Once the an infant she acquired dance instruction away from an effective Mrs. Thorp during the midtown Manhattan. To 1897, just after graduating away from Thorp’s moving college, she toured briefly which have Black colored Patti’s Troubadours. A good girlfriend acceptance their particular so you can design to own an advertisement that have Bert Williams and you can George Walker, who had only scored a bump inside their vaudeville first in the Koster and Bial’s Sounds Hall. She offered to design towards the advertising and you can after that inserted the fresh new guys to help you dance from the cakewalk finale. Immediately following joining John W. Isham’s Octoroon, an effective critic to your Indianapolis Freeman announced, “I got only observed top girl performer.” That have Grace Halliday she shaped brand new sister dance work off Overton and you can Halliday. It did just like the group of Honolulu Belles regarding Williams and you can Walkers’ The policy Professionals (1899), and you will after that, Overton started to build due to the fact an effective soloist with reasonable spots. Throughout the musical comedy The fresh new Sons out-of Ham (1900) she carried out and danced “Miss Hannah off Savannah” and you may “Best Woman”; along with the next release, “Society” and you will “Sparkling Ruby” hence put her jubilant acclaim. James Weldon Johnson published you to she “got the lowest-pitched voice with a natural sob in order to they, which she know ways to use having informing visite site effect into the putting more a track” (Johnson 1933). Tom Fletcher appreciated their unique because a singer exactly who performed ragtime tunes and you can ballads just as well; and as a performer “exactly who you will definitely manage almost anything, no amount whether or not it try dollar-and-wing, cakewalk, if you don’t some sort of grotesque dancing . . . she borrowed the newest abilities a neat gracefulness of motion unsurpassed by anyone” (Fletcher 1954).

In the 1910, she entered the new Smart Lay, a black colored theatrical company, and you may starred in His Prize the Barber (1911)

To the June 22, 1899, following closure out-of A fortunate Coon, the new ragtime sounds revealed by Ann Charters just like the “a beneficial hodge-podge of all things throughout the ‘coon’ range out of dollar-moving and ragtime tunes to help you selection about grand opera,” Overton married George Walker; the commitment do changes and you can elevate brand new cakewalk of a key African-American individuals dancing towards the a black modernist expression, a premier artwork really worth becoming did before royalty, towards white professional, as well as on new performance stage.

That evening while onstage, George Walker, to play the new part out of Bud Jenkins, turned into unwell

Williams and you may Walker’s Dahomey (1903) try one of the primary black colored musicals to learn the fresh cakewalk’s conversion. Involved, Aida (she altered the newest spelling of their particular title out of Ada to help you Aida, title of your Haitian lwa out of fertility) played Rosetta Lightfoot that have a highlighted solamente, “I wish to Feel a real Woman,” and also the “Cakewalk Finale,” married because of the their husband. “New range, new grace, the fresh new hoping euphoria of them dancers, just who curved more than backward up to its heads nearly moved a floor, an accomplishment requiring an amazing quantity of electricity, its eager prancing, almost when you look at the slow motion, have-not already been equaled in this revel, let alone surpassed,” had written Carl Van Vechten (Van Vechten 1974). Dahomey is brought to London, where it absolutely was shown at the a command abilities just before King Edward VII in the Buckingham Castle. United kingdom high-society followed new Royal Family which have a gushing love getting cakewalking. The firm returned to Nyc with a new variety of the brand new songs called Into the Dahomey, hence unwrapped in the Huge Opera (1904).

Inside the Williams and you can Walker’s 2nd reveal, Abyssinia (1906), Overton Walker is each other a performer as well as the show’s choreographer. She try 2nd searched inside the and staged the latest songs number getting Bandanna Property (1908). His periods have been later on identified because syphilis. When you look at the 1909 the guy remaining the newest inform you, and his awesome character try rewritten to possess Overton Walker, whom donned their flashy clothes and you may done their numbers, plus his biggest tune, “Bon-bon Buddie.” Together with her partner’s status reduced extracting, and up against where their particular coming set, she selected to not ever renew her package with Williams and Walker and you can as an alternative registered the latest throw out of Bob Cole and you may J. Rosamonde Johnson’s The newest Purple Moonlight (1909) where she was featured in two music wide variety: “Pheobe Brownish” and “Pickaninny Weeks,” dancing money-and-side on chorus. She second opened at The newest York’s Western Movie theater having a good vaudeville operate presenting another type of moving, the fresh “Kara Kara,” or dancing l’Afrique.