Dance Advantage » George Balanchine http://danceadvantage.net Giving students, teachers, and parents an edge in dance education Thu, 09 Feb 2012 19:00:46 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 History Moves: Using the Creative Process to Explore Dance History http://danceadvantage.net/2011/12/08/history-moves/ http://danceadvantage.net/2011/12/08/history-moves/#comments Thu, 08 Dec 2011 14:24:48 +0000 Heather Vaughan-Southard http://danceadvantage.net/?p=13630 The history of dance is far from dull and including dance history in your classes doesn’t have to be either.

When we think of learning about history, most people see lectures, thick books, and discussions about plenty of dead people. There are ways to incorporate information about the traditions of dance and the people who shaped them while relating it to the material that students may find more exciting.

Last month I provided a list of ten ways to move beyond steps, making dances that venture outside the norm of assembling favorite movement to popular songs. This enriched way of working leads to many possibilities for students to become aware of their dance heritage and the methods dance icons have used for creating dance.

IMAGE Blindfolded dancers in a group IMAGE

Photo by George Joch / Courtesy Argonne National Laboratory.

To recap:

Concert Dance, to me, is determined by process – the ways movement is inspired, how it is developed, edited, and finally presented. The style of dance is irrelevant in many respects; it is all about the intent and the journey, which lead to the product.

Let’s draw on those same ten ideas to outline two ways to practically include dance history lessons while going about the usual business of making dances:

A: For a single artist’s view, I have chosen modern dance heavy-weight Merce Cunningham whose development of his own technique, innovative ways for crafting dances, and pushing the boundaries in dance technology provide ample opportunity to explore many aspects of dance.

B: If you are more interested in covering a variety of artists, here is a sampler of artists that have made interesting decisions during the work they’ve created.

1. Choosing Content.

Find content with enough depth that it can be explored from multiple angles, voices, and perspectives.

Merce Cunningham: Creating dances “about” the movement potential of the human body, the potential of movement within an established movement vocabulary

George Balanchine, founder of New York City Ballet: Balanchine’s choreography is known for its visual relationship to the musical score. Balanchine’s early work included direct narratives (Prodigal Son, The Nutcracker), his later work revolved around identifiable themes without demonstrating a clear plot (Agon, Serenade). In this sense, Balanchine offers three different ways in which content can be explored.

2. Choosing Genre.

Which style of dance best suits the idea or concept you are presenting?

Merce Cunningham: Modern Dance choreographer whose movement relates well to other types of dancers. This example allows for the discussion of how technical concepts are experienced differently or similarly based on styles of dance. Example: Cunningham’s use of spine, port de bras, and weight shift can be compared similarly to classical ballet and yet very differently to other types of modern dance such as release technique.

Twyla Tharp, versatile choreographer with major works in post-modern (Eight Jelly Rolls, The Fugue), contemporary ballet (When Push Comes to Shove, Sinatra Suite), and musical theatre “jazz” (Hair, Movin’ Out).
If any choreographer epitomizes versatility, it is Twyla Tharp. Working from a strong personal point of view, Tharp relies heavily on technique and the fundamentals of movement and thus can easily relate to many kinds of dancers and audiences.

3. Choosing Movement.

Is the idea behind the piece best represented by technical movement, gestural movement, or a combination?

Merce Cunningham: Again, creating within an established movement vocabulary, Cunningham explored possibilities physically first but later in his career used a computer program, Dance Forms, to inspire new movement threads before teaching them to his dancers.

Bill T. Jones: a self-proclaimed liberal artist. This is a choreographer who masterfully ebbs and flows between codified and gestural movement based on what the piece needs. Please note, when looking for video samples be sure to preview before watching with students. His work takes on many topics and some are more suitable for high-school aged dancers and older.

In jazz, Bob Fosse offers a rich example of stylized movement vocabulary that allows each piece to look different while still reflective of the Fosse trademark swag.

4. Choosing structure.

Dances don’t have to be choreographed from beginning to end. Try creating large movement phrases that can be ordered in different ways, layered in contrasting movement, or fragmented.

Merce Cunningham: The pioneer of chance operation as a choreographic device, Cunningham created methods such as rolling dice to determine the order of movement, order of works within a concert, and other production elements.

Explore the range Romantic, Classical, and Neo-Classical ballet to discuss structuring story and structuring movement. Martha Graham offers great examples of how to structure these principles as well as movement for solos or large groups.

5. Choosing sound.

Does the piece need music or could it be danced to text, silence, or unconventional sound?

Merce Cunningham: search out his collaborations with John Cage or the use of dueling stories in How to Pass, Kick, Fall, and Run.

Pearl Primus, a modern dance choreographer and anthropologist: Primus created Strange Fruit, set to the poem of the same title by Lewis Allen. This is also a nice example of how dance can be used to discuss other subjects such as the African-American experience within American culture.

6. and 7. Choosing alternate methods for coaching ideas and movement within rehearsal.

Find the unison in intent rather than (just) the unison of performance.

Watch choreographers rehearse their dancers in A Lifetime of Dance about Merce Cunningham and Dancemaker, about Paul Taylor.

Check out Daniel Nagrin‘s book, The Six Questions: Acting Technique for Dance Performance.

7. Choosing production elements.

What kind of showing is best? How important are costumes? Lights?

Merce Cunningham and collaborators believed dance, music, and set design should co-exist in space and time rather than depend upon one another.

Explore choreographers such as Anna Halperin, Doug Varone, and Liz Lerman and their use of site-specific dance. Google site specific dance for a long list of artists (and video samples of their work) creating this way both in the past and in the present.  Although site-specific dance does not necessarily mean outside, here is article that offers valuable information on non-traditional performance spaces.

8. and 9. Choosing your value system and Choosing your method for reflection.

What determines good v. bad? How do you measure the success of the process as well as the success of the work?

Consider re-evaluating how you talk about choreography. Some interesting reads on this are by Larry Lavender (Dancers Talking Dance) and Liz Lerman (Critical Response Process: A Useful Method for Getting Feedback On Anything You Make from Dance to Dessert).

The artists listed here are a mere sampling of a larger pool of artists that relate easily to any and all of these segments of the creative process. Many of the artists listed are established modern dance choreographers, however, there are a great many choreographers from ballet and jazz worlds also working within the concert dance philosophy and developing interesting creative processes, too.

In developing lesson plans, realize how important it is for students to SEE dance and include opportunities to do this.

The newly available Jacob’s Pillow Interactive, dance company websites, clips from Youtube, PBS broadcasts available for purchase, or materials available through your library should make much easier than even a few years ago.

Here are some additional ideas for teaching the History and Evolution of Dance, and for leading students through the process of making their own dances.

How do you explore dance history in your classes?
What recommendations for source material would you add to those above?

© Heather Vaughan-Southard for Dance Advantage, 2011. | Permalink | Category: Beyond the Bubble, Blog, Choreographing, Dance Media, Dance Styles, Dancethropology, Film/Video, For Classroom, History of Dance, K-12, Modern/Contemporary, Teaching | Who's talking about this article?

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]]> http://danceadvantage.net/2011/12/08/history-moves/feed/ 1 Profile of an American Icon: A Few Words With Paul Taylor http://danceadvantage.net/2010/02/23/paul-taylor/ http://danceadvantage.net/2010/02/23/paul-taylor/#comments Tue, 23 Feb 2010 12:20:16 +0000 Nichelle (admin) http://danceadvantage.net/?p=4755 An Unignorable Hunch


Paul Taylor is one of the most prominent and influential choreographers of our time. Yet, in the late 1940′s he seemed to be on a different path. He was studying painting and swimming on scholarship at Syracuse University when amidst a series of seemingly unrelated dance experiences he was struck by a revelation or, as he describes it in his autobiography Private Domain a “flash of recognition… an unignorable hunch” that he was to become a dancer. Not long after he began training within the newly formed dance department at Julliard and won a scholarship to the American Dance Festival where his athletic build and powerful presence captured the attentions of Martha Graham, José Limon, and other modern dance founders. He was already making his own choreography by the time he was invited to join Graham’s company in 1955.

Taylor performed in the work of a number of dance pioneers in these early years, including Merce Cunningham and George Balanchine. He did so while continuing to choreograph for his own company a number of avant-garde works that sometimes confounded audiences. In 1962, the same year he left Graham’s company, he created his first popular success Aureole.

Photo by Tom Caravaglia

Photo by Tom Caravaglia

“The amazing inventiveness, that peculiar quality of dynamic imagination which infused even his earliest choreographic attempts, continues absolutely unabated. There is still an awe-inspiring naturalness to his choreography, a sense of every step being in the right place at the right time to the right music, that is simply God-given.” — Clive Barnes, Dance Magazine 1994

An Unequivocal Talent

In a 1989 New York Times article, Anna Kisselgoff states “There are four Paul Taylors. One choreographs dark pieces, another creates light comic works, a third favors homemade rituals and the last seems to invent pure-dance pieces inspired by music.” She goes on to acknowledge that this is an oversimplified analysis of Taylor’s rich body of work, a hallmark of which is the bleeding of these ostensible contradictions into one another. Taylor’s choreography ranges from revolutionary to romantic, comical to controversial, robust to penetrating, spontaneous to shrewd, often within the same dance.

Photo by Lois Greenfield

Carol Walker, retired Dean of the Conservatory of Dance at Purchase College calls Paul Taylor

“an American icon and one of the most prolific and stunning choreographers of the past 60 years. He was a dancer who captivated audiences in his performances with the Martha Graham Dance Company and in his own work. He is an author of two books and an Emmy winner for his choreography Speaking In Tongues. Dancemaker, Matthew Diamond’s award winning, Oscar nominated feature-length film about Mr. Taylor was hailed by Time as ‘the best dance documentary ever’. An artist and a man who has been devoted to making dances not only for his company but for major ballet companies as well, his work has awakened in many a love for dance that few choreographers’ inspire.”

Celebrating 80

Paul Taylor will be 80 years old this July yet a celebration of this milestone begins this week with Paul Taylor Dance Company’s return to New York City Center [link] which features performances of enduring favorites as well as two premieres. On March 15, the day after the company closes its season at City Center, Mr. Taylor will be honored with a Nelson A. Rockefeller Award at the Purchase College School of the Arts Gala. To celebrate Mr. Taylor’s work at the gala, members of the Purchase Dance Corps will perform excerpts of two of his works.

A Few Words With Paul Taylor

Photo by Maxine Hicks

I have been captivated by Paul Taylor’s choreography since my first exposure to his work in college. Seeing Esplanade live was an exhilarating introduction to his movement and scenes from the insightful film Paul Taylor: Dancemaker made an enormous impression as I practiced the craft of choreography and prepared to enter the professional dance world. Therefore, I feel very honored that Mr. Taylor took the time to answer a few questions for Dance Advantage about his life and work in an email interview.

Dance Advantage: Your first experience with dance was through books. What did you read or see within the pages that so captured your attention that it changed the trajectory of your college study and your life?

Paul Taylor: Some of the first dance books I read during college that changed my aims were Martha Graham: Sixteen Dances in Photographs by Barbara Morgan, a book about the Diaghilev Ballet in Paris, Dancers, Buildings, and People in the Streets by Edwin Denby, and several books on dance history.

DA: Your dances have often been categorized as either dark and psychological or light and joyous.

PT: Most of my dances are a combination of both dark and light.

DA: Indeed, certainly this is a reflection of life and the human experience, but which is harder to make – the light or the dark?

PT: All of my dances have been both hard and easy to make.

DA: You have created over 130 works for your company since 1954. What is staggering about this is that you have made new work (sometimes multiple dances) every year for the past 55 years. What about the creative process continues to intrigue you and keeps you coming back again and again?

PT: It’s my life.

DA: Despite all this dance-making, you’ve said that you don’t think about dance much before you get into the studio.

PT: I lied.

DA: Is choreography a bit like sculpture, are you molding or carving the dance as you go?

PT: It is like sculpture or a painting but I usually have a general plan before rehearsals start.

DA: And what happens when you get stuck and aren’t sure how to proceed?

PT: I skip ahead then go back and try to solve the problem later or ask the dancers to improvise and use whatever steps that seems suitable.

DA: Many of my readers are young dance students who face the decision of attending college or heading straight to a performance career. The dancers you select tend to have gone through university or conservatory programs before coming to you. What do you think these dancers are “picking up” in college that makes them right for your company?

Photo by Lois Greenfield

PT: College is a good place for students to find out what they really want to do. They are exposed to a lot of things that they may not have experienced before. They may be inspired by attending a performance by a touring dance company or by seeing a dance film.

DA: In auditions one of the first things you have dancers do is walk. What do you learn from the exercise?

PT: Walks are like fingerprints – none of them are the same. An individual’s walk can reveal a lot about a person.

DA: What other attributes (aside from great skill and technical ability) are essential in the dancers you choose?

PT: Passion and commitment to one’s chosen profession. Company morale is as important as the dance steps, if not more so.

DA: The legacy of modern dance is that we try to avoid doing what our predecessors have done and push the art form in new directions. Many of your dancers have gone on to choreography. In what new directions do you see them trailblazing?

PT: A lot of my dancers have gone on to do interesting things and are trailblazers. Twyla Tharp was one of a pioneer in making dances that combined jazz, modern and ballet. Laura Dean created dances with a lot of repetition, choreographed to Phillip Glass, which was very innovative. Pina Bausch introduced a harsh theatricality in her work that had not been done before.

DA: You’ve seen so much, what (if anything) surprises you about the 21st century.

PT: I’m constantly surprised by the advancement of technology, especially the invention of computers and cell phones.

DA: You’ve received numerous awards and you will soon be honored again with a Nelson A. Rockefeller award at Purchase College School of the Arts. What does this award mean to you?

PT: One always likes to be appreciated and I’m especially grateful that my friend Carol Walker, who has had the Company perform at Purchase College many times, will be presenting me with this prestigious award.

“Purchase College is honored to present the Nelson A. Rockefeller Award to Paul Taylor at the School of the Arts Gala on March 15, 2009. Paul Taylor is selected for this prestigious award because of his lifetime of achievements as a dancer, a choreographer, an author, an artist and the epitome of a creative role model. We are honoring his prolific and powerful body of work, his engagement with other art forms, and the long time association that the Purchase College Conservatory of Dance has enjoyed with Mr. Taylor and his company.” — Carol K. Walker, Dean of Dance 1984 – 2007

Learn more by clicking the image above

Proceeds from the Purchase College School of the Arts Gala will create the first permanent endowment expressly for the School of the Arts. Reserve tickets

More Paul Taylor Links and Resources

Special thanks to Paul Taylor, Carol K. Walker, Purchase College School of the Arts, and Karen Apablaza.

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© Nichelle Strzepek for Dance Advantage, 2010. | Permalink | Category: Beyond the Bubble, Blog, Dance Companies, Dance Styles, History of Dance, Interviews, Modern/Contemporary, News and Events | Who's talking about this article?

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