Modern/ Contemporary Dance
The term “modern dance” refers to a variety of techniques and styles. Historically, modern dance rejected the rigid requirements of ballet, as well as ballet’s unnatural lines and training, and the “upper class” label and the politics of ballet. But it wasn’t just a rejection of ballet; it was a rejection of vaudeville, a travelling dance/comedy show, with its exhibitionism and offensiveness to the dance world. Types of acts in vaudeville included musicians (both classical and popular), dancers, comedians, trained animals , magicians, female and male impersonators, acrobats, one-act plays or scenes from plays, athletes, lecturing celebrities, minstrels (story tellers), and short movies. Those who began to dance under the umbrella of “modern” believed that dance could be a social comment, and lead to political reform. It could make people think about life and society.
In the 100-plus years of modern dance, thousands of forms and styles and techniques have evolved in response to a person’s interest in creating a personal statement. Modern dance is known to be experimental. It focuses on exploring the manipulation of time, space, and energy.
Early criticisms of modern dance included comments that it wasn’t “beautiful” in the traditional sense, the music wasn’t “dance music,” and there was no fancy scenery or story that was clear. But these early dancers (1900-1940) were serious about dance being reestablished as a serious art. It was very a controversial dance form, sometimes causing fights to break out as dancers went deeper and deeper into the human psyche, searching for dance capable of revealing the inner self.
During the 1960s, modern dance continued to evolve and challenge the typical performer-audience relationship and the idea of training. Chance dance, happenings, and contact improv all attempted to capture the movement qualities of everyday people and activities.
Pioneers of modern dance:
1. Martha Graham (emphasized breath pulse, contractions and expansions of the torso)
2. Doris Humphrey (emphasized gravity as the source of dynamic instability, balance and imbalance) (Both Graham and Humphrey created dances that were described as stark and harshly dramatic.)
3. Merce Cunningham (eliminated the focus on patterns and traditional music by using electronic music and music of John Cage, introduced the idea of “chance dance”)
4. Paul Taylor (minimal dance, as well as incorporating modern, jazz, and African dance in his work)
5. Twyla Tharp (no sound accompaniment, experimented with alternative spaces)
Assignment:
In groups, develop a 3-minute (minimum) dance that is inspired by modern dance. Requirements:
· The piece must explore a theme or story or social issue of your choice.
· Use music. Choose carefully. It should capture the energy of your theme. It may be slow or fast, instrumental or not.
· In one section of the piece, you must demonstrate the modern dance positions, both feet and arms combined. These should not be done as a sequence in order as we did for ballet positions, but instead must be incorporated throughout. I will be looking carefully for a deliberate modern style that is different from ballet and hip-hop.
· Incorporate at least 4 modern movements from the list of selected modern dance vocabulary.