Fred Astaire and Michael Jackson In Smooth Criminal

Michael Jackson and Fred Astaire









How many people know that Fred Astaire, another great iconic figure, legend and one of the worlds greatest dancers also admired Michael Jackson and thought of him as his peer and rightful successor? Michael Jackson also admired and studied every move Fred Astaire ever made and once these two men met they quickly became friends.

The history of dance on film begins with Astaire, beyond film and television, the history of dance in the video era began and ended with Michael Jackson.

Just like Astaire's execution of a dance routine, Michael Jackson's routines were also elegant, graceful, original, innovative and precise. Both men drew from a variety of dance influences, including tap, African American rhythms, classical dance and ballroom dance.

Michael Jackson set the standards in which subsequent video dance numbers would be judged. Sadly that standard has played out and been destroyed by the takeover of Rap music which seemed to destroy every creative artistic style of music and the production of quality music videos in it's path.

Videos became more sexual and exploitative with nothing really worth watching unless you emulated the whore, pimp and gangsta lifestyle. Much like most of the people that they were marketed to, quick and easy money, lacking any type of prevalence and a future.

I long for the day to see a good dance number again. As I said before Chris Brown has what it takes to be that spark of awe and astonishment we saw in Michael and Fred Astaire. As with any human being (which we seem to forget that celebrities are human) No one is without controversy or drama in their lives. People want to be entertained, and not by the garbage fed to us as talent these days. These men were innovators of their time and each one gave us the gift of the ultimate in entertainment, Dance.

Although each man viewed themselves as entertainer's first and foremost, their supremely artistic contributions to American dance won them the admiration of twentieth century dance legends and fans all over the world and right now the world is hurting.

Dancers are like children, they have to be in order to get up there and do what they do. ~Hermes Pan, ChoreographerSphere: Related Content