By The Beachwood Freaky Dance Step Affairs Desk
The moonwalk or backslide is a dance technique that presents the illusion that the dancer is stepping forward while actually moving backward.
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“The moonwalk was recorded as early as 1955 in a performance by tap dancer Bill Bailey,” according to Wikipedia. “The French mime, Marcel Marceau, used it throughout his career (from the 1940s through the 1980s), as part of the drama of his mime routines, such as in trying to chase a balloon, etc. James Brown used the move in the 1980 film The Blues Brothers. Jeffrey Daniel performed a self-made variation of the moonwalk in a performance of Shalamar’s ‘A Night To Remember’ on Top of the Pops in 1982.”
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“Marceau, who died aged 84 in 2007 and was extremely popular with US audiences, ‘would often recount how Michael Jackson used to go see him perform when he was around 13 or 14,” AFP notes. “‘He told him once backstage that the inspiration behind the moonwalk was Marceau’s Walking against the Wind’.”
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The physics of the moonwalk. The key is friction.
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London Flash Mob Tribute to the Moonwalk
Posted on June 29, 2009