf of the Robert L. Reed Tap Heritage Foundation.
“Ludie has uninhibited style and grace when she dances and her inner joy shows,” said Williams. “She wants you to express yourself so that the audience can feel it. When she dances, you can’t take your eyes off of her. She is simply wonderful!
The joy of dance shown by Miss Ludie
Photo by Melba Huber
Dance historian Delilah Jackson agrees. “Ludie Jones is considered one of the greatest tap dancers in Harlem. She has kept tap alive for 70 years and is still dancing and teaching at age 92. Today some people just tap dance, but Ludie has her whole soul in it. She just loves to dance.”
Jones began her career in 1934 after completing high school. She toured England in the chorus line of “Lew Leslie’s Blackbirds of ’34.” Following this show, she became a member of The Lang Sisters with Marion Worthy and Peggy Wharton. In London, they went to the famous Buddy Bradley’s School of Dancing where he choreographed numbers for them. The Lang Sisters performed Bradley’s choreography, including a soft shoe that they later danced at the Apollo Theatre in New York. But, Ludie Jones always did her own special rhythm tap number.
Jackson says, “Those chorus girls were the best—trained by Clarence Robinson, Leonard Harper and Charlie Davis. They were the great chorus line dancers of the ‘60s.. When they appeared at the Apollo on the same bill with Eddie Rector, John Bubbles or Bunny Briggs, the men would pad their steps because they knew in the next show, the chorus girls would be doing them. They were the greatest chorus girls of our time and were always welcome at the Apollo Theatre.”
The Lang Sisters worked exclusively with Louie Armstrong at the Paramount Theatre in New York and on the road at the RKO and Loews’ Theatres. “Louie had a dog named Charmie and he would warm up his voice by calling his dog… ‘Oh Charmie,’” Jones recalled. “It was fun and the band was great.”
When the Lang Sisters disbanded, Jones joined Sybil Warner and Geraldine Ball in a group called “The Three Poms.” The group toured with Fats Waller, Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong. A memorable performance was with Ethel Waters at the Belasco Theatre and another on a television show called “American Bands of the Week.”
Jones loved traveling and doing shows with all the bands. She said they were all friends and spent lots of time playing poker between shows. “The Three Poms” entertained many troops as part of USO shows during World War II and did shows in Japan, Okinawa and the Philippines.
At the age of 68, she was asked to join the cast of the musical “Shades of Harlem” in 1984 at the Village Gate. The show toured Italy, Japan, Lithuania, Monaco and many U.S. cities. Photographer John Citron said, “I remember her well. Miss Ludie is quite the Lady.” Jones joined Ruby Riley in 1984 teaching a group of senior citizens at the Kennedy Center in Harlem. When the center needed a van, Jones said the only thing she could do was dance and offered to do a show to raise money. With the help of Chiqui Martin, Geri Kennedy, Ruby Riley and Estralieta they organized a great show that included Bobby Booker’s band and singer Al Hibbler, plus a great cast. They purchased the van and took the dancers to many other senior citizen centers. The group is known as “The Tapping Seniors” and entertains in hospitals and senior centers in New York.
“Shades of Harlem” is still ongoing and whenever there is a show, Miss Ludie Jones is there doing the thing she loves best…tap dancing!