Montreal's Queen of Tap says goodbye to dance school in Dorval

Ethel Bruneau's tap school is something of an institution, not just in Dorval, but in the wider Montreal dance community.

Bruneau, who is now 82, casts a long shadow and has had a hand in teaching hundreds, if not thousands, of young people and adults during her career.

This month she's closing another chapter, as she bids farewell to the dance school she's run in Dorval for the last 14 years.

Bruneau says the rent on her studio is just too high, and student enrollment in dance classes isn't what it used to be.

"I don't have the students that I had. Kids aren't dancing like they used to. There used to be 200, 300 kids in here. Now I'm down to about five," she said.

Born in Harlem and dancing since the age of three, Bruneau opened her first dance school in Dorion, Que. in 1959.

She worked in showbiz for many years, but she always came back to teaching.

"The thing that I love most is teaching people how to dance," she said.

"When you teach someone how to do something, and you see the smile on their faces, and you see the little kids that could go out on the stage and do a show by themselves without me being in the front of them, it's like a dream come true."

Alongside her dance school, Bruneau was also a nursery school teacher in Montreal West for 30 years. She taught tap prolifically, teaching students at Collège Jean-de-Brébeuf and at Eva Von Gencsy's Ballet Jazz studio.

Bruneau also performed with the Cab Calloway Orchestra, in Montreal jazz hotspots and made numerous television appearances. 

"I danced all over Montreal," she joked. "It's been one heck of a ride."

At her studio in Dorval, Bruneau has built up a community over the years, with students ranging in age from four to 86. 

"This is a family," she said, motioning the walls covered in photos of former students. "This has been my life."

Her granddaughter Majiza Philips is carrying the legacy on in her own way, teaching tap at five different schools in the Montreal area.

Still, Bruneau isn't ready to hang up her tap shoes just yet.

"I'm still teaching, I'm not going anywhere," she said.

She plans to keep her operation going in one way or another, perhaps by renting out shared studio space on a limited basis.