As a teacher, it's been difficult to teach my students musicality in a way that they understand. And as a dancer, I didn't fully understand musicality until I was in my twenties. But once the light bulb went off, I enjoyed dancing more than ever before. I was no longer just doing steps, I was finally dancing! Here are some highlights from an article in Dance Spirit Magazine, "Musicality Matters". I've inserted just the highlights, because it's a very long article!
...So what exactly is musicality? It’s how a dancer expresses music in his or her body. “Musicality is understanding music on a technical level, and then dropping all of that knowledge so you can sit deep inside the music,” says choreographer and “So You Think You Can Dance” regular Wade Robson. “It’s dancing inside the music, as opposed to floating on top of it.”
...Put a musical dancer and a nonmusical dancer side by side and you’ll see why it’s so important to be attuned to the rhythm, melody and mood of a song. Dancers without a keen connection to the music might seem stiff or disconnected—often, they’re hard to watch. “They’re unable to transmit the emotion the musical notes are giving,” Feijóo says. “A strong but nonmusical dancer is like a painting without any colors. I’d rather watch a musical dancer with less extension and not-as-pretty feet.”
Musical dancers, on the other hand, never disregard the music to fit in more tricks. “You can see the effort in a nonmusical dancer—they are often step-driven,” says NYC ballet teacher Deborah Wingert. “Musical dancers don’t just turn until they stop. They turn until they have to move on to the next point in the music. Musical dancers never get so caught up in steps that they ignore the music.”
...To start working on your musicality, “do your barre work in a musically accurate way,” says Oregon Ballet Theatre principal Anne Mueller. “It starts from the moment you begin dancing. Don’t slide through the music in tendu combinations, for instance. Making sure that you’re clear in your execution will give you more options because you’ll be able to take advantage of the still space; musicality can be as much about when you’re not moving as when you are."
...Phrasing Philosophies
If you’ve ever discussed musicality with a teacher or other dancers, you’ve probably heard a lot about “phrasing.” But do you know what it is? Musical phrasing is the way music is organized within measures. Where are the syncopations? The cadences? The accents? Choreographic phrasing is similar—it’s how steps are organized within a musical phrase. Which steps hit on the beat, and which move through the rhythm? Should one step be performed quickly so another can be stretched out?
Sometimes choreographers will specify the way their steps should be phrased, but when it’s allowed, experimenting with phrasing can give you multiple ways to dance a piece. In fact, the better you know a score or song, the more you’ll be able to play with the dynamics and timing of the steps—instead of always dancing right on a square beat, which can make you look repetitive and boring. Perhaps you can hold a développé for an extra moment or change the tempo of your movement to squeeze in another battu. “A dancer must have an excellent sense of rhythm to hold the
audience’s attention,” says Feijóo. “Without getting off the beat, find where you can balance longer or fit one more turn. This is how you translate the mood the music gives you into the steps.”
audience’s attention,” says Feijóo. “Without getting off the beat, find where you can balance longer or fit one more turn. This is how you translate the mood the music gives you into the steps.”
...Honing Your Ear
Learning to differentiate instruments will help you translate what you hear into movement, which will, in turn, give your dancing shade and texture. If you don’t know the difference between a clarinet and an oboe, start with musical works like Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf or Benjamin Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, both of which break down each instrument in a symphony so you can learn to distinguish sounds. Another way to hone your ear is to listen to recordings of the same score with different conductors and identify the differences between them.
Robson swears by this exercise, which he picked up from his days dancing with Michael Jackson: Find a song you like and listen to it as you normally would. “Just take it in,” Robson says. Then play it again, but listen only to the drum. Block out every other sound and follow the drum through the entire piece. Does it change? Does it stay the same? Play the song a third time, focusing on another instrument, like the piano. Repeat this exercise until you’ve followed every instrument in the song.
“You might have to listen 20 times, depending on the complexity of the song,” Robson says. “The last time you listen, take in the whole song again. You’ll be able to hear both the instruments individually and the tune as a whole. And you’ll be able to freestyle and dance to rhythms you never heard before. It will change your life as a dancer.”
...Counting on Counts
Some choreographers may not count at all. If you find yourself struggling not to count, look for other musical cues to help guide you.
...The more comfortable you become with the music, the easier it will be not to count, so make it your goal to learn the music well enough to stop counting. “Some ballets you might need to count at first, but after you’re secure, you won’t need that anymore,” Feijóo says. “And that will give you freedom to interpret, because you aren’t just following the beat or the melody.”
No comments:
Post a Comment