Because the an infant she received moving knowledge off an excellent Mrs. Thorp inside the midtown New york. To 1897, after graduating off Thorp’s dance school, she toured briefly with Black Patti’s Troubadours. Good girlfriend anticipate their to help you design for a publicity with Bert Williams and you may George Walker, who’d only scored a bump within vaudeville first at Koster and Bial’s Tunes Hall. She wanted to model with the offer and then inserted the brand new guys so you’re able to moving in the cakewalk finale. Once joining John W. Isham’s Octoroon, good critic toward Indianapolis Freeman declared, “I experienced merely seen the very best girl performer.” Which have Elegance Halliday she designed the latest aunt dance operate away from Overton and you can Halliday. They did because the collection of Honolulu Belles from the Williams and you can Walkers’ The policy Players (1899), and you will from there, Overton started to make as an effective soloist with additional big spots. Throughout the music comedy The new Sons away from Ham (1900) she sang and you may danced “Skip Hannah off Savannah” and you can “Leading Woman”; as well as in its 2nd model, “Society” and “Sparkling Ruby” hence delivered their jubilant acclaim. James Weldon Johnson penned you to she “had a low-pitched voice that have an organic sob in order to they, and that she realized making use of with informing impact in the putting more than a tune” (Johnson 1933). Tom Fletcher recalled her just like the an artist which did ragtime music and you may ballads equally well; and also as a performer “which you can expect to do almost anything, with no number if this is actually dollars-and-side, cakewalk, otherwise some form of grotesque dance . . . she lent brand new overall performance a nice gracefulness of movement unsurpassed of the anyone” (Fletcher 1954).
When you look at the 1910, she inserted brand new Smart Place, a black colored theatrical company, and starred in His Award the brand new Hairdresser (1911)
To the June 22, 1899, pursuing the closure out of A fortunate Coon, the fresh ragtime musical discussed by the Ann Charters because “a hodge-podge of everything from the ‘coon’ range off money-moving and you will ragtime tunes to help you options on grand opera,” Overton partnered George Walker; the connection carry out alter and you may escalate the fresh new cakewalk from a center African-Western people moving with the a black colored modernist expression, a high art worthy of are performed prior to royalty, towards light elite, and on new performance stage.
That evening if you are onstage, George Walker, to play the latest role away from Bud Jenkins, became sick
Williams and you may Walker’s Dahomey (1903) was one of the primary black musicals to find out this new cakewalk’s sales. Involved, Aida (she altered the spelling out of her label off Ada to Aida, title of the Haitian lwa regarding fertility) played Rosetta Lightfoot with a presented unicamente, “I would like to Getting a genuine Woman,” and also the “Cakewalk Finale,” partnered because of the their own spouse Paraguay kadД±nlar. “The fresh range, the fresh grace, the new hoping euphoria of those performers, just who curved more backward up until their brains almost touched the floor, a task demanding a great quantity of stamina, its keen prancing, nearly in the slow-motion, have never started equaled in this particular revel, not to mention exceeded,” composed Carl Van Vechten (Van Vechten 1974). Dahomey try brought to London, in which it actually was displayed from the an order efficiency just before King Edward VII from the Buckingham Palace. British high society adopted new Royal Family that have good gushing warmth getting cakewalking. The firm returned to Ny with a new type of new music entitled From inside the Dahomey, and therefore established at Huge Opera (1904).
During the Williams and you will Walker’s second show, Abyssinia (1906), Overton Walker is both a dancer and also the show’s choreographer. She are next seemed inside the and you will staged brand new songs quantity to possess Bandanna Land (1908). Their symptoms was after recognized because syphilis. In the 1909 the guy leftover the fresh new inform you, and his awesome part was rewritten having Overton Walker, which donned his fancy attire and you will carried out his quantity, including his big tune, “Bon bon Buddie.” Together with her partner’s standing reduced wearing down, and faced with in which their particular future place, she chose to not ever renew their particular price with Williams and you will Walker and alternatively inserted the shed away from Bob Cole and you will J. Rosamonde Johnson’s The brand new Red Moon (1909) where she are checked in two musical wide variety: “Pheobe Brownish” and you may “Pickaninny Months,” dancing dollar-and-wing toward chorus. She next unsealed within The newest York’s American Theatre that have a beneficial vaudeville work featuring an alternate dance, the new “Kara Kara,” or moving l’Afrique.