On some Saturday mornings this past summer, nearly two dozen people tap danced outside, their novel sounds and smiles filling Riverside Park in Cambridge near Harvard Square.
Last fall, the jazz tapper and singer decided to put her faith in that idea to the test when she was feeling anxious and isolated at home.“I had just quit my job,” Herzog recalled,"and I was sitting around in my apartment depressed, just like lots of my friends and family.”“First it was just some friends,” she said. “We put up this handwritten sign by the tree that says 'Tap for Joy every Saturday.'”It wasn't Herzog's sign that drew 23-year-old Natasha Stark to the class.
Herzog begins each all-level class with a warm-up and goes over some basics. She designed two-by-two-foot wooden boards for the students so they can dance together from a distance. The platforms are spaced out on the grass forming a big circle.Early on, Herzog said people would show up in sneakers and sandals, which aren't nearly as fun or satisfying as the real deal. So she put out a call on Facebook. “I now have bags and bags and bags of donated tap shoes,” Herzog said smiling.
Herzog approaches tap as a percussive instrument that channels individual expression. For her, it's as much about musicality as it is movement. Throughout class, she focuses on different phrasing, dynamics, texture and grooves. Because it's grounded in rhythm, Herzog feels it's a great tool for bringing people together.
. She's shared her philosophy — and bags of tap shoes — with other communities in the neighborhood, including at an afterschool program, a senior assisted living center, public housing and the Fletcher Maynard Academy. That's where Herzog introduced Reis Jackiewicz to tap. Now theWhen asked what he likes about tap, Jackiewicz thought for a second before deeming it entertaining. “Because you get to move your body,” he explained, “you step back and forth, left and right, diagonal.
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