Doris had said contemporary has proven to be the most helpful style for carillonneurs. I enjoyed contemporary the most now that I’ve had time to think about it. Contemporary dance made me feel like I had a flow of positive energy coursing through me. Ballet, on the other hand, felt like the complete opposite. The style of ballet felt so rigid and controlled; I was thinking about dancing more than I was dancing. I middle ground between the two would be jazz in my opinion though. There’s a certain level of accuracy and sharpness to the moves without the same excessively sharpened edge. I guess I’m saying contemporary was free, ballet was suffocating, and jazz was very structured. I also experienced the kind of contemporary exhibited by Kate Weare and Company. Personally, I found their style of contemporary to be to emotionless and perfected… there was no flow. The opposite of emotionless was the West African dance workshop I attended. Though I wouldn’t want to practice that style myself, I didn’t experience dancers in my time this semester that looked happier than the individuals in that …show more content…
Before this class I had only seen ballets and broadways. I feel that one of our best class discussions was facilitated by me questioning Kate Weare’s message. The 15 minutes or so we spent as a class discussing our interpretation of the performance proved to be more engaging than some of our physical dancing. I was sweating a lot in class most days though. I’m definitely in better shape than I was coming into class -- just staying moderately active for two or so hours a week really goes a long way. Unfortunately, I did miss some classes which I regret. I had a really difficult semester marked by strep throat that grew to be a sinus infection, the death of a loved one, and my first cold winter away from home. There were times trying to dance through all that felt grueling and other times it felt liberating.
I would say the one common facet between all of the style we practiced was the presence of energy, focus, and emotion. Not a single style is worth watching if the dance doesn’t possess or bring those qualities to the dance. To me, dance technique is something that comes from within a person, manifesting itself in the smallest minutiaes of a person’s movement. I never understood when people would say cliche things like “dance is life” or “the movement speaks,” but I can truly say those phrases mean something to me at this