BEFORE 1983 FEW PEOPLE IN AMERICA – LET ALONE THE WORLD – HAD HEARD OF MADONNA CICCONE. BUT THAT WAS SOON TO CHANGE…

STEVEO’ BRIEN

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1983 was a year of transition for the young Madonna

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On 9 January 1983 Madonna Louise Ciccone made her first ever television appearance. Not that many people saw it, though. Dancin’ On Air wasn’t one of those monolithic, fully networked TV shows like Louisiana Hayride (which introduced Elvis to the world) or NBC’s Midnight Special (where Prince made his first appearance) – instead it only ever reached seven East Coast states. But if you had caught that episode you’d have seen the 24-year-old newbie, alongside two backing dancers, performing her debut single Everybody in front of three school chairs. It was all a far cry from the lavish stage presentations that she’d become associated with, but hey, everybody – even the biggest popstar in the world – has to start somewhere.

1983 would be the year Madonna became a star, but little in showbusiness is genuinely overnight. 1983 may have been the year she made her first television appearance and released her debut album, but the road to that moment had been a long one, starting with her move to New York City in 1978.

“[COMING TO NEW YORK CITY] WAS THE BRAVEST THING I’D EVER DONE”

MA DONNA

Madonna was 20 when she dropped out of college in Michigan and upped sticks to the Big Apple. “It was the first time I’d ever taken a plane, the first time I’d ever gotten a taxi cab,” she recalled. “I came here with $35 in my pocket. It was the bravest thing I’d ever done.”

After finding accommodation in the Alphabet City neighbourhood of the city’s East Village, Madonna would pay her rent by working variously as a waitress and posing nude for art classes, “staring at people staring at me naked,” as she put it. She also signed up to the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, while also studying dance under the tutelage of esteemed choreographer Martha Graham. But dancing alone wasn’t a big enough dream for the young Madonna. She lasted just a few months with the Pearl Lang Dance Theatre before she told friends she was leaving to become “a rock star”.