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Steps


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I attended a new choreography workshop the other day and one of the choreographers stated that

he wanted to create a piece with as few steps as possible. And he did, there were pirouettes, some passes

a few grand jetes and that was about it except for running and sliding on the floor.

He almost seemd to imply that steps were BAD. But aren't steps just a tool? Aren't they just a way to express

something? This was the clearest expression I've heard of the current vogue for stepless ballets?

And I don't understand it? Any thoughts?

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Wow. Sounds like the same old anti-ballet argument that I hear day in and day out: "All they do is take all their steps out of a book. Ballet is not creative, because the dancers and choreographers don't use expressive created movements, just all that obscure French crap from, like, 1000 years ago." rolleyes.gif

By that line of reasoning, I suppose poetry isn't creative either, since they don't make up their own expressive created words, they just take them all out of that big fat book written by some dead white guy named Webster.

No, I'm not bitter. biggrin.gif

[ March 17, 2002, 06:18 PM: Message edited by: BalletNut ]

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Perhaps the choreographer didn't necessarily have a disdain for steps as such, but wanted to de-emphasize their importance for other reasons. Maybe his dancers were showing too much concern for the text of ballets (i.e., steps) and not enough for the spirit.

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A few years ago I gave my extra ticket to someone who was primaril interested in modern dance. After one ballet -- not a very good one, not one by a master -- she said, "Too steppy."

That was my introduction to the Anti-Steppers, a small but extremely vocal, and influential, cult among the Contemporary Set. When I taught at an area university, I heard exactly what Ballet Nut said -- and I used the Webster analogy too! (It didn't convince them.)

This was in an aesthetics class, and after reading some of the articles that dealt with ballet, one of the brightest students said, "I'm glad I read that. I always thought ballet choreographers just picked a bunch of steps at random." There was very much the notion that modern dancers MOVED and ballet dancers Did Steps.

I thought Manhattnik's point about "Esplanade" very interesting, because, in a way, yes, there are no "steps" in it, and yet it LOOKS as though it's composed of steps. I've always thought one of the reasons ballet people often like Taylor -- or at least, he's their gateway into modern dance -- because the dances look familiar. They're not ballet steps, but there are steps in his works.

Ari's point is a good one too, I think. I wish a choreographer would think that way. I'd be surprised, though.

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More benignly, I know there's a certain point in the making of a ballet (usually towards the 3/4 done point) where I consciously decide that there should be no new steps added. By that point I feel the movement pallette of the work is developed and adding an unrelated idea could harm the focus of the work. Perhaps the choreographer was trying to limit his pallette to refine and focus it?

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liebs wrote:

quote:


one of the choreographers stated that

he wanted to create a piece with as few steps as possible.

That doesn't sound like refinement, but that that was his intention.

liebs, why not ask him what his reasons were? He may well have wanted to use a limited vocabulary ("Let's see if I can make a dance with three steps in it.") Or he may be reflecting the trend that some of us have noted above. Or he may have a different reason entirely. It would be interesting to know.

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I went to two performances of this workshop this weekend (it was the NY Choreographic Institute). Four choreographers' works-in-progress were

presented: Ben Millepied, Damian Woetzel,Sabrina Matthews, and Alexei Ratmansky. The Ratmansky effrort was the one I liked the least---it was

lots of running on the diagonal, grand passionate lifts, flinging oneself backward onto the floor and the final impassioned kiss and then backward collapse (as opposed to Flinging) onto the floor.....

Not Much There. I don't just mean the steps/absence/elimination thereof.

It was very Russian,very impassioned (this is a direct quotation from the choreographer) but very derivative (do I see every Soviet balletic cliche ?)and having no emotional or dramatic core. No core, no steps....what is left? Lots of bravura dancing to smoke. ...the dancers were very good, but it pretty much was the equivalent of a beautiful curtain to hide the emptiness.

The remaining three pieces were quite interesting---obviously

works-in-progress, but they left me wanting to see more. Millepied did two dances to music by Steve Reich and as it was entirely rhythmical (Clapping Music, Typing Music), the steps, figures and structure were for me more evident --very crisp and delineated. I really didn't see the need for much cleaning, actually.

Matthews' work was set to a Bach Partita for violin and I found it very

interesting, mostly as a result of the contrast between the highly structured music and the movement, which was very inorganic and expressive. She stated that she wanted to give the dancers scope for individual expression within a set framework and I liked the contrast between the movement and the music......it was really beautiful but must have been very difficult to dance.

Woetzel used a series of songs by Copland and while I think it could use a little cleaning and less pyrotechnics, a number of the shapes and images I retained from this series of pieces were very arresting---a good marriage of music and dancing, a beautiful use of his chosen dancers.

It was a very stimulating program.....but the Ratmansky piece seemed very empty (well, almost formulaic). This was a workshop performance, the choreographers had eight days to develop and rehearse pieces.....however, with the other three pieces, I saw a lot more than steps.

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THanks for the report on that workshop -- it's so good to hear WHAT people are doing elsewhere....

I agree with Alexandra, it would be so interesting to know WHY the choreographer wanted to restrict his vocabulary.... There could be so many reasons. Balanchine said somewhere that it was when he was making Apollo that the first realized the power of restricting his vocabulary and not just use everything.... Look at hte first movement of Serenade -- there aren't many steps in that, it's mostly running, or the first movement of Mozartiana, no releves at all, no jumps, no turns that aren't bourrees, it's mostly walks and reverences and piques and bourrees (but bourrees ARE piques, and look how many kinds of bourrees, the last ones are in parallel for half the distance and turn out for hte second half) and walks and a back bend; the next movement is crazy with jumps...

And Mozartiana is inspired... sometimes people are making etudes.....

Sometimes when I'm writing, I'll set myself the exercise of writing a whole paragraph in monosyllables -- it's a GREAT exercise, for it makes you USE the rhythm and pitch of your voice, for real English is full of little bitty words. it makes you sound like you mean it.... Another is to write with my not-facile hand....

Leigh said there comes a point when he's choreographing where he doesn't want to add any steps he hasn't used.... what's up with that? He's an interesting guy, I'd like to know what he means by that....

Leigh? Would you mind?

[ March 18, 2002, 10:32 PM: Message edited by: Paul Parish ]

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Paul -

It isn't a deep artistic thing, it's more about craft. I feel a dance has more focus if it has a specific movement palette to it. By a certain point in the dance, you've pretty much set up what that is. It's not an inviolable rule, but I think as a choreographer a small warning should go off in your head if you suddenly start running off with a completely different idea towards the end of the process. Will it integrate? Are you just running out of ideas and spouting or is this an evolution to where you really wanted the ballet to go? If so, do you need to reverse-engineer the piece to integrate the material?

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I'm taking composition this semester in school, and our teacher sees steps as limiting, and encourages us to try to make movement we've never seen before. At first this was very hard, but now it's becoming fun. I think the "perfect" contemporary dance would have a balance of steps and "new movement".

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