"Back in the good old days . . . before people watched TV. . . ."
How often these words are heard by children. But in this book it is different because it is the children who say the words as Grandpa, who lived in those times, brings them back to the children. "Grandpa was a song and dance man who once danced on the vaudeville stage. . . ."When three generations come to visit and the old leather-trimmed trunk is opened, the garb from the past is paraded; half-moon taps on shoes, vests, hats and a gold-headed cane.
The show begins: an old soft shoe, a faster step that "sounds like a woodpecker tapping on a tree," a version of "Yankee Doodle Boy," magic tricks, jokes and a finale of spins, jumps and a bow to the children.
With nostalgia, Grandpa glances back at the attic. "We wonder how much he really misses that time on the vaudeville stage, when he was a song and dance man. . . ."
"The Song and Dance Man" is about an hour (maybe even less) shared by grandfather and children when an old man relives his past. But this hour in the attic is obviously not the first performance by the former burlesque artist. These children know about the leather trunk and what tenderness it holds; for example, the shiny tap shoes wrapped gently in shammy cloth. They each have a favorite hat from the collection and perch themselves in familiar and strategic seats, as the tilting old lamps make a spotlight for the floorshow.
They know about the dance steps, have heard the jokes before, had the silver dollar pulled from out of somebody's ear. This is not the first show by Grandpa.
But its familiarity does not take away from the ceremony. The applause and hugs at the end (with the old man's whispered appreciation of the here-and-now) make it a bonding like no other performance between audience and performer.
What Karen Ackerman has captured with the slight text, Stephen Gammell has expanded with colored pencil drawings - antics of a grandfather who can still shuffle and strut even though the ravages of time have put girth on the once-lithe body.
"The Song and Dance Man," winner of the 1988 Caldecott Award, is as nimble and rhythmic as the old man's tap shoes.