are new kinds of dance possible?

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 06:36 AM

in 3/2. Breton dances still exist in this metre.

Hmm, what are Bourees' timings (yes yes there are 4/4 Bourees - I dance them).

It is interesting that a few of the Cajun onestep moves have been observed in extremely old French dances - ie the lantern position (aka looking through the window). Not that we should be at all surprised.

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 05:46 AM

I suppose some would say the "Riverdance" style is a new kind of dance but I think I would go along with the view that it is a variation/evolution of a theme - modernising/re-styling Irish traditional dance.

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: olddude
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 02:17 PM

I think it is a fine topic,   a dance craze has a direct influence on the development of new music. Have a look at ragtime, the big band era. I think it is a good question myself

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 02:05 PM

Oops and oops.

Oops 1: GUEST above was me, having not realised my cookie had gone.

Oops 2: I was thinking that Mary's appeal concerned triple time in general because (apart from 6/8) it's pretty scarce for English dances. Also what someone notates as 3/2 someone else could notate as 3/4 (e.g. I once heard that Alistair Anderson had perceived a resemblance between polskas, which are usually written as 3/4, and some Northumbrian tunes in 3/2).

If we're looking specifically at the 3/2 hornpipes, isn't the problem that the tunes have survived but no-one knows what the steps were?

Richard

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Marje
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 11:05 AM

I'm getting confused now. If they are in waltz time, they're not in 3/2, are they? I'm thinking (and I think Mary is too) of tunes like 3/2 "hornpipes", which you couldn't possibly waltz to - Rusty Gully, for example.

I suppose all it takes is for some prominent ceilidh band to invent a dance that works with a 3/2 rhythm and then promote it at their dances, by demonstrating it and encouraging others to copy it. At a festival, for example, there would be lots of dancers keen to give it a try, and other bands around to watch and learn.

I agree, there are some cracking tunes out there, and it must be possible to invent or rediscover a way of dancing to them.

Marje

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 10:21 AM

In response to Mary:

Many European countries have folk dances (of various ages from hundreds of years to newly made) in 3/2. Obviously waltzes, but also mazurkas, polskas in Sweden and springars etc in Norway. At least one minuet survived into modern times in Denmark and is now done by folk dance enthusiasts.

Some of these are couple dances, where each couple either stays in one place or, more commonly, moves round the room independently of other couples (apart from trying to avoid collisions) but there are some in square formations and some with each couple dancing with another couple and then progressing to the next couple.

Britain does have a few in waltz time, such as Waterfall Waltz and The Duke of Kent's Waltz.

Richard

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Mary Humphreys
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 08:57 AM

I would love to see a revival of dances in 3/2 time. Some of the best tunes ever were in this time signature. Purcell & Handel composed cracking dance tunes in 3/2. Breton dances still exist in this metre. Why have English dances died out I wonder?

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Marje
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 06:41 AM

Interesting historical oversight there, Bob L.

But then, don't many things change faster now? And they may be media-driven in ways that were not possible in the past. For instance, there could be a revival of ballroom styles because of "Strictly Come Dancing".

The renewed interest in folk and country dance in the UK (e.g. American square dance, EFDSS, RSCDS and, eventually, English ceilidh) began in about the late 1950s, so if you're right, that should also have another century or so to run.

Marje

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: GUEST,Bob L
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 04:41 AM

Historical note:

Country dancing was popular from, very roughly, 1650 to 1800, but by then it was a shadow of its former self.

It was displaced by short-lived styles such as quadrilles and what we nowadays call "Old-Time".

Ballroom dancing was popular from, very roughly, 1810 to 1960, but by then it was a shadow of its former self.

It was displaced (within living memory, including this contributor's) by short-lived styles such as rock & jive.

The present style, where you stand in one place and shake around in time with the music, came in about 1965.
Historical precedent would suggest we're going to be stuck with this for another century or so.

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Marje
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 12:18 PM

OK, so the "hip hop" is quite impressive, but it seems to be an organised, choreographed display dance, performed for an audience - it looks like a more modern equivalent of the disco dances that are used to back pop videos.

I'm not convinced that as an informal social dance (i.e. without rehearsal) it would be a "group dance" in the sense of a group moving and dancing as a team and interacting with each other, any more than disco dancing or twist would be.

But I freely admit to zero experience of this sort of dance, and I'm happy to be corrected.

Marje

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: M.Ted
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 09:57 AM

It's group dancing, it's what the young people all over the world are doing, and it doesn't look much like the twist. World Hip Hop Dance Championship: KABA MODERN World Finals 08/02/09

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 09:36 AM

As George Bernard Shaw said:

"The golden rule is that there are no golden rules"

But there are a lot of fashions. And they go in cycles. And permutations make it new enough to claim as new and exciting for the young things that have seen so little of life (yet know so much).

I never pogoed but I think you will find the inhabitants of the Masai Mara had ceremonies doing just that way back into unrecorded history. It is just that they probably didn't gob at the musicians.

New dance forms? New to us. What was the hokey cokey but a farndole. The twist looks a lot like Cajun moves I see on archive film without the lateral or longtitudinal progress, or even the need for a partner. And didn't it originate down in that neck of the woods (ish)? Mind you it obviated the need for a handbag to dance around.

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 08:20 AM

Why was line dancing invented?

So Morris dancers could have something to laugh at...:-)

Seriously though - Jack has a good point. Our club ceilidh band, now sadly no more, did an excelent trad. dance which fitted very nicely to a Status Quo riff! At Salford Uni, where the floor was packed with young people, I witnessed the pnenomena of head-banging and shoulder-dipping in place of the usual promenade or waltz between figures.

A joy to behold and, to my mind, a step (pun intended) in the right direction.

Cheers

DeG

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: doc.tom
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 06:29 AM

"Meanwhile in the folkdance scene (SCD, contra, Latin, bellydance, whatever)"

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Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Marje
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 05:02 AM

Just because it doesn't have an obvvious answer doesn't make it a pointless question. I think it's an interesting topic.

One of the big attractions of waltzes, polkas and other couple-dances when they were first introduced was that they permitted close physical contact via the "ballroom hold" throughout the dance, even in polite and formal society where no such intimate contact was otherwise possible.

Then when we got as far as the Twist (and the "shake", whatever happened to that?), couples began to let go of each other and started to dance independently, although still in couples and often mirroring each other's movements. It was still some years, I think, before young people at a dance would just get up and dance as singles or in groups, without a partner. Dancing became more and more an individual's way of expressing themselves, without much reference to others around.

And as far as I know, most new dances that have developed since then are done by individuals, sometimes with an element of display (e.g break-dancing).

So if I had to predict a new trend, I'd hazard a vague suggestion that there might be some move back to group or couple dancing, with more emphasis on synchronised movements and physical contact (line dancing has the first of these but not the second). Throughout the world, people love to dance in groups, moving together to create something more than the sum of the parts, and this is largely lost in popular dance now (except of course in folk dance). It's an effective method of group bonding and helping people to feel they belong. But what form this new dance would take or what music would drive it, I can't begin to guess.

Marje

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 30 Dec 09 - 08:56 PM

I'm gonna try to bring back the waltz--in 9/4 time.

Subject: RE: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 30 Dec 09 - 08:28 PM

Break dancing? Body popping? Line dancing? A new one will certainly come along, but by definition that would be impossible to forsee. Pointles question, as it is impossible to give an authorataive answer.

Subject: are new kinds of dance possible?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 30 Dec 09 - 07:52 PM

Getting away a bit from the usual focus on what's gone wrong with the song tradition...

The last new kind of dance I can remember becoming a mass phenomenon in my lifetime was the Twist, sometime in the early 1960s. And even that was maybe just a variant of jive. There have been new moves within existing popular dance styles - moonwalk, pogo - but not a whole new genre of dance you might need a class to get down right.

Meanwhile in the folkdance scene (SCD, contra, Latin, bellydance, whatever) we have a lot of new dances created by combining existing steps and moves, which are great fun for small circles of hobbyists, but nothing that has a prayer of catching on in the wider culture. Whatever merits something like "Shiftin Bobbins" has, nobody's going to be doing it to a DJ mix in a club.

Fast backward a few decades and you had whole new dances being created every few years, carrying their specific kinds of music along with them on a wave of popularity that could often be an international phenomenon. Waltzes and polkas were probably the biggest ever, but there were still new ones up till WW2.

Maybe Latin American dance has managed to generate new ideas more than the First World's Euro/Afro mainstream, but even with that what's caught on in the culture as a whole in the last 25 years?

Can dance still be a motive force for the development of a melodic tradition that goes in a new direction?