The Columbia University Center for Jazz Studies defines trading eights as, 'soloists taking turns at improvising, playing for eight bars at a time.'  As a tap dancer, I’ve always thought of it simply as swapping eight counts.  One phrase at a time.  You give a little, you take a little, but you always keep dancing.  One eight at a time.  In the grand scheme of improvisation, trading eights is really the only kind of improv I’ve ever enjoyed.  The idea of having to get out on the dance floor and bust-a-move for a lengthy solo is intimidating, overwhelming, and often feels like drowning in a pair of tap shoes.  On the contrary, trading eights is a perfectly simple taste of improv.  It is the amuse-bouche of tap dancing.  One deliciously sweet bite of rhythm created spontaneously and existing only until the next eight comes around.  The other wonderful thing about trading eights is that you are never alone.  By definition you are improvising as a soloist, but when you trade, you always have backup: a friend, a wingman, a true collaborator in the cold, hard, dog-eat-dog world of improvisational tap dancing.