[Tango-L] Choreography

[Trini y Sean (PATangoS)]

Thanks Kace & Huck for very informative posts.  Perhaps I
have been using the word incorrectly.

Suppose I am explaining to someone about not using high
boleos or potentially harmful ganchos on a crowded dance
floor.  I might say, choose your choreography to fit the
available space.  This is actually how I normally use the
word - choosing a portion of vocabulary out of one's full
repertoire.  I am not referring to scripting the dance.

Or I might say, that if one is dancing to D'Arienzo, one's
choreography might include more rhythmic elements rather
than languid elements (like the climbing a tree embrace :).

What should I be saying instead?  Just "vocabulary"?

Trini de Pittsburgh

--- Kace <kace at pacific.net.sg> wrote:

> Trini y Sean (PATangoS) wrote:
> > For "choreography" in the way I prefer to use it, I
> think
> > of it simply as how one combines vocabulary, but it
> doesn’t
> > mean following a preset formula.  In a way, any
> two-step
> > pattern (rock step, ocho), can be called a
> choreography,
> > right?  If one has favorite ways to enter or exit a
> > particular movement (or habits), doesn’t that become a
> > choreography?
> >
> > Trini de Pittsburgh
> This use of the word "Choreography" is simply equating it
> to a "script". 
> That
> only covers part of what it really is.
> 
> The key element of choreography, in my opinion, is the
> power to communicate
> between dancers and audience. If there is no audience,
> there is no 
> absolute need
> to choreograph, since the communication between the
> dancing couple is 
> already
> solved by perfect notion of using lead and follow
> dynamics, and 
> improvisation.
> 
> A choreography is needed mainly to transform a big
> artistic idea into a 
> series
> of movements that can be visually understood by the
> audience. It is the
> choreographer's job to be the "third eye" during
> rehearsals; his version 
> of what
> message the dance is trying to send; his selective
> application of tango 
> steps,
> accented with vocabulary from ballet and other forms of
> body language, and
> how he create or adapt a soundtrack to make everything
> fit.
> 
> Without understanding the full reason for choreographing
> a performance,
> the whole experience becomes distorted to the point of
> either (1) 
> self-indulgence,
> the dancers doing what they like but not making any point
> to the 
> audience; or
> (2) purely technical, like a show-off pulling out his
> entire bag of 
> tricks to get
> a "wow" reaction.
> 
> Kace
> tangosingapore.com


PATangoS - Pittsburgh Argentine Tango Society 
Our Mission: To make Argentine Tango Pittsburgh's most popular social dance. 
http://www.pitt.edu/~mcph/PATangoWeb.htm


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