Celebrate Dance Icon Mable Lee's Centennial Next Month

Eubie Blake National Jazz Institute and Cultural Center will partner with Tapology, Inc. to host Mable Lee's Centennial Celebration & Big Band Dance Party on Saturday, August 7 as a hybrid event, live at the Eubie Blake Center, and virtually. The event takes place from 11AM until 11:00PM EST.

If you don't know Mable Lee, you should! She is the late, acclaimed dance icon known as the "Queen of the Soundies". Lee worked and traveled extensively with Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle from a teen, until her adult years. She graced the cover of Ebony Magazine in 1947 and was a featured vocalist on Eubie Blake's Song Hits: With Eubie and His Girls album recorded in the mid 70s.

Lee continued to captivate audiences while mentoring the next generation of female dancers such as The Bradley Sisters, Michelle Dorrance, Dormeshia and Michela Marino-Lerman. All were a part of Mable Lee's Dancing Ladies until Lee's death on February 7, 2019. Lee represents a cross pollination of music and dance genres, cultures, and styles deeply rooted in African American traditions highly deserving of preservation and celebration, according to event organizer, Brinae Ali, a Broadway performer, choreographer, tap dancer, vocalist, and activist (STOMP, Shuffle Along, Baltimore Jazz Collective).

Ali was compelled to organize a dream team of Lindy Hop, Jazz, and Tap dancers, along with a mix of musicians, cultural institutions and organizations (Tapology, Eubie Blake Cultural Center, Guardian Baltimore, American Tap Dance Foundation, Collective Voices for Change, Duke Ellington Center For the Arts, Peabody Institute-Jazz and Dance, and the Black Lindy Hoppers Fund) around the world to celebrate the 100th birthday of the late Mable Lee.

"Mable Lee took me under her wings for over 20 years. After she died, I felt compelled to keep her legacy going and it became my mission to create a mentoring program in her honor. Sweet & Able was created as a vehicle to educate, mentor, and extend the life and works of Mable Lee. It is vitally important that she is celebrated and never forgotten." -Brinae Ali

Buy tickets here to benefit Tapology's Sweet & Able Mentorship Program & The Eubie Blake Center.

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