choreography

Choreographic notation for the ballet La Bayadère.

Choreography is the art of designing sequences of movements in which motion, form, or both are specified. Choreography may also refer to the design itself, which is sometimes expressed by means of dance notation. The word choreography literally means "dance-writing" from the Greek words "χορεία" (circular dance, see choreia) and "γραφή" (writing). A choreographer is one who creates choreographies.

The term choreography first appeared in the American English dictionary in the 1950s.^[1] Prior to this, movie credits used various terms to mean choreography, such as "ensembles staged by"^[2] and "dances staged by".^[3]

Choreography is used in the fields of cheerleading, cinematography, dance, gymnastics, fashion shows, ice skating, marching band, show choir, theatre, and synchronized swimming.

Techniques

In dance, choreography is also known as dance composition. Dance compositions are created by applying one or both of these fundamental choreographic techniques:

• Improvisation, in which a choreographer provides dancers with a score (i.e., generalized directives) that serves as guidelines for improvised movement and form. For example, a score might direct one dancer to withdraw from another dancer, who in turn is directed to avoid the withdrawal, or it might specify a sequence of movements that are to be executed in an improvised manner over the course of a musical phrase, as in contra dance choreography. Improvisational scores typically offer wide latitude for personal interpretation by the dancer.
• Planned choreography, in which a choreographer dictates motion and form in detail, leaving little or no opportunity for the dancer to exercise personal interpretation.

Choreographic techniques are: mirroring (facing each other and doing the same), retrograge (doing a range of moves in exactly the same order but backwards), cannon (a group of people doing the same move but one after the other), levels (people higher and lower in a dance), shadowing (stood behind each other doing the same moves), unison (two or more people doing a range of moves at the same time).

Dynamics are: fast, slow, hard, soft, long, short.

See also

Dance portal

Articles

• Ballet master
• List of choreographers
• Stage Directors and Choreographers Society
• Dance improvisation
• Contact improvisation
• Movement director

Categories

• Ballet choreographers
• Choreographers

References

Further reading

• Blom, L, A. and Tarin Chaplin, L. (1989) The Intimate Act of Choreography. Dance Books. ISBN 0-8229-5342-0
• Ellfeldt, L. (1998) A Primer for Choreographers . Waveland Press. ISBN 0-88133-350-6
• Minton, S, C. (1997) Choreography: A Basic Approach Using Improvisation. Human Kinetics . ISBN 0-88011-529-7
• Tufnell, M. and Vaughan, D. (1999) Body Space Image : Notes Toward Improvisation and Performance. Princeton Book Co. ISBN 1-85273-041-2
• Smith-Autard, J, M. (2000) Dance Composition. Routledge. ISBN 0-87830-118-6

External links

Look up choreography in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Interview with choreographer Natalie Marrone, 4/6/2006