It had to be you - Tribute to Mabel Lee

This little video is a humble tribute to one of the most magnificent jazz dancers and singers of the swing era: Mabel Lee. Our dance groupe has been working on the interpretation of the choreography that she performs in the soundie Chicken Shack Shuffle (1943) while learning about her life, work, and philosophy through her whole life until she passed in 2019 at the age of 97. From our understanding, Ms Mabel Lee was an artist that focused her work on a free expression of the body and promoting the idea that one should dance as one is. And everyone has a place on the dance stage. As a black women in showbusiness in USA, she had to overcome with the codes, struggles and racism that the American society was imposing to her. And she did so, with and incredible intelligence. Her timeless dance made us dream, her humour, her resilience and her wit made us understand still another layer of this multiplicity of realities that is the jazz era.