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Donald McKayle was an American modern dancer, choreographer, teacher, director and writer best known for creating socially conscious concert works during the 1950s and '60s that focus on expressing the human condition and, more specifically, the black experience in America. He was "among the first black men to break the racial barrier by means of modern dance." His work for the concert stage, especially Games (1951) and Rainbow Round My Shoulder (1959), has been the recipient of widespread acclaim and critical attention.
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McKayle's career began in 1948 as a modern dancer and choreographer, his early concert works synthesizing ballet, tap, modern, and Afro-Caribbean vocabularies to articulate the Black American experience with unprecedented specificity. He transitioned to Broadway in the 1950s and achieved historic prominence in the 1970s as the first Black director-choreographer of major Broadway musicals, most notably *Raisin*, which garnered him a Tony Award. His final decades were marked by leadership roles at Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and UCLA, cementing his status as a transformative figure who proved dance could be both artistically rigorous and socially urgent.
Tony Award for Best Musical for *Raisin* (1974), becoming the first Black man to direct and choreograph a major Broadway musical
DeWitt Clinton High School
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