Wilder’s class is clapping and thumping at Takoma Park’s Knock on Wood Tap Studio, the only dance school in the area — and one of the few in the country — that focuses solely on tap. KOW officially opened in this location last month — and the bustle on this busy Monday night, as students greet each other in the crowded reception area, sign the roll book and jostle for space to change their shoes, belies the fact that, as recently as last month, its continued operation was in doubt. The start of fall classes here marks not only a new semester, but a new beginning.
When the small nonprofit school shuttered its longtime Silver Spring location in March after funding cuts made it impossible to meet operating expenses, the tap community swung into action. Instructors held fund-raising tap classes, other schools loaned space, and alumni donated money to put supplies — sound systems, tap shoes, portable dance flooring — in storage. Meanwhile, the board of directors scrambled to find the school a more affordable home. The Takoma Park space fit the bill and, in a circuitous twist of fate, is the site of Knock on Wood’s original studio.
“We’re across the hall from where we used to be,” said co-founder Yvonne Edwards. “It’s like going home again.”
Edwards co-founded Tappers with Attitude, Inc., which encompassed the studio and the youth performance ensemble that rehearsed there, with Renee Kreither in 1991. A dance instructor for more than 60 years, “Miss Yvonne,” as she is affectionately called, presides over the studio as a sort of grande dame of the tap community, offering warm greetings to all comers. Her school is known for welcoming students at all levels, whether performance-bound teens or determined adult beginners. Says Edwards, “I just love everybody who wants to put on tap shoes.”
Her attitude reflects that of the Washington area tap scene, which embraces community over competition. “Everybody knows each other,” laughs KOW instructor Lisa Swenton-Eppard. “We refer to each other as the Tap Family.” That family comes together every spring at the annual D.C. Tap Festival, held at the D.C. Dance Collective and the Duke Ellington Theatre. Throughout the community, KOW is recognized as a standard bearer for its tap-only program, the professionalism of its instructors, and its emphasis on musicality and tap history.
The new studio still has a makeshift quality. There’s no office phone and no readily identifiable KOW signage on the building. Canvas curtains separate the main studio from the reception area, and a fiberboard hallway leads to a smaller studio painted burnt orange. Both dance areas are equipped with the basics, however — mirrored walls, ceiling fans, and the all-important sprung maple flooring so dancers can stomp away without injuring their knee and hip joints. The studio’s inviting spirit is reinforced by the shiny black tap shoes in every conceivable size that wait in pairs by the door.
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