| Louis Johnson was born in Statesville, North Carolina, and spent most of his
childhood in Washington, D.C. After initial study at the Doris Jones-Clara
Haywood School of Dance he moved to New York in 1950 to accept a
scholarship at the School of American Ballet. In 1952 Johnson performed
with the New York City Ballet in the premiere of Jerome Robbins'
"Ballade." Throughout the 1950s Johnson danced on Broadway in several
shows including "My Darlin' Aida, House of Flowers, Hallelujah Baby!"
and both the stage and screen versions of Bob Fosse's "Damn Yankees."
Johnson began making dances in 1953 and achieved his greatest fame as a
choreographer who comically combines a continuum of movement styles
including social dances to popular music, classical ballet technique,
Katherine Dunham-inspired modern dance, spiritual dancing, and acrobatics.
His two most popular ballets are "Forces of Rhythm" (1972), created
for the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and "Fontessa and Friends" (1981),
first performed by the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. In 1970 Johnson
was nominated for a Tony Award for his choreography of "Purlie," a
musical version of Ossie Davis' "Purlie Victorious." He also
choreographed the films "Cotton Comes to Harlem" (1970) and "The
Wiz" (1978). Johnson staged the Houston Grand Opera's 1975 revival of
the Scott Joplin opera "Treemonisha," which included a reconstruction
of the "slow drag," a 19th-century African-American social dance.
Active as an arts educator and teacher since the 1970s, Johnson has
conducted black arts symposiums at Howard, Yale, Virginia State, Hampton
Institute, and Morehouse College, and in 1986 was appointed as the
director of the dance division of the Henry Street Settlement on the Lower
East Side of Manhattan.
-- Thomas F. DeFrantz
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