Othella Dallas

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Othella Dallas (* 26. September 1925 in Memphis (Tennessee) as Othella Strozier ) is an American dancer and jazz singer . After working in Paris and Zurich, she opened a dance school in Basel's Gundeli district in 1975 , where she teaches the Dunham technique .

Live and act

Dallas, whose mother was the first African American pianist to be heard on the St. Louis radio , comes from a musical family; her half-brother is Frank Strozier . WC Handy was her babysitter. In 1943 she was discovered by Katherine Dunham at a school performance in St. Louis , who brought her to her dance company in New York. As a solo dancer for the Dunham Company, Strozier toured as far as South America and Europe. After their marriage, she moved to France in 1949. There she began to perform as a singer from 1952, also with greats like Sidney Bechet and Nat King Cole . In addition, she founded a dance school there, just as in the 1960s in Zurich, where she taught Margrit Läubli , Daniel Spoerri , Ruedi Walter and Margrit Rainer . Duke Ellington wrote two songs for her; The singer's first recordings were made in 1967 with Mac Strittmatter's septet. Further albums were made from the 1980s. On her seventieth birthday, she performed for three weeks in the Basler Tabourettli , and later toured Russia. Her CD 2008 I Live the Life I Love (2008) gave her appearances at the Festival da Jazz in St. Moritz as well as at the Rigiblick Theater in Zurich .

Andres Brütsch made the documentary Othella Dallas - What Is Luck? , which premiered in 2015.

Her dance workshops , which she organizes not only in Basel, but also in other European countries such as London, are very popular, as she is the last still active dance teacher to dance with Katherine Dunham . As a jazz singer, Dallas is touring Switzerland with her band in 2019 as part of the “94th Anniversary Tour”.

Discographic notes

Awards

  • 2019: Swiss Jazz Award

literature

  • Eva Caflisch, Stefan Zurkinden: The Othella Dallas Story: An American in Basel . Benteli Verlag, Bern 1981, ISBN 9783716503744 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bruno Bötschi: I can't dance in heaven. In: The time . July 25, 2013, accessed September 16, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Maya Künzler: "If I stop dancing, I will be dead". In: TagesWoche . April 25, 2017, accessed on September 17, 2019 (Swiss Standard German).
  3. ↑ Urs Bühler: With body and life | NZZ . April 20, 2016, ISSN  0376-6829 ( nzz.ch [accessed on September 17, 2019]).
  4. ↑ Renata Sago: She Learned From Katherine Dunham. At 93, She's Teaching Her Technique. In: The New York Times . April 30, 2019, accessed September 17, 2019 .
  5. ↑ Othella Dallas: Concerts. Retrieved September 17, 2019 .
  6. ↑ Swiss Jazz Award 2019 goes to Othella Dallas. In: Tages Anzeiger . May 13, 2019, accessed September 17, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME Dallas, Othella
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Strozier, Othella (maiden name); Wydler, Othella
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American jazz singer and dancer
DATE OF BIRTH September 26, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH Memphis (Tennessee)