‘Noise’s’ Heir Apparent

At age 24, Derick K. Grant calls himself “the grandfather” of the young cast of “Bring in ‘Da Noise, Bring in ‘Da Funk”--the show that reinvents tap dancing, currently playing at the Ahmanson Theatre.

His feelings result not from age so much as the size of his big new responsibility: performing the central role of ‘da beat, a highly personal role that Savion Glover, the co-creator of the show, conceived and choreographed for himself.

The role of ‘da beat includes a dramatic solo, performed on a darkened stage in a semicircle of dance studio-style mirrors, entitled “Green, Chaney, Buster, Slyde: A Tap Rap Discourse.” The piece is a tribute to Glover’s tap idols Chuck Green, Isaiah “Lon” Chaney, James “Buster” Brown and Jimmy Slyde, and is performed to an audiotape of Glover’s words, spoken by Grant. But even though the signature on the role is so clearly Glover’s, and the choreographer might have been thought to be irreplaceable, Grant has been earning raves from critics as he travels with the show in this touring production.

Grant knows he’s stepping into some very large, loud shoes. But after working his way up through the ranks in the show, he says he knows exactly what he’s doing.

“My initial job with the show was understudy, then I went on to be dance captain, and in doing so, I really had to learn both Savion’s style of tap and choreography and staging,” Grant said during a recent breakfast conversation, while he and another cast member, understudy Sean C. Fielder, lent new meaning to the term “carbo-loading” by ordering pretty much everything on the menu (probably safe to say that “Noise/Funk” burns more calories than any past or current Broadway show).

“When the time came to assume the role, I felt that I really had enough of a preparation . . . physically, I was geared for it,” Grant observed. “The next hardest thing was mentally, to be able to trust myself enough to be honest, and really just give my all, completely, to the role. The only reason I had the courage to do that was watching Savion do it for two years.

“That’s really what the beat is all about--trying to fulfill your soul by being as honest as possible, to triumph over any situation. ‘Da beat is a role that I wish everyone on the planet could experience being inside of, just because it’s so fulfilling.”

A Boston native, Grant is known to Los Angeles dance audiences from his three years in the early 1990s as a soloist with the local Jazz Tap Ensemble. He describes his own approach to ‘da beat as completely different from Glover’s--he’s more outgoing, with a jazz dancer’s approach--even though he, like Glover, studied with some of the old masters as a child. At 10, Grant traveled to Rome (his first trip outside Boston, where he trained in tap at his aunt’s dance school) to perform in a two-week tap festival with both up-and-comers and some of the legends of tap.

“I was just awe-struck,” Grant said. “Just to be around these old men still doing it. To me, it was like a club that I always wanted to be in.

“Chaney was like the rugged ex-boxer--he was so big. As a kid, I admired him so much, because he put in 110%, but at the same time, I was afraid of him . . . I kept my distance. Slyde was different. Slyde was, if you fall down, he’ll pick you up and dust you off and tell you to keep going, whereas Chaney would probably laugh at you for falling.”

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Grant shares with Glover an almost religious dedication to preserving the history of tap. He enjoys seeing popular percussive shows such as “Tap Dogs,” “Riverdance” and “Stomp,” but calls them trendy entertainment, not art. The only similarity between those shows and “Noise/Funk,” he said with a raised eyebrow, is that “they’ve got something on the bottom of their shoes.”

“There was a time when tap was almost invisible,” Grant said. “We are working hard to make sure that doesn’t happen again. The hardest thing for me, being young and fairly successful, is knowing that I have 60 years in front of me, and there could be another drought. It’s nice to have shows like ‘Tap Dogs’ and ‘Riverdance,’ as long as it doesn’t become just about trendiness. What are they saying?

“I do this for my life. I’m a tap dancer. So if you are just doing it because it’s the ‘in’ thing to do right now, you are screwing up my thing . . . for me, it’s a form of meditation, an outlet.”

Grant fears that the current tap trend will defuse its power. “I compare it to rap music,” he said. “Rap music meant so much more when it was done in the ghetto . . . it is being stripped of that juice, that oomph, that got it there in the first place.”

Grant is equally dedicated to the show’s educational component, as it offers a fast-and-furious trip through black history. “I think, more than anything, the show is about identity,” he said. “As a people, being taken from our home in Africa and having to identify with becoming American, that whole struggle and that process is something that everyone can relate to.”

Can everyone relate to the fact that, at least so far, the “Noise/Funk” cast has failed to bring in ‘da women dancers? “Here we go . . . ,” says Grant, grinning half-apologetically, as though he’s heard this question before. “I’m really old-fashioned when it comes to this stuff, I’m a little piggish at times. You have to take tap as seriously as I do if you are going to share the stage with me, you know what I’m saying? And there are some women who are like that, but not the majority.

“When we approach it, it’s from a competitive, athletic, testosterone, muscle-head kind of attitude. A lot of women approach tap from a very dance-y point of view. A partner is going to want to do lifts and dips--nah! We’re out there to cut throat. We’re out there to win the game. It’s like being in basketball, being the Dennis Rodman out there who is ugly, but is beautiful.” Grant pauses to think for a moment. “But I’ve got to say, a lot of women do it, and the reason that tap is still around is that women teach it,” he muses. “You don’t see many men teaching. The only way we are getting our education is through women. They have always played an integral role in our survival as tap dancers. Without one, you don’t have the other.”

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* “Bring in ‘Da Noise, Bring in ‘Da Funk,” Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N. Grand Ave., Los Angeles, Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays-Sundays, 2 p.m. and March 26, April 9, 23, 2 p.m. Ends April 26. $15-$65. (213) 628-2772. Running time: 2 hours.