For this month's Dance Historian Is In, Kurt Albert, Klaus Bleis and Max Pollak present on the life and legacy of tap dancer Carnell Lyons. Born in 1917 in Kansas City, Missouri, Lyons was famous for his “Paddle & Roll” tap style, and is the dancer that brought Rhythm Tap to Germany.  Becoming known during the 1930s and 1940s with his tap trio “The Businessmen of Rhythm”, Lyons’ popularity rose  with the tap and acrobatic act “Jesse, James & Cornell” in the 1950s, performing with show business greats like Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Josephine Baker, and all the famous jazz orchestras like Ellington and Basie. In the mid 1950s he relocated to Europe and started the German tap comeback in 1979 teaching his unique Kansas City tap style all over Germany and Austria. 

For more than 10 years, The Dance Historian Is In at the Library for the Performing Arts has highlighted a diverse range of dancers and choreographers across history. This series began when archivist and historian David Vaughan started volunteering at the Jerome Robbins Dance Division. Vaughan began a monthly program showing his favorite dance films from the Division's extensive collection, through which he unearthed many treasures, and helped acquire even more. Vaughan continued the series until the end of his life. Today, we honor his memory and work by inviting dance historians from all over the world each month to carry on the tradition of highlighting dance history through the Dance Division's moving image collection.