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This is the podcast for us dance teachers balancing our teaching job with other jobs, commitments, and just life in general! We don't need to know how to run the whole studio, work with students 20+ hours a week, or win big at competitions; we just want practical advice and real conversations about how to be the best dance teachers we can be with the little time we have with our students. Join Maia on the casual dance teacher's podcast and in the casual dance teacher's network on Facebook.
Maia
Hello and welcome to the Casual Dance Teachers Podcast, this is Maia and we're finally getting into it. We are going to talk about choreography, finally! This is one of my favorite topics, I actually had a concentration in choreography when I got my degree in school, so it's just something that's very near and dear to my heart, and of course you know that I also love to go with units, love to have a theme. So we're going to make this choreography month, so I'm going to share a number of different tips and my thoughts across a variety of different topics around choreography, and today of course we're going to start at the very beginning. So we're talking about choosing your music and/or your theme for your choreography. Let's talk about it.
Anyone who's been listening to the podcast or gone back and listened to past episodes knows that I do alreadys have an episode about choosing music for dance classes, and I mentioned in that episode that choosing music for your classes is a little different than choosing music for choreography. So, I'll discuss the differences a little bit today, but I didn't want you to get bored or feel like I was like circling back over the same topic. Instead of just talking about choosing music, we're going to talk about choosing the Theme for your choreography and I'll get into what I mean by that in just a second. I also did want to mention, of course, that I'm only talking about choreography for recital dances so of course I'm not talking about concert dance that's like a whole different ball game.
I'm not talking about choreographing for competitions either, although I'll get on my high horse for like just a half a second and say that I don't really feel like competition choreography should be different; they should kind of serve the same purpose. But we won't get into that that's totally kind of up to your opinion, we can talk about that another time, but what i'm really talking about is just a recreational recital setting how you're going to come up with a theme for choreography that is meant to showcase what the students have learned and their talents and skills so before i start getting into that let's kick it off with this question of do you even have to have a theme before you start choreographing can you just step into the studio and start coming up with movement and setting it or must there be an underlying theme in mind before you start that process and for me i feel like the answer is yes you do have to have a theme to me the best way to showcase what your students have Learned is to unify it all under some kind of theme, so let me get into what those themes are and a couple of tips or insights on how I've chosen themes for my choreography in the past, and then in the coming weeks we'll actually talk about the process a little bit more, what goes into the choreography and all of that, kicking off with talking about choosing music for your choreography if your studio has a theme for the recital and you need to choose music that fits within a certain theme, I feel like that's really helpful, I feel like that's awesome because my problem with choosing music generally is not that I can't come up with Any ideas it's just that there's almost too many options and I don't know how to narrow it down and find just the right one to fit that particular class that I'm trying to choose music for so if you're searching for music that fits a certain theme you can go to certain playlists, you can listen to music that's similar, and then wait for the algorithm to kind of do its job and find additional similar songs for you until you find something that fits your music, and then you can go to music that's similar, and then wait for just that right one; you can reach out and ask people for music that falls within that theme, you can search for certain Keywords within whatever streaming service you use, so there are so many ways that you can find music that fits within a theme.
That should actually be really helpful for you. My studio has always done very broad themes, so I'm given a lot of creative freedom in choosing the songs and themes for my dances, which is awesome as a choreographer, that's so exciting. But again, sometimes it can be overwhelming how many different choices I have throughout the year. Anytime I'm listening to music, I talk about this in the other episode too. I'm always grabbing songs that I like and throwing them into these playlists, even if I'm not going To use them that season or it's just not the right fit for the particular classes I'm teaching right now. If a song inspires me, I'm going to throw it onto a playlist.
Now, I have playlists curated for each style of dance that I teach and that includes any music that I think I can use in a class to teach that style. Those are again very long-term and I'm going to throw them into a playlist that I'm extensive playlist. I throw all the music in there and then on a weekly or monthly basis, I just kind of go in and rearrange so that the songs I'm using at the time are at the top. I also have a separate playlist specifically for songs that have inspired Me with some kind of choreographic idea now from a practical standpoint, I have to tell you one of the biggest things that will get me to put a song on this playlist is if it's like a two and a half to three and a half minute song because I hate music - I hate when a song is just getting going and then there's a fade out or there's like some awkward cut in the middle or something, like that.
And it has to happen because obviously, like this is recital choreography; it has to be a certain length. But even if I'm on the fence about a song, like I don't love it but I see that it's three minutes long on the dot like that might be the thing that makes I'd put it on the playlist, so that's one consideration - is it the right time or does it have a section in the song that's the appropriate length that they're going to put time that I can easily use it for a recital? Dance. The other thing, obviously, is it appropriate? Is it a theme to the music itself that is going to be inspiring for my kids and it's going to be really fun for them to dance to and not too mature for their age level or anything like that?
Then, of course, there's a time signature in the beat and I actually kind of... I hate to say this... I kind of want to like rescind what I said in the music for Dance Classes episode, I was talking About how for young students I might want to use more music that's in a four-four time signature and has a steady beat so it's easier for them to hear the music. As soon as I listened back to that episode, I thought, 'You know, that's not even really true.' I don't know why I said that because young kids don't always have that four-four time, five-six-seven-eight ingrained in their brains where they can't think outside of that. I've actually done a dance to Flight of the Bumblebee and they did amazing; they didn't need a helper on stage or anything.
They knew that choreography; they knew the timing because they just listened. The music. They weren't worried about it. They just were like latching on to the cues in the music and did great with it. So, I again i kind of take back what I said. I think young kids, you can do pretty much any time signature you want as long as you're teaching them appropriately how to count it and you're not counting five, six, seven, eight if it's not same. With older kids, of course, if you want to teach them to get better with their timing to get better with counting to work with their timing to work with their timing to work with their timing to work with a non-traditional time signature that's great but make sure that you have the Space in your season to really work on that and make sure they've mastered it. I've had classes where just as a group, they feel music really well and they're very musical group, and I want to showcase that so I give them a piece of music that has a non-traditional or a different kind of time signature. I've had other groups where they are beautiful dancers, excellent technique, and I want to showcase that but if I were to give them any kind of music that's not counted in four-four time, they would lose it, and I don't want to put them on stage with beautiful technique but they can't keep the timing, and so it throws off the beauty of the Piece so just kind of feeling out what the class's strengths are, what they're comfortable with, what's going to make them look best and the music has to enhance that, that's going to be the primary thing.
So in the rare occasions that I don't have an idea of what to do, I'm going to give them a piece of music that has a non-traditional idea for music. I don't have a theme and I just can't find the right piece of music I need some other source of inspiration to come up with where I'm going to get started with my choreography for this piece. And also, this kind of only applies to recital choreography but it seems like you have to order costumes. From the costume companies, so early now, like they are just crazy, so sometimes I'm getting costume books and being like it's time to pick out costumes and I haven't even thought about the recital like it's just not even a thought in my mind because it seems like it's so far in advance.
But flipping through those costume books can be really helpful for me. I might find inspiration in a costume, whether it's that the costume reminds me of a certain character and I go oh, if we chose this costume then they could kind of portray that character, that would be the theme maybe. The costume just like the colors and the way it's made it. It reminds you of a piece of music, or it reminds you of a certain story, or a piece of music, or a piece of music, or a piece of painting, maybe, or a piece of art, or something like that, and then that can be the theme for your dance. So I know I'm not alone in that many dance teachers will look through costume books, you could even look online, there's so many different resources where you can find costumes and get inspired for a theme that way.
Along the same lines, even without looking at a costume, your theme might just be a story or a character from pop culture or from a movie or a book or just something in personal life and I'm not alone in that because i'm not alone in that because i'm not alone in that one of my favorite dances that i ever choreographed and i didn't even tell my dancers this like i didn't say this is the story but some friends of mine had actually lost their daughter and it was obviously such a sad time there was so much mourning and grieving going on and i just had this vision in my head of their daughter in heaven just dancing and like just this beautiful vision it in it didn't start out as a choreographic vision it just started out with me like feeling like there was just some picture that i wanted to convey of this beautiful young girl in heaven Just surrounded by beauty and grace, and none of the sadness, none of the grief, none of the darkness or anything like that. So it turned into this dance that was really beautiful, very light. You know, it was very happy. And I never told the dancers that there was anything like really devastating behind it because I just wanted them to portray that grace and that was the happiness and that lightness that I felt when I had that vision in my head.
And it's such a near and dear piece to my heart, but it also moved a lot of people again without me saying anything. So, starting out as a theme, me finding music, and finding costumes and Creating movement based off of that worked really well in that case. Sometimes it can actually be more difficult to choose music when you have this clear, clear vision in your head to start with and you're like, 'I just wish I could create my own music to go with it.' And I just wish I could create my own music to go with this idea. Maybe you could reach out to a local musician if you have enough time in advance and you're doing like a three-minute dance.
I'm sure that you could find a local musician that could create a piece and you guys can work together and go back and forth and curate something really special just to go with your theme. And your idea so that would be so fun, could you have live accompaniment on stage that would be even cooler, that would be amazing. So it's okay to think outside the box to try to bring a story to life if that's the idea that you're starting with and then finally, of course, like I said, I'm kind of coming at this with a little bit of academic background, like I was trained in choreography in college, and I would say that my approach has changed a lot in the years since I've graduated just from working in that casual setting and a recital setting and not doing these long form pieces of dance but I always have that in the back of my mind like dance doesn't have to be a story, it doesn't have to be like purely for entertainment, it doesn't have to be like a story, it doesn't have to be like a story, it doesn't have to be like a movement; you can do movement for movement's sake, the theme of the dance can be dancing, it can just be whatever movement you want to say it is, okay to just speak through dance and have no other emotional intention behind it or narrative intention behind it, but again the reason why I say you have to have a theme even if you're just doing, you know, movement for movement's sake is that we're working with students; they're going to have certain limitations.
And they're going to have certain strengths, and it's really our job to you know show their their parents or whoever is paying for their dance classes that return on investment, right? We gotta educate them. We have to also entertain them. We have to show them that all of this has been worth it, and show them what they've learned. So your theme could be just showcasing the steps that your students are best at. It could be showcasing a combination or a series of combinations that they really really excelled at. It could be showcasing their musicality again if you have a group that is just phenomenal at finding the beat and accentuating. Accents with their bodies that could be the theme, but you have to at least wrap your head around this whole dance is going to be about accenting certain notes with the body and all the different ways that my dancers can do that or the theme of this dance is going to be this really big energy that my dancers have when they do any kind of jump or leap so that they're going to be leaving the ground a lot and doing a lot of level changes, and we're going to explore what that means for them and how they excel at that. That's still your theme, but I would never just step into the studio and start coming up with stuff and not understand that.
There's going to be some kind of intention behind every single thing that we do, and of course I hate ending on this note, I'll have to come up with something else to add at the end so I don't end on this negative note but don't get your idea for your theme from somebody else you're not going to be able to do it else's dance that killed at a competition or has tons of views on TikTok or something you're like oh that music is really fun I bet my kids would like it it did really well I could do something like that for this theme or you know it really connected with people, you're setting yourself up a to be disappointed because you already Have an image in your head, and then be like you're not fulfilling that artistic part of you, so I don't understand why people do that.
I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir here, but I just I just figured I'd tag that on like there's so so many ways to come up with original ideas again. You can go back to that first episode that I posted about choosing music for dance classes and there I talk about a couple different ways to find other people's playlists, and also to let the algorithm kind of learn what you're looking for so you can then get suggestions that might help you find more unique music so you don't get stuck in a musical rut also. We have the Casual Dance Teachers Network on Facebook, we can always chat there. We can ask for suggestions, we can ask for questions, we can ask for suggestions, we can confide in each other when we're stuck and we need ideas, and maybe show each other different resources that we use.
So I'm really, really eager to hear from you guys. I really think that the four things the music, the story, the costumes, and the movement are the only ways that I've ever chosen a theme for choreography. I can't think of anything else. If you have, I'm really, really curious to hear that. Please let me know. And again, if you're stuck and having trouble like Reach out to us in the Facebook group, that's what we're here for, and we'll be happy to help you out. So to wrap up, you know I always thank GB Mystical for my theme music; he's got tons of super cool music in all different styles, so maybe check out GB Mystical see if he has any music that you could use for your dancers before we go.
Let's close with a quote that of course is about choreography from Alvin Ailey, and this one I don't know if it's really inspiring per se, but it felt to me like it was nice to have this really practical reminder that even the greatest choreographers of all time kind of have this really practical reminder that Even the greatest choreographers have the same stance on choreography, that all of us do. Alvin Ailey said, 'Choreography is mentally draining, but there's a pleasure in getting into the studio with the dancers and the music.'.