Music and Dance

I have so far had an enriching start to the half-term and as I reflect on the influences that have stimulated my thinking over the past few days I realise that experience can not only set us up for further development but it can inspire and serve as our practical experiential research. 

To start the week I visited Ronnie Scott's jazz club on Sunday and watched the incredible musician Al Jarreau.  What an inspiration.  At the age of 74 he has the ability to not only entertain and deliver music at the highest level but imparts to his audience so much of himself and the experiences he has been through in his musical career.  Whilst listening to him and his super talented musicians, I started to think about how much 'we' as dancers, teachers and choreographers research music and very often find incredible possibilities within the 'found' accompaniment.  Although this is not exactly the in-depth study of research that is required at this stage of our journey, it is something that has helped me breakdown the barrier (a little) on the process of research.  It struck me that the pattern of searching for music is almost symmetric to any other research.  The search often occurs from either hearing a track and we then investigate that further, which can lead to other tracks, albums, composers etc, which can then lead to other artists and so the search for music goes on.  The trail of searching for songs often gives us findings that we've never heard of and yet we've found the right piece to accompany the class or choreography.  I suppose it's a bit like a 'jazz hands' style of archaeology. It's also encouraging to extend the  musical experience of our students/dancers. I have no doubt that the dance students' ipod is an eclectic mix of musical choices that perhaps might not be so if they didn't experience dance.............what do you think?

My second enrichment was yesterday when I watched one of my students at the Royal Ballet School.  The day was specifically for JA's and the focus was historical dance.  Although I have seen the content of the day many times before, yesterday was the first time I recognised so many research opportunities to be had from the experience.  So, already my MA is forcing me to question, recognise and reflect in a way that I never have done before.  The children learnt a 17th century dance known as 'Picking of Sticks' which is taken from the Playford Dances.  The day was not only beautiful to watch but was a combination of social interaction, history lesson, research project, musical appreciation, equality and diversity, social etiquette - the list goes on.  So much to be had from the day and so many research opportunities.  The children had such a wonderful time and the education (which they probably didn't even realise) was superb. This brought me to a feeling of both joy and frustration:

Joy - because how lucky we are as dancers to have so much investment into our art from the people who are passionate about its history and development and are those who teach us.
Frustration - because too little of the outside world (i.e. outside of the arts) don't recognise the amount of first class education that is to be found in dance.

However, there is a positive to be had from my 'frustration'.  I remember Adesola saying during our last Skype session that in Module 1 we were the children of Middlesex University (the parents) and in Module 2 the parents have let go of our hands.  As children of Middlesex University without being held by the hand we are being trusted to let go and develop the future for the dancing children that we see before us.  I know that possibly sounds a bit deep, and I apologise if it does, but it's exciting to think that our research could potentially make a difference in the future and hopefully the more 'frustrations' will promote a need to invest more and more into the development and recognition of dance education. 

There is so much to be had from our past and future - who would have thought that 17th century music and dance would be enjoyed by children and adults of 2014?  I'm not sure if I'm any closer in gathering material for a potential research proposal, but the excitement of possibility is driving me on each day.