Quotes from Savion Glover

Whether it is Jimmy Slyde or Lon Chaney or Gregory Hines, their dance shows what they experienced, what they had to go through.

I actually wanted to be a fireman when I was younger.

Every now and then, someone comes along - we used to call it 'New Jack' - tries to do something new, tries to take all the credit, without acknowledging the past.

I like to be around dancers who are totally committed to the art form, totally committed to the men and women around them.

I wake up, and I'm in the zone... My performance is the continuation of my life.

I can produce any instrument, any sound that I can imagine; it may be percussive to the audience, but in my mind it may be a piano, a melody, or a tuba, or a harp, or a harmonica. My mission is to allow people to hear the dance in its purity and up against any other type of sound or music.

Every performance is different because I'm different; my mood is different.

Authenticity is the most important thing. You have to know where it all comes from, study who pioneered it.

I search for different tonalities in my taps. But my greatest pleasure is hearing a note I haven't heard before, hearing a chord that sparks something new.

What does genius mean? God has put us here specifically... every person has a job or journey to do. It's just a matter of finding what we're here to fulfill or execute. That's genius to me.

Jimmy Slyde was more a musician than a dancer; Greg Hines was more musician than dancer.

My show mode is that the dressing room is like going into the cockpit. Going down the stairs is like going on the runway, and once we begin performing, it's flight time. I'm just floatin' on that stage.

I see myself helping the next generation of dancers who come along, helping them to keep the dance focused, so we don't get into a position where they're saying in 2050, or whatever, that around 2001 or 2002 or something the dance died.

Other dances are like languages, like French or Spanish, but my steps are slang, and slang is always changing.

I try new stuff every time I perform. I have steps I do that I know are definite, and stuff I can make up right then and there and then forget.

The Nicholas Brothers were the best tap-dancers. I'm not talking about their flash-dancing, I'm talking about tap-dancing. They were really saying something with their feet.

I can hold a note, but that's about it.

I try to convey the musical notes through dance, take on the music.

I want to share what I have, and I'd rather share it with people that are a little bit more open-minded.

Great athletes last because they let the mental do all the work. What we do as hoofers is not so much a physical strain as everybody thinks. It's more of a mental stretch.

Frank Sinatra changed people's approach to singing. Ella Fitzgerald, Marvin Gaye, van Gogh, they were all part of movements that allowed people to think about their craft differently. They changed the game. These people changed the game.

The connection of what I do to flamenco lies in the whole lament, whole cry, whole pouring back into the earth and giving energy back to the earth. It's a cry and a celebration. That's what music, sound, vibration should do. It should spark energy in someone.

I go for a nice walk in my neighborhood and search for vinyl, old jazz, classics. Then I go home and listen to them.