Category: dance

Using the space that is available for your dance is one of the most widespread concepts out there. What it means is that you consciously work with the space that surrounds you.

This can be as easy as trying to remain stationary or being everywhere in the space at some time during your dance or as difficult as following a predefined path with a set speed or chasing an opposing dancer in a battle.

Using a lot of space in your rounds results in a more dynamic look compared to being stationary. In a performance setting you can guide the audience towards important things in your performance by strategically changing place to let them know about a change in your story.

To get started with conquering the space around you pay attention if you favor stationary movement or moving through the space. Try to find a balance with those two and try to move in directions that you don’t use normally.

A simple exercise to improve your movement is to mark a path or form on the floor and try what you can do with your dance by following it. I will give you more complex instruction on this concept in the future and some additional exercises in the newsletter. For now, try the “follow the path” exercise to get used to using the space for a specific task.

This post is a follow up to last weeks introduction article about dance concepts. I introduced the following key-principle.

You should understand every move as an abstract set of instructions that can be applied in different ways.

Yo, right. But what do I do with that information?

When you see every movement you learn in this way, there are certain basic things that you can alter. This gives you a lot of possibilities how to apply this move in different ways.

I’d like to call this basic things that we can alter “the basic questions that we ask every move”. Of course this is only a metaphor as we do not really ask, but I love the dance = language metaphor and will entertain it a lot in the following posts. So it is better to get used to it.

Let’s get to the questions:

The question of direction. How does it look when presented from different angles. This includes choosing different orientation in the space as well as rotating during the move.

The question of speed. What happens when you execute it faster or slower. Every move has a certain speed imprinted to it, that is set by it’s traditional connection to the music. But often a change to this brings really interesting results.

The question of energy. How does a move change when I reduce or increase the amount of energy used. Energy is not always directly related to speed. You can do every movement with a different intention and amount of force. This changes the movement itself.

The question of size. Size does matter in dance. There is a big difference if you reach out in the space as big as possible or try to keep the movement small.

The question of rhythm. How does a change in rhythm change the movement? Like with speed, most moves come with a basic rhythm attached to it. This is usually the rhythm the moves are taught with. But this does not mean that it is the only way to do it. Change the rhythmic phrasing of the move and get some interesting variations for free.

By exploring all the possibilities above you create a whole world of moves from within one movement.

This idea and many others can be found in my first book Dance Smart, which is available on Amazon as ebook and paperback.

As I am still working on my book about dance concepts I will start to put some of the content online to test how it resonates with readers and to get some additional feedback. If you have suggestions or something is not easy to understand, let me know in the comments or send me an email.

For today I give a little introduction about what dance concepts do in my opinion and why you should learn to work with them.

A dance concept gives you the freedom to explore the music and movement without thinking to much about technique or moves.

It gives you direction about the creation of your dance or creation of your moves. This can happen in the moment you dance = freestyle or beforehand in a planned manner = choreography. Almost all the concepts that I know can be applied in both ways.

The first concept that I will introduce today is very easy to explain but gives you a ton of opportunities to work with. Acutally it is the root of all the basic concepts I will introduce further down the road.

You should understand every new move you learn as an abstract set of instructions that can be applied in many different ways.

Sounds fancy but it is not that complex. Instead of learning a new movement and think of it as set in stone you should look deeper into what it does and apply the idea of it, instead the move itself.

For Example: in breaking we have a step that is called the salsa step. It goes by different names in different places but salsa step is the most common one. Instead of thinking Kick – Step – Side – Back : Repeat, you should think: one kick and three steps, then repeat. Now you have a easy set of instructions that you can apply. You are free in directions, rhythm and size. In this way the salsa step alone gives you endless possibilities to create.

You can find many concepts on this blog and 36, that I consider very powerful, in my book Dance Smart, which is available as ebook and paperback on Amazon.