The Best Dancers In The Soul Era

[Gotsoul]

Yes I'm talking about the best on stage in the soulful sixties...Gladys Knight And The Pips...The Temptations...The Intruders...The Artistics...The Spinners...The O'Jays...The Manhattans...The Unifics...The Delphonics...The Five Stairsteps...and I'm not talking about swaying back and forth but moving...oh and of course-James Brown's Famous Flames.

[Robbk]

The Vibrations, The Contours and The Peps

[Guest MBarrett]

1 hour ago, RobbK said:

The Vibrations, The Contours and The Peps

Based on old 1963 film of the Motown Revue my vote goes to the Contours.

That's the fellas. If we are including the girls got to be Tina and the Ikettes. Surely! Hands down!!

 

Edited April 2, 2016 by MBarrett

[Bazza]

The flamigos - Jump Children .it don't get much better than this

 

[Mick Boyle]

 

[Roburt]

The main man for teaching soul act stage routines was Vegas based (in later life) Cholly Atkins (half of Coles & Atkins) ...........

... see here ...  https://articles.latimes.com/2003/apr/23/local/me-atkins23

Cholly was the guy who Motown hired in the 60's .... to teach all their acts .... BUT ... he wouldn't have anything to do with the Contours (he called them idiots, coz all they did was fool about & mess up his routines) ... after Motown, he went freelance & took on the O'Jays (& more) .... all the acts loved him & gave him gold records + back stage access to ANY shows in any Vegas casino / concert hall.

He was a really humble man & made me SO WELCOME when I would visit him. He had a den full of memorabilia from so many acts & I'd ask him about working with each. He had so many items that one day he just picked up a hand full of laminated backstage passes & said .. YOU CAN HAVE THESE ..... I almost broke into tears &  just took 1 Temptations backstage pass.

[Roburt]

I'm no Detroit expert, (too much great soul music made elsewhere for me to focus in on Motortown stuff) BUT from speakin to people on the Detroit club scene .... they always say that the only act to come close to the Tempts (& it was no accident that other groups made records about 'The Temptation walk') was ...... ....... .. ... ... ... .... ..... ...... THE PRECISIONS.

Perhaps one of the Detroit experts on here could comment on this info .... is this what you understand from takin' to folk on the scene in the city ??  

[Robbk]

I never saw The Precisions in a show, nor have I heard that they were great dancers.  The Mike Hanks act that I know were great dancers were The Peps/Fabulous Peps.  They were said to have beaten The Temptations in same show (head-to-head" competitions.    I'd be curious to see any clips of The Precisions dancing.  Now that I think of it, I can't remember ever even having seen a clip of them.

[Roburt]

I have no personal view on this & can't say if there is a jot of truth in it .... BUT .... Joe Tex was always VERY VERY bitter about James Brown's reputation for having a great stage act ... the dancing, the 'fake collapse', the cape, the fighting his aides & return to continue his show .... Joe always claimed that most of that performance had simply been filched by James from Joe's stage act .... MIND YOU ... James could certainly DANCE !!!  

[Roburt]

55 minutes ago, RobbK said:

I never saw The Precisions in a show, nor have I heard that they were great dancers.  The Mike Hanks act that I know were great dancers were The Peps/Fabulous Peps.  They were said to have beaten The Temptations in same show (head-to-head" competitions.    I'd be curious to see any clips of The Precisions dancing.  Now that I think of it, I can't remember ever even having seen a clip of them.

In no way does this back up my claim ... BUT ... I just like this clip ..... Billy Prince performing in Europe a week ago ........

 

[Guest johnny hart]

A  young Tommy Hunt in that Flamingos dance clip ,still performing in his mid eighties and living in Donny ? 

[Venus]

The Vibrations on Hollywood A Go Go watch the dancing from the 3m35sec mark? love it 

 

[Robbk]

8 hours ago, Roburt said:

In no way does this back up my claim ... BUT ... I just like this clip ..... Billy Prince performing in Europe a week ago ........

 

Roburt, - in no way did I mean to imply that The Precisions were not top-notch dancers.  I only meant that I had never seen them perform either live or on film, and that I hadn't heard anything about their dancing capabilities.  On the contrary, even without having read your comment on them, I would have guessed that it's very likely that they were, indeed, excellent dancers, as that was true about MOST male Soul groups during the '60s.  That was pretty standard for a performing group.  It was the groups that just stood and did hand motions or just sang, that were in the minority.  Based on your information, I would guess that The Precisions were probably also up there among the best.

[Robbk]

2 hours ago, Venus said:

The Vibrations on Hollywood A Go Go watch the dancing from the 3m35sec mark? love it 

 

Yeah man!  That's what I'm talkin' about!

[Guest]

Major Lance was good, great footwork! Reminded me of a lot of some great Northern Soul dancers.

And really Micheal Jackson should get a mention, think he must have watched a lot of James Brown's moves!

[mecca74]

How about the Whispers ?

[Robbk]

34 minutes ago, solidsoul said:

Major Lance was good, great footwork! Reminded me of a lot of some great Northern Soul dancers.

And really Micheal Jackson should get a mention, think he must have watched a lot of James Brown's moves!

Major Lance was a fabulous dancer.  That's how he got his start.  He was a featured teen dancer on Jim Loundsberry's local, Chicago version of American Bandstand.  Lance, living in the same (Cabrini-Green) housing project, on Chicago's Near North Side, Major had become a friend of both Jerry Butler and Curtis Mayfield.  Mayfield wrote a couple of songs for Lance, hoping to get him an artist's contract with a major record label, so he could get his songs on the air, and get background singing work for his Impressions.  He succeeded in spring 1959, by getting Mercury to sign Lance and release "Phyllis"/"I Got a Girl, and having his Impressions sing backgrounds on both sides, and he, himself getting to assist in running the recording session.  Major sang it a couple times on Loundsberry's show, and the record had decent local, Chicagoland sales.  Major's dancing has always been a nice bonus in his stage act.

[Gotsoul]

Quote

I'm glad that the Flamingoes got mentioned, they are the group that the Temptations patterned themselves after, and have been often called-The Latter Day Flamingoes.

 

[Robbk]

14 minutes ago, Gotsoul said:

 

The Temptations, having started in early 1961, probably patterned themselves after the "Middle Day" Flamingos (middle End years), with Nate Nelson on lead, rather than The Philips group.

[recordsnracin]

I was so lucky to be the right age at the right time and the right place.I was in college in south Jersey from 1961-65,just a subway ride from Camden over the bridge and north on Broad Street to Dauphin St across the street from the Uptown Theatre.As a Caucasian I drew stares but didn't have any problems,although I only went to matinees as I wouldn't chance it at night.I was lucky to have seen the original Motown revue along with dozens of the stars of that era,favorites such as Major Lance,Vibrations,Patti and Bluebelles who were outta sight live,Joe Tex,Drifters,Impressions and on and on.Almost all had some dance routines or "acts" that raised the level of excitement of the crowd.But I agree,Major Lance,Vibrations,and Contours were among the best.Oh what memories. 1965 brought graduation,marriage and of course on the down side the race riots. It was only after about 5 yrs of marriage I talked the wife into seeing shows in Asbury Park,NJ near our home with Sam & Dave,Magnificent Men, Joe Tex, 5 Stairsteps and others.Then the family started and the times changed.Now I am able to go back in time a bit with the nostalgia oldies shows and oldies concerts and many of the reformed groups of old.As I said ,right place,right time.Thanks for reading my  trip down Memory Lane.

[Roburt]

An ad showing the Precisions in action on stage ....

[Sunnysoul]

The biographical information on The Precisions  mentions that they appeared on The Upbeat TV Show in Cleveland in 1967 ;  and while there is some archival footage from The Upbeat available on youtube of other pop and soul artists   ....  nothing has come to light so far of The Precisions . One lives in hope.

Here is that artist line up on The Upbeat episode 167 from 21 October 1967 :

 [167] October 21, 1967 (Cleveland)
Guests: 

• The Candy Men, 
• Johnny Cymbal, 
• Brenda Holloway, 
• Barbara Mason, 
• The Precisions, 
• Sam the Sham,
• Roger White. 

The Precisions, Brenda Holloway Barbara Mason and Sam The Sham all on one episode !

 

 

Edited April 4, 2016 by sunnysoul

[Sunnysoul]

And then they appeared again  , Episode 189, 23 March 1968  check out this line up:

4.29 [189]  March 23, 1968 (Cleveland)
Guests: 

• The Blues Project, 
• Classics IV
• Wayne Cochran and the C.C. Riders, 
• John Fred and His Playboy Band, 
• The Human Beinz, 
• Chuck Jackson & his band, 
• The Lemon Pipers,
• Margo, Margo, Medress and Seigel [formerly The Tokens],
• The Precisions, 
• ? (Question Mark) and the Mysterians, 
• O.C. Smith, 
• Bobby Vee, 
• The Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Ban

[Pomonkey]

Hi Roburt, have no doubt that the Precisions would be hard to beat, have heard many detailed memories from Billy Prince about the amount of work they put into their stage show, and they spent so much time with their choreographer he even appears vocally on at least one of their recordings, he himself has no footage of them either, what would we give for that huh. 

[Roburt]

Yes, I back up the last post. Billy says they put huge effort into their stage act & were highly regarded because of their dance work. He also confirms that, so far, no footage of them performing in the 60's has been found. It all seems to have been destroyed.  SHAME !!