The moonwalk is probably the most famous dance move ever performed. Michael Jackson debuted it in March 1983 on the Motown 25 television special, and the world lost its mind.
He never claimed he invented it. He said so repeatedly, and always credited Black street dancers. But the full chain of who taught it to whom is stranger and better than most fans know — and it starts with a child.
His brother Marlon Jackson revealed it in a radio interview, and the detail is lovely. The first person to show Michael the move wasn’t a professional dancer. It was a nephew from Marlon’s wife’s side of the family.
He was eight years old.
Michael Jackson – Live Motown 25 (Full Footage) HD 60fps
Marlon’s account is direct: “My nephew, not on my family’s side, on my wife’s side, was the first person that showed him the moonwalk. He was eight years old.”
The child did not even call it that. “He told me that they call it the backwards slide.”
That name is the key to the whole story. The move existed long before 1983 and had been circulating in Black dance communities for years under names like the backslide. It was a street move, passed hand to hand, that had nothing to do with the moon.
Then came the professionals. Jeffrey Daniel — from the group Shalamar — taught Michael the backslide properly around 1980, three years before Motown 25. Daniel has said he was the first to perform it on television, on the British program Top of the Pops in 1982.
Michael Jackson Learned Moonwalk From 8-Year-Old Kid
So what did Michael actually do? Two things, and both mattered.
He perfected it — drilling it privately for years until it looked less like a dance step and more like a violation of physics. And he renamed it. The backslide became the moonwalk.
Jeffrey Daniel has never resented it. His description of watching Michael take what they were doing and push it into another dimension is generous: “it was like, wow.”
A child showed him. A street dancer taught him. Michael made it immortal.