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Gus Giordano began the company in 1963 under the name Dance Incorporated Chicago. It became the Giordano Dance Company in 1966 when many of its live performances were broadcast by Chicago’s Public Television Station WTTW. In 1968 the company performed American jazz dance for the touring Bolshoi Ballet who were so impressed that an invitation was extended, and the company eventually toured the Soviet Union in 1974, the first jazz dance company to do so.
This focus on jazz dance led to a new name — Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago — and its current mission to develop and preserve the indigenous American art form of jazz dance, thereby creating an awareness of jazz dance as a true artistic expression of American life.
For more than 40 years, the Giordano Company has brought the excitement of American jazz dancing to audiences throughout the United States and in countries around the world — including Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland, Russia, the Bahamas, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, and Japan. GJDC serves as host performing company at each summer’s Jazz Dance World Congress, which has been held at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., at the University at Buffalo, in Japan, Germany, Mexico, Costa Rica, Phoenix, and Chicago.
According to the Chicago Sun-Times, “Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago demonstrated that it now belongs in the front ranks of this city’s resident companies.” In 2004, the company received a Chicago Dance Award for its production and performance of Ron De Jesus’ Prey, “representing the vital new directions taken by the company.”
Since 1993 Nan Giordano has served as Artistic Director and has guided the development of a large and diverse repertoire.
GUS GIORDANO Founder
1923-2008
Gus Giordano wrote the highly acclaimed Anthology of American Jazz Dance, the first book of its kind. Giordano organized the first Jazz Dance World Congress in August 1990. This event, co-sponsored by Northwestern University, assembled jazz dance greats such as Luigi, Matt Mattox, and Giordano and numerous jazz dance companies for a week of master classes and performances. Now an annual event, the Congress has been held at The Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., at Northwestern University and University at Buffalo, in Phoenix, Chicago, Japan, Germany, Mexico, Costa Rica, and in the summer of 2009 will return to Chicago. Gus Giordano was the recipient of the 1984 Dance Educators of America Award for his “outstanding contribution to the world of jazz dance.” Additional honors include the 1988 Mayor’s Award for the Arts (Evanston, Illinois), the 1989 Governor’s Award for the Arts for exemplary individual artistic achievement, the 1991 Dance Teacher Now “Circle Award” for lifetime contributions to dance education, the 1993 Ruth Page Lifetime Service to the Field Award (presented to Gus and his late wife Peg); and in 1996 from the University of Missouri the “Distinguished Alumni Award” and the “William Francis English Scholar-in-Residence Award.” In 1985, Governor James Thompson declared April 25 “Gus Giordano Day” in appreciation of “his immense contribution to the cultural environment of the State of Illinois.” In 1995 he received the “Honorable Artist Award” from Chukyo University in Nagoya, Japan. In 1997 Gus served as National Spokesperson for National Dance Week. In 1999, Gus received the Third Annual Katherine Dunham Award for “excellence and great contributions to the Arts,” and in 2003, Chicago’s Mayor Daley presented Gus with the Chicago Senior of the Year Award. In 2005 the National Dance Association presented Gus with its Heritage Award, and the same year Gus received an Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts Degree from Shenandoah University.