I have a confession. Ever since I saw all of last season’s episode of Dancing With the Stars in a marathon, I’ve been intrigued. I’m watching this current season, and it seems unsurprisingly to have lost some of the charm of the first season while introducing new information about dancing.

Last season, the dances were beautiful, clean ballroom dances. I loved them. It made me want to run out and enroll at a ballroom dancing school, if for no other reason than to get me dancing again. This season, I don’t so inspired to go dance, but it is very nice to see the better couples try to incorporate a story of some sort into their dance. It really makes those dances very entrancing, even if the dancers are having trouble with the steps themselves.

When I studied ballet, one of the things my favorite teachers tried to impress on us during rehearsals was that our dance was trying to tell a story. It didn’t matter if the piece was part of a ballet with a well-known storyline or just our end of year piece. Every dance tells a story. It doesn’t have to be a complicated story, but it should be present enough to leave the audience with some feeling outside of, “Well, that was lovely.” Not all choreography plays along, but theoretically there should be a story in every formally choreographed dance.

Posted by Rebecca in Uncategorized