Tempo: Slower music gives dancers more time to play, more time for style and variations. Unlike most ballroom dances which tend to use the music as a metronome to guide the dance, Lindy Hop and West Coast swing view matching your dancing to the spirit/mood of the music is the highest goal achievable. This is also a key characteristic of improvised swing dancing. This is especially true in choreography, where dancers plan a routine of dance moves, sometimes with a specific song in mind. Dancers usually step on the beats of the music, and may vary the size of their movements with the volume of the music. Musicality may also refer to fitting a dance to the music being played, with the goal of relating the dance to the music's rhythm, melody, and mood. One usually differentiates between two types of musicality: To be able to perceive music (musical receptivity) and to be able to reproduce music as well as creating music (musical creativity). The word also refers to the quality or state of being musical (aka melodiousness.) A musical person has the ability to perceive differences in pitch, rhythm and harmonies. Musicality is a noun that means sensitivity to, knowledge of, or talent for music. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Whichever you choose, be sure that in the end you and you alone are happy with the result.This article does not cite any references or sources. You may prefer to highlight the staccato notes (short and quick) versus the legato “oohs” that dominate the song. Everyone has a different style and the way you move to for instance “Sail” by AWOLNATION may be completely different to anyone else in your studio. Sometimes, just listening to the music and really paying attention to how it makes you feel can be the most important exercise of all.Īnother helpful tool is your camera, filming yourself freestyling to the music and to particular points in the music brings about a better understanding of how your body moves to different styles of music. Listening for all of the aforementioned details can be extremely helpful, and also overwhelming at the same time. Finding a layer within the music can provide inspiration for unexpected accents as well as points in the music where a movement may need to be more pronounced. You can listen out for one of the items I listed in the music and create movement based on just that. Lyrics: Paying attention to the lyrics can help with musicality and character development Mood: Music can carry a particular mood be it happy, hopeful, adventurous, dramatic, sensual etc. Harmony: The supporting notes to the song-an under-layer Melody: The main tune in the song-usually the most memorable. Tempo: Tempo is the speed of the music, its pace
There are a few ways in which the music can be dissected dancers can examine tempo, melody, harmony, rhythm, volume, mood, and lyrics. After that a dissection of the music occurs, listening to the song on repeat helps to grasp the layers within the music fully. For me, this is how I am able to come up with movements that feel natural to me, even if I am portraying a character outside of my usual choice. I think it is even more important to choose music you can relate to in some way. Many people may choose a song based off of what is popular or considered a good pole song.
Musicality is important for all styles of pole dance in that it involves hitting the beats, but also in that it sheds light on the the importance of feeling your music. Naturally people define musicality in array of ways, the definitions I found are a good start to understanding what it is. Musical creativity is the ability to “feel” the music and interpret, connect with, and add innovative movement. Perceiving music involves a knowledge of music in terms of tempo, rhythm, mood and phrasing. One way is the ability to perceive music, and the other is the ability to reproduce or create music. Musicality is a word that often comes up in pole discussions, but what does it mean? A quick dictionary search tells us that there are two ways musicality can be defined.