Black Arts Movement choreographer Ruth Beckford Room naming ceremony at Geoffery's Inner Circle in the BAMBD
Grand Diva of Dance in the Bay Area, Most Honorable Ruth Beckford
Friends and lovers of Ruth Beckford in the "Ruth Beckford Room" Gefforey's Inner Circle in the BAMBD
photo Gene Hazzard
The Grand Diva of Dance in the Bay Area, 91 year old Queen Ruth Beckford was honored tonight (Dec 1, 2016) with a room in her name at Geoffery's Inner Circle, an anchor venue in the Black Arts Movement Business District. I am proud to say I knew and idolized Ruth Beckford when I was a child growing up in West Oakland. I was in elementary school and after school, I would go to New Century Playground next to McFeely Elementary School. There I saw the most beautiful Black women I'd ever seen, Ruth Beckford taught dance at New Century which was a venue in the Oakland Department of Park and Recreation.
L to R: The Honorable Ruth Beckford, MX grandson Jah Amiel, Marvin X and granddaughter Naeemah Joy. When the event planner told Marvin to show his grandchildren the archives on the wall of Geoffery's, his tour included the bar, at which his granddaughter jumped on a bar stood at the bar and rested her hands like John Wayne ready to order a shot of whiskey. When the bar tender ordered her out of the bar, Ms Naeemah Joy had an attitude but said nothing though her face expressed her displeasure at being kicked out the bar at five years old. Marvin ordered his grandchildren a generic Shirley Temple which they said was good, good, good. Readers may recal when his grandson, Jah Amiel, was three years old, he told Marvin X, "Grandfather, you can't save the world, but I can!" Marvin X has never been the same! As readers will note from this pic, Marvin X is partially blind from partner violence. What goes around comes around, he heard. As per Marvin X, he noted when he met Ruth Beckford he was the age (8) and size of his grandson Jah Amiel. photo Gene Hazzerd
I would see her coming and going from New Century and my childhood brain told me she was just absolutely the most beautiful queen my eyes had seen. I cannot say African Queen because I knew nothing about Africa at the time.except Tarzan.
I didn't get to know Ms Beckford at New Century because I wasn't into dance but I must credit the Oakland Rec for initiating my career in drama since I performed in a children's play at Mosswood Park, at which I was called a nigger for the first time by a little white girl who told me, "Nigger, get out of the sandbox."
Throughout the years, I continued to see Ruth Beckford and marvel at her black velvet skin and short natural that she wore during the 50s.
The Honorable Ruth Beckford, BAM artist supreme and Geoffery Pete, owner of Geoffery's Inner Circle in the BAMBD
photo Gene Hazzard
When Geoffery Pete honored her tonight, he remarked that her father was a member of Marcus Garvey's UNIA. Thus, she was a child of Black Nationalist parents. We will offer her biography in a moment, but I know she trained many in dance in the Bay Area and elsewhere. I will name Deborah Vaughan, Ellendar Barnes and Suzzette Johnson. Although her students were absent, her many friends were present. We note also on the 50th anniversary of the Black Panther Party, it was Ruth Beckford who set up the breakfast program for the BPP and made her dance students "serve the people".
Choreographer Beckford was honored with commendations from Congresswoman Barbara Lee and a proclamation from Oakland City Council President Lynette McElhaney.
BAMBD photographer promises us ample photos tomorrow.
BIOGRAPHY OF CHOREOGRAPHER RUTH BECKFORD
Ruth Beckford (1925 - ) was born in Oakland, California on December
7, 1925. She was one of four children including one sister and twin
brothers. Her parents, natives of Jamiaca and Atlanta, Georgia, and her
extended family supported her training in dance including tap,
acrobatics and ballet as well as music lessons. Miss Beckford performed
professionally as a child in vaudeville acts, with her brother and solo,
onstage in competition at movie-houses and also at social settings such
as Sunday teas and other community events. Miss Beckford continued to
train and perform, eventually auditioning for Katherine Dunham's touring
company in San Francisco at age seventeen. Offered a contract, Miss
Beckford chose to attend UC-Berkeley and perform with Miss Dunham
whenever they toured locally.
Miss Beckford studied modern dance technique and ocmposition with
Caryl Cuddeback at UC-Berkeley while also training at Welland Lathrop
and Anna Halprin's dance studio in San Francisco. She was the first
African-American performer in a Bay Area modern dance company and also
to become a member of the Orchesis Modern Dance Society at UC-Berkeley.
Upon graduation, Miss Beckford created the United States' first
recreational dance department at Oakland's Parks and Recreation
Department. She remained project director for twenty and one and a half
years, developing a coherent philosophy of teaching the whole child and
established a graduated set of programs for girls ages seven through
young adult. Several of her students have become significant dance
artist/educators including heads of dance departments and professional
companies both locally and nation-wide.
Miss Beckford simultaneously taught African-Haitian dance based on
the Dunham technique at her private studios and was artistic director of
the Ruth Beckford African-Haitian Dance Company. The company toured
throughout the college and university circuit before disbanding in 1962.
Her writing career includes the authorized biography of Katherine
Dunham, supported by several research trips to Haiti and published by
Dekker (NY) in 1979. She has also written her own autobiography, two
cookbooks, three original plays and an article for the California Dance
Educator's journal.
Her trilogy of plays titled Tis the Morning of My Life was
produced by Ron Thompson of the Oakland Ensemble Theater Company, where
she has served on the Board of Directors. The play have been performed
in the East Bay and in New York and was also filmed for a television
pilot series. Miss Beckford has also sung and acted on stage, in feature
films, television and commercials including two PBS television movies
directed by Maya Angelou.
Her many honors and community acknowledgements include acting as a
dance panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts (1972-74), and
induction into the Black Filmmakers, Oakland Parks and Recreation and
the Bay Area's Isadora Duncan Dance Community Hall of Fame.
Miss Beckford closed her private dance studios in 1975 and had
several back surgeries. Based on her life-time of helping others,
including co-creating a free breakfast program with the Black Panther
Party, Miss Beckford developed a new career in social work-related
programs. Recent work has included counseling at the City of Oakland Job
Training Partnership Act office and also at the Oakland Earthquake
Support Services Center after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. She also
developed, with collaborator Ron Thompson, a motivational speaking
business for both homeless and corporate clients. Miss Beckford was
crowned Ghana Queen Mother of Dance at Harambere Dance ensemble
performance in 1990.
Drummond: Ruth Beckford still fabulous after 80
Former dancer and choreographer Ruth Beckford, 88, is photographed
at her home in Oakland, Calif., on Wednesday, May 8, 2013. Beckford is
an Oakland Tech alumni and taught at the Katherine Dunham school in New
York. Among her many accomplishments, she’s a founder of the Oakland
Dance Association. (Jane Tyska/Bay Area News Group)
Oakland native Ruth Beckford is a Bay Area dance legend who used to thrill audiences with her acrobatic moves.
Beckford, was a disciple of the late Katherine Dunham, the
matriarch of the modern black dance movement. Beckford taught at
Dunham’s school in New York and studied voodoo dance rituals under
Dunham in Haiti.
Beckford later returned to the Bay Area to open the Ruth
Beckford African-Haitian Dance Company. She also started a modern dance
department at the Oakland Office of Parks and Recreation, where she
taught dance to countless young people over the years.
Beckford, 87, who could once make her body perform feats
others could only dream of, uses a walker. Yet she refuses to let
age-related ailments interfere with her zest for life.
On Saturday, Beckford and fellow octogenarians, former
television journalist Belva Davis, genealogist Electra Price, educator
Careth B. Reid, and youngster Dezie Woods-Jones, 72, will share their
advice for living life to the fullest in one’s golden years.
I recently interviewed Beckford at her downtown Oakland
home, where she has lived for 50 years, to talk to her about what it’s
like to be 87.
Q: You’ve lived through a lot of historic events. What stands out the most?
A: My sweet 16 on Pearl Harbor Day. We all went to the
movie. We’re sitting in the movie eating milk duds … and on the screen
the movie stopped, and it said all military personnel report to your
bases the United States is at war with Japan, we are getting bombed. …
Folks talk about 9/11. Our best friends were Japanese kids. Then, when
they got evacuated to their camps, we all cried; our friends were gone.
It was terrible. And no one ever came back.
Q: What’s the most important thing to keep in mind when you turn 80?
A: You don’t have to prove yourself anymore. It’s about you.
Don’t be an on-call baby sitter. You can still have a good time. Just
because you are 80 doesn’t mean sit down and die. Make your bucket list
different. The main thing is to be independent. I get on Paratransit and
go to Lorraine Hansberry (Theatre) to see a play. I saw that show with
the Chinese dancers, that was great. I take myself out to lunch, went
and did my nails yesterday.
Q: What kinds of health challenges have you had?
I am the original bionic woman. Five back surgeries. Two hip
replacements and one adjustment. Rotary cuff. Four trigger fingers. And
I’m getting ready to have a new knee as soon as I get back from
Atlanta. My innards are good. It’s all these joints.
Q: So how do you deal with declining physical health and not getting depressed?
A: I’ve had five back surgeries, but I can get up on that
walker, and I like to go out. So there’s always somebody worse off.
Happiness is an inside job.
Q: Have you ever smoked?
A: Never. Never made sense to me to even sneak it. When I
went to Cal, everyone had cigarette holders and cases and things. I
always thought that’s a waste of my money.
Q: Tell me about your diet.
A: I had an attack of gout, which makes you stand up and say
thank you Lord it’s over. So I can’t eat meat or fish or shellfish.
It’s a choice. I can say let’s go out and have a martini and then have
an attack of gout; it ain’t worth it. I can cook chicken and turkey any
way you want. I eat vegetables.
Q: Do you exercise?
A: I do my recline cycle three times a week, which I hate with a passion. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 7 o’clock.
Q: How many of your friends are still living?
A: So many of my friends are gone or have Alzheimer’s, and
it’s just very, very sad. That’s why I say keep in touch with your old
friends because they get fewer and fewer and fewer.
Q: What is your secret to longevity?
A: I don’t let things stress me out. Anything I cannot touch
and help I’m not going to let it get on me. Stress will give you the
heart attacks, the strokes and all that business.
Q: Do you use the Internet?
A: I don’t have a computer. I’m not interested in the
Facebook and the backbook and the hipbook and the earbook. I don’t want
to know that you walked across the street today.
Q: What advice do you have for younger people?
A: Quit smoking now. Don’t wait. Don’t worry about what
folks think of you. If you want to do something, and you’re true to
yourself, go do it.
The workshop is Saturday at Geoffrey’s, 410 14th St.,
Oakland. Registration is from 8 to 9 a.m. Admission is $25, exact
change, cash only. There is a handicap elevator around the corner on
Franklin Street and public parking at Webster and 14th Street.
Friends and lovers of Ruth Beckford in the "Ruth Beckford Room" Gefforey's Inner Circle in the BAMBD
No comments:
Post a Comment