Alfred Desio

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Dancer and choreographer Alfred Desio, a Broadway veteran who invented a form of electronically enhanced tap dancing called Tap-Tronics, died Wednesday. He was 74.

Desio died of complications of bladder cancer at Olympia Medical Center in Los Angeles, his wife and dance collaborator Louise Reichlin said Friday.

Desio created Tap-Tronics in the 1980s, a concept that allows tap dancers to make their own music by means of microphones in their shoes. The tap sounds picked up by the microphones are relayed to transmitters, receivers, synthesizers and other electronic equipment.

Electronic tap was featured in the 1989 movie "Tap," starring Gregory Hines, Sammy Davis Jr. and Savion Glover.

Born in Geneva, N.Y., Desio began performing at a young age and studied acting, dancing and singing in high school, his wife said.

He was an original cast member of the Broadway hit "West Side Story," playing a Sharks gang member, and had roles in "Fiddler On the Roof," "Man of La Mancha," "She Loves Me" and other musicals.

Desio moved to California in the early 1970s while touring with Katharine Hepburn. The two met while working on the musical "Coco."

After settling in Los Angeles, he focused on producing tap dance performances and teaching at the University of Southern California, the Colburn School of Performing Arts and Loyola Marymount University.

In recent years, he directed a tap dancing program for children and helped his wife run the Los Angeles Choreographers & Dancers dance company.
Copyright © 2007 The Associated Press