Alfred Desio’s Choreography
Morton Gould’s Concerto For Symphony Orchestra and Tap Dancer with the San Diego Symphony at Copely Symphony Hall, San Diego, CA, January 2000.
Caution, Men At Work: Tap . Director, and co-choreographer with Louise Reichlin. Premiered California Music Theater in 1999, 13 state tour March and April 2000.
Gershwin Suite for Pops Goes to the Movies with the Pasadena Pops at Descanso Gardens, co-choreographer with Louise Reichlin, September 1998.
Flamenco Tap Fusion Premiered at Dance Kaleidoscope, Anson Ford Amphitheatre, July 1997.
Magico, Maidens Dance, Youth Tribal Stomp Premiered at Dance Kaleidoscope, Anson Ford Amphitheatre, July 1996.
Barcelona Suite Premiered at Dies de Dansa, an international dance festival, Barcelona Spain, July 96.
Con Alma Premiered at Marion Theatre, Allan Hancock College, Santa Maria, October 1995.
Drums, Piano, Orchestra A tap-tronic suite premiered at Fulkerson Hall, Humboldt State U, April 95.
One Note Samba Premiered Kelly Walsh Auditorium, Casper WY, October 1995.
Easy and Uneasy Pieces/a collaboration. A suite of modern and tap works co- choreographed with Louise Reichlin. New section Milking the Cow premiered at the Fountain Theatre in Hollwood in October 1994.
There’s a Light Coming Through the Window. The first section of a modern and tap work co-choreographed with Louise Reichlin. Premiered with Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s Bing Theater, in August 1994.
Brandenburg Boogie. Premiered with Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers at Bovard Auditorium, Los Angeles, April 1994.
Add One. Premiered at Orange County Performing Arts Center, November 1993.
Neth-Atu. Premiered at Pardoe Theatre/Brigham Young U., October 1993.
Birthday Dance. Premiered at Bing Theater/Los Angeles County Museum of Art, August 1992.
Tap-Tronic™ duet performed by Alfred Desio and guest artist Sam Weber.
Flight of the Foo Birds. Premiered as quartet at the Los Angeles Children’s Museum, May 1992. Performed by Kids Tap/L. A.
Sextet. Premiered for 6 dancers at the Los Angeles Children’s Museum, May 1992. Performed by Kids Tap/L. A.
4 Solos. Premiered at the Los Angeles Children’s Museum, May 1992. Performed by Kids Tap/L. A.
Quintet. Premiered at the Los Angeles Children’s Museum, May 1992. Performed as a quintet by Kids Tap/L. A.
D. C. Drums. Tap-Tronic™ solo, premiered with Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers at Bovard Auditoium, Los Angeles, February 1992.
Flight of the Foo Birds. Premiered as solo at Bing Theater/USC, Los Angeles, April 1991.
Zapped Taps Suite. Premiered at Bing Theater/USC, with choreography, score and plexiglass tiles by Desio, April 1991.
D. C. Drums. Premiered at the Smithsonian Institute for the opening of their new Experimental Gallery, Washington D. C. February 1991.
Foot-Beats. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered on Northern California tour of Zapped Taps™/Alfred Desio October 1990.
Floor Piano. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered on Northern California tour of Zapped Taps™/Alfred Desio October 1990.
Zapped Rhapsody. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered on Northern California tour of Zapped Taps™/Alfred Desio October 1990.
Audience Taparticipation, Boss Modules, Trigger Midi Interface, Trio Improvisation. Designed for Northern California tour of Zapped Taps™/Alfred Desio October 1990.
Untitled. Tap-Tronic™collaboration with Carl Stone premiered at the CyberArts International, Los Angeles, September 1990.
Solo Program. Created for the Royal Viking Sea, a cruise ship, Hawaii, June 1990.
Zorba. Dances for the musical for Fullerton Civic Light Opera May 1990.
hefti-Hefti. Acoustic solo premiered at Keck Theater/Occidental College, Los Angeles with LA C& D March 1990.
7 AM. Acoustic solo premiered at Keck Theater/Occidental College, Los Angeles with LA C& D March 1990.
Kalimba While You Work. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered at Keck Theater/Occidental College, Los Angeles with LA C& D March 1990.
Midi Puzzle. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered at Keck Theater/Occidental College, Los Angeles with LA C& D March 1990.
Variations For Zapped Taps™ and Orchestra. Collaboration with Lucas Richman for solo Tap-Tronics dancer and the Pacific Symphony Orchestra, premiered at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, Costa Mesa February 1990.
Three Jazz Works. Premiered with The Juggernauts, a big jazz band, at Warner Park, including 2 solos and a duet for Lorene Shields and Desio. September 1989.
Pino Copy 4. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered at Bing Theater/USC, Los Angeles with LA C&D April 1989.
Midi Two-Step. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered at Bing Theater/USC, Los Angeles with LA C& D April 1989.
Sounds of Electricity(Sronx). Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered at Bing Theater/USC, Los Angeles with LA C& D April 1989.
Danca Solitaria. Acoustic solo premiered in New York at Dance Theater Workshop as part of Zapped Taps, August 1987.
Ragatap. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered in New York at Dance Theater Workshop as part of Zapped Taps, August 1987.
Capriccio Stomp. Acoustic duet premiered in New York at Dance Theater Workshop as part of Zapped Taps, August 1987.
Tiger Rag. Duet premiered in New York at Dance Theater Workshop as part of Zapped Taps, August 1987.
Street Feet. Trio premiered in New York at Dance Theater Workshop as part of Zapped Taps, August 1987.
Covering Ground. Acoustic duet premiered at Japan America Theater, Los Angeles, with LA C & D, November 1986.
Implants 1. Duet for Percussionist and Tap Dancer, collaboration with Roger Boyce, premiered at Japan America Theater, Los Angeles, with LA C & D, November 1986.
Electronic Raga. Tap-Tronic™ solo premiered at Japan America Theater, Los Angeles, with LA C & D, November 1986.
Dinah. Solo premiered at Japan America Theater, Los Angeles, with LA C & D, April 1986.
Selected Reviews
Al Desio's tap dancing perfect, staccato and vibrant"
"Jazzy, complex, unaccompanied routine that defined tap musicality... brilliant... absolutely dazzling."
"Immediacy and excitement...fascinating"
"When Desio dances, the focus never shifts to any part of the stage that does not embrace his personage...the expertise of a master."
"a stunning tap-out"
"Desio is a tap dancer. His billing is The Dancing Fool. That and the news that he dances in front of an abstract painting painted by himself leads you to suspect a spoof. Not a bit. He's very serious and very good. He works to Bach as well as jazz with every measure clean and alive and part of a larger pattern that grows ever more complex, like a Henry James sentence. He closes by videotaping an improvised piece and then tapping out a counterimprovisation, live, as the tape rolls on the screen. This has the flair of a New Orleans jazz cutting contest, but there's also something of the metaphor about it, a suggestion of certain conversations one has with oneself. Desio is the thinking man's tap dancer."
"The delighted fascination that seems to drive the Los Angeles-based Mr. Desio to explore these high- tech extensions of traditional tap also informs his...dancing. His intricate, deft footwork and his ease are compelling. But in the end it is the cagey exuberance of this leprechaun tapster that makes the work so enjoyable."
"Desio displays an amazing range of pitch in his taps, devises delicate rhythmic variations dotted with slides, scrapes, and flutters. Getting faster and lighter, but not louder, the dancing and drumming whip their intensity into a galloping chase."
"Desio's premiere Flight of the Foo Birds, to music by County Basie, is a wildly colored (bright green pants, blue jacket and orange and pink lighting,) fluttery solo of an exotic, side-leaping avian. An engaging showman, Desio teases his audience in his hefti-Hefti, wisecracking right and left, as he ultimately draws his (very willing) audience into humming along to Neil Hefti's Cute. A slow beginning but the solo picks up as he sings out a phrase, then taps a snippet in response. And when he slides as though on ice, feet crossing as though skating, the work's lighthearted play is simply gleeful. Capriccio Stomp, with the most straightforward tapping, is marvelous; Desio is under complete control as rhythms rattle out with machine-gun speed and his emphases shift."
"Radiating the most heat of the evening was the premiere of Desio's Brandenburg Boogie, for which he was joined by four personable young tappers from Colburn Kids Tap/L.A. In a solo full of satisfying synchronicity, Desio did what we all long to do - keep up with the Bach beat. And in a traditional tap lineup, all five dancers whipped through clever, quirky canon and unison steps."
Selected Reviews about Tap-Tronics™
"Desio, a Broadway vet, is probably the most inventive tapper in the business. He devised an electronic system that allows the dancer to produce all kinds of musical and percussive sounds with his feet, just as a keyboardist would play an electronic keyboard. Now having perfected this system, he is still inventing new ways to use it...One of Desio's most appealing attributes is the pleasure he seems to get from his dancing. It's contagious! Everyone feels a little better about things after sharing one of his performances."
"Desio is the first known tap dancer to wire his feet electronically. Every time he takes a step on the "zapped taps mat," the mikes in the soles of his shoes send shimmers of hollow, mesmeric sound through the synthesizer and back out to the audience. Imagine a human body made of aluminum bones, and imagine that you can hear inside this body, inside its bones. The effect is fantastically eerie; we travel to places in the body hitherto considered unapproachable. We become insiders, and for the first time we can sense a dance unfolding from the dancer's point of view; from his muscles."
"Alfred Desio is a Los Angeles tap-dancer who virtually invented a new approach to tap, electronically wiring the soles of his shoes so that with each rat-a-tat-tat the sound goes through a synthesizer and emerges more like rat-a-boing-whang-pop. It's wonderful...His performance is not only a contagious joy, it's a true technological amazement."
"What made Zapped Taps special, apart from the sheer excellence of the dancing, was Mr. Desio's innovation, Tap-Tronics. In this concept, each dancer uses electronically amplified tap shoes. Transducer microphones in a tapper's shoes are wired to a transmitter either hand-held or places in a pants pocket. The tap sounds are relayed to a receiver and can go through special effects modules, a number of synthesizers and other electronic equipment. There is a special effect due to performance: the music is developed and changed by the dancer at the moment that the dance takes place. Basic elements include the tap sounds, any electronic devices and the material that the composer has pre-programmed into the sequence."
"Watching hoofer Alfred Desio plugged into his Zapped Taps, one can't help but recall the scene in the movie Big when Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia dance out Heart and Soul on a gigantic keyboard. The melodies and rhythms Desio creates are far more complex than any ditty by Hoagy Carmichael (the sound of Desio's taps trigger preprogrammed electronically synthesized music,) but the free-spirited innocence of the bit is right on. The high point of Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers' seven-part program, presented Sunday afternoon at USC, was watching associate director Desio dance three electronic tap solos - Sounds of Electricity, (Sronx) Pino Copy 4 and Midi Two-Step. Desio has been experimenting with his Zapped Taps technology (the trademark is his)for several years, and he has finally perfected the medium for theatrical performance."