Jump, Shake Your Booty

My informant has been a dancer since elementary school, and currently dances with her performing arts high school. She told me the following piece of folklore about a pre-performance tradition:

So, after everyone gets ready and is about to go onstage for opening night before a show, everyone like gets together in a big group, and usually we turn off the lights but not always depending on where we are, but we usually turn off the lights, and then we all like get in a circle and its quiet for a few seconds and then sort of spontaneously it starts, we all start like shouting JUMP SHAKE YOUR BOOTY, JUMP JUMP SHAKE YOUR BOOTY and we all jump up and down and shake our butts along with the chant, and I guess it’s for good luck on opening night, I’m not really sure, but, like, we all do it before opening night and I’ve done it at, like, pretty much every show I can remember.

My informant told me she and the other members of her cast would perform this tradition for good luck before a show. She does not know when or where it began, but said it has been around for as long as she can remember. Although my informant is a dancer, she said many of her other friends in other disciplines celebrate this tradition as well, and it appears to be a long standing theatrical tradition across all disciplines. It could be a way to get the cast excited before the show, and to loosen up through the motions in the chant, or simply a way to remind everyone to have fun and enforce comradeship in the cast.