Jazz in movement and music is ever-evolving. As jazz dance celebrates its many interpretations, it pays homage to its lineage. Its history and artistic roots in the expression of enslaved peoples strengthen the art form, turning its practice into a metaphor for resistance and a struggle for acceptance.

The rapid kaleidoscope of movement and music in Uprooted speaks more clearly than any artificial narrative. Setting testimonials from dedicated practitioners of jazz dance against a linear examination of American history, Uprooted is an opportunity to experience the nuanced place that the art form finds itself in today.

“…an enriching corrective to the official story of jazz dance, taking it beyond its already fascinating and complex showbiz luster to profoundly political terrain. … incisive (and, for the most part, nimbly interwoven) commentaries observing the ways jazz dance, like jazz itself, embodies the very history of the United States. Stripped of identity, severed from their African cultures and forbidden to use drums because they were a form of communication, enslaved people were silenced people, and dance became a necessary language, a form of survival and a means of protest.” – Sheri Linden, Hollywood Reporter

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