Ethel Bruneau: Celebrating a Life in Tap
Channel: Lux Magna
Date: 17/02/2019

Ethel Bruneau: Celebrating A Life in Tap (Live at La Sala Rossa (Montreal, QC), January 26th 2019)

Ethel Bruneau, now 82 years old, was born in Harlem and began her life of tap at only 3 years of age. Enrolled at the Mary Bruce Dance Academy, Ethel was immersed among tap's greatest stars: Bill Robinson, Sandman Sims, Honi Coles, Sammy Davis Jr. and Gregory Hines. In 1953 she left Harlem with the Cab Calloway Orchestra dancing as a soubrette, and arrived in Montreal for a 3-week gig. There, she was scooped up by a Montreal agent and the promise of 365 days a year work in Canada’s own Sin City, or Neon City, so-called for its marquee lights, where she performed in all of the hot-spots during the height of Montreal’s jazz era, across Quebec and Ontario and on television. In 1964 she began teaching in Dorion to the west of Montreal, and later opened a school on Ste Catherine’s next to Eva Von Gencsy’s Ballet Jazz, and later again at the Universal Negro Improvement Association or UNIA in Little Burgundy. She now teaches in Dorval at her own school. 

Ethel Bruneau wakes up in the morning to dance, and even with some hip pain once in awhile she says dancing puts joy in her life and she goes to bed happy. She has also put joy into the life of the hundreds of students who learned the art of tap in her dancing studio as well.

Ethel is joined on stage at Lux Magna 2019 by her grandchildren Tesfa Llewellyn, Tisha Llewellyn, Majiza Philip, and the latter’s student Krista Riley and Kyle Briggs.

Special Guests: Travis Knights, Tanya Knights and Cat's Corner

Music by The Liberté Big Band (MTL Formation)

Curated by Sonya Stefan
Camera Operator: Christian Rivera
Edited by Sonya Stefan