Tapping Into Cuba

The prima ballerina, now in her 70s, settled in her seat, ready for a performance she would not be able to see.

Then something extraordinary happened.

The room filled with clear, precise notes--music from the feet of children schooled in the art of tap dance. With her failed eyesight, the ballerina could not see the intricate steps, the meaningful expressions, the posture of the dancers, but she could hear the dance.

A smile spread across the ballerina’s face. And at the end of the January performance, Cuba’s legendary Alicia Alonso had words with the directors of the company.

“She said to me, ‘They were delightful, and I would love to invite them to come to my country and perform for the children,’ ” said Paul Kennedy, who, along with his sister Arlene, directs the Kennedy Tap Company in Los Angeles.

The Kennedys had no idea that wish would be realized so soon.

On Thursday, 17 members of the Kennedy Tap Company will fly to Havana to perform at the 50th anniversary celebration of the National Ballet of Cuba. The celebration runs concurrent with the 16th International Ballet Festival, a showcase of the best in the world of ballet.

The young tap dancers will share the stage with renowned groups like the Bolshoi Ballet and the Alvin Ailey Repertory Ensemble. They will also be the only children performing. And after the big night, the Kennedy dancers will be sharing time with Cuban schoolchildren and touring the country.

Unlike the world-famous performers, the tap company has paid its way to Cuba with the proceeds of bake sales, carwashes, local dance performances and donations.

They will arrive in Cuba with none of the acclaim of the others. But dancers like 13-year-old Brittany Dixon are simply happy to be going. All he wants is to give his best, he said, and leave the Cuban audiences smiling.

“If you make somebody feel happy, that’s the best feeling in the world,” Brittany said, taking a break during a recent rehearsal. “I’m going to try to make them so happy.”

The trip will mark the first time in at least 17 years that a group of American children has visited Cuba for a cultural exchange, said Sergio Martinez, press secretary for the Cuban Interest Section in Washington, D.C.

The Kennedy Tap Company is part of Paul and Arlene Kennedy’s Universal Dance Design, a dance studio that has offered dance lessons for 18 years. The walls of their Olympic Boulevard studio are lined with glossy black-and-white photos of former students who are now professionals. Some have appeared in Broadway shows including the tap phenomenon “Bring in Da Noise, Bring in Da Funk.”

“They come here as children and stay until college,” Paul Kennedy said. “No pregnancies. No drugs. And all the madness, they miss.”

But even for the Kennedys--who have spent a lifetime dancing, choreographing and teaching--having their students perform with world-class artists in Cuba is stunning.

“They’re doing it younger than I did,” said Arlene Kennedy, who performed with companies in Italy at the age of 18. “I’m hoping this is just the beginning of their travels. . . . I hope it helps build their character.”

Alonso first heard the tap company earlier this year during a performance at a reception for her. The National Ballet of Cuba, which she founded in 1948, was performing in Orange County at the time.

Alonso has spent a lifetime dedicated to dance. As a child, she studied ballet at Cuba’s first ballet school and by the age of 16 was dancing with the American Ballet Theatre in New York. After forming the national ballet, she continued dancing in full-length performances until her late ‘50s. As recently as 1995 the Cuban diva was the center of attention at an international dance festival sponsored by the San Francisco Ballet.

Six months after Alonso heard its performance, the tap company received an official letter of invitation. The U.S and Cuban governments have approved the trip.

Since then, the Kennedys have been on a mission, preparing the children for the biggest night of their lives.

“The practice has intensified,” said Paul Kennedy, who choreographed for the Temptations, Marvin Gaye and Gladys Knight and the Pips. “We had to bring them from a recital level to a professional level. They will be in the arena with Alvin Ailey and 22 major companies from all over the world.”

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The dancers, ages 10 to 15, rehearse as long as four hours on Friday and Saturday nights. During the week they take ballet and jazz dance to improve their poise. Often there are performances and fund-raisers.

Despite the work, they follow the Kennedys’ policy: homework first.

But with so much performing and rehearsing, there is little time for other things. Movies, hanging out at the mall, TV sitcoms have disappeared from their schedule--mostly without a peep of protest from the dancers.

“I get my homework done, then I’m ready to dance,” said Chantel Heath, an eighth-grader who plans to major in nutritional science.

In the Kennedys’ studio, confidence has taken on a tangible form. You see it in the way the dancers walk, heads high. And in the easy way they greet visitors. And, especially, in the way they dance. Like young contenders before a title bout, they are ready to jump in the ring, ready to prove themselves.

“By us being the only kids out there, it’s a challenge,” Chantel said, after a difficult number. “We’ve worked so hard. When we get out there, we’re going to tear it up.”

The dancers understand that a good performance is more than technique. It is reaching an audience.

Brittany, a fan of dancers from the Nicholas Brothers to Janet Jackson, thinks of one person while he performs.

“I entertain the whole audience,” Brittany said. “But I find a person, and I entertain that one person. I want everybody in the audience to feel like that.”

Dancers tell stories with their bodies, said Amorita Johnson, 12. The way they move, their expressions, their energy are all part of the dance. But mastering this form of communication takes serious devotion--for dancers of any age.

“I would like the [Cuban people] to know that kids don’t just play,” said Amorita, who hopes to be a pediatrician. “We work really, really hard.”

The Cuban audiences will also witness the continuation of a family tradition.

Two members of the group, Nicole and Cathy Nicholas, are the granddaughters of Fayard Nicholas, the older of the famous Nicholas Brothers tap duo who appeared in films and toured the country decades ago.

Now 83, the elder statesman of tap will travel to Cuba with his granddaughters.

“The last time he was there was in 1947,” said Tony Nicholas, Fayard’s son and the father of Cathy and Nicole.

But Fayard Nicholas has been told he still has fans in Cuba.

“He’ll do a little dance for you at the drop of a hat,” Tony Nicholas said. “We’re going to have to hold him down; he’ll probably try to jump up on stage.”

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Once in Havana, the Cuban government will pay for the group’s food, lodging and travel. Cuban teachers have offered to help tutor the dancers during their 11-day stay.

The company raised money for air fare to Havana, and for things needed to look the part of a professional dance company: matching jackets, T-shirts, shoes.

So far, they have raised $15,000--about $3,000 short of what they need.

Parents had reservations about sending their children on the trip until they met with a Cuban official. They are now some of the trip’s biggest boosters.

These are parents like Valerie and Ray Wiggan Sr., who are sold on the value of art in the lives of their children, Josette, 15 and Joseph, 12.

“They love to be on the stage and to smile and express themselves,” Ray Wiggan said. “They’ll look back over the years and be glad they did have this accomplishment.”

In preparation for the trip, the students have been studying Cuba and brushing up on Spanish.

In Cuba, the children will do more than dance for festival audiences. The company will also perform at a hospital for terminally ill children and participate in cultural exchanges with school-aged kids, said Joe Perez, a Cuban American businessman who invited the company to perform for Alonso.

“They can learn from each other,” Perez said.

Dancers like Brittany will also demonstrate the power of the arts to turn lives around. Before Brittany discovered dance at the Kennedys’ school, “there was like a gate between me and the world,” he said.

“I opened that gate when I came to Universal,” he said. “That opened the world to me.”