Toni Basil Choreographing New York

New York is as exciting now as it ever was.  It’s been a magnet for incredibly talented people from all over the world for over a century, and continues to attract the best and the brightest of each subsequent generation.  People who have an inkling to make grand statements in art, design, and world culture come to the city to see how they might make themselves heard and understood.  It’s a vibrant place to visit, too, not only for the locals.  Now more than ever it’s a place to go to see exciting new work in the fields of dance, performance, and music.  There are many travelers who will go to www.newyorkhotelsuites.com to book their perfect trip, where they can see the city in style.

There are some, too, who like to travel to the other side of the country, and see what’s happening in Los Angeles.  Many residents of New York or L.A. eventually become bi-coastal, doing work in both cities, because of the high concentrations of talent in each place, as well as powerful entertainment industries, too, in each city.  Sometimes the most innovative artists will achieve success from a sudden and unexpected hit somewhere, which is what happened with Toni Basil with her big MTV hit Mickey.  There are countless fans of this song who know her only for this song, but her career is much longer, and much more extensive than this.

She’s made appearances in some major films, including Easy Rider, which defined a generation.  It’s interesting to see how her music hit in the 80s would similarly define a generation, and for much more vapid reasons, but the joke was probably on all of us all along.  Her choreographic work is absolutely magnificent, and she’s been involved in iconic performances from David Bowie to David Byrne.  Recently, she’s been winning awards for work in hiphop, and has taken an interest in Lucumi rhythms, as well as choreographic work in other Latin forms, in L.A. as well as New York City.