Jerome Robbins Essay

Influenced primarily by cultural roots and incredibly opportunity, Dunham had the luxury of studying in the West Indies as well as anthropological study of other cultural style dances. The West Indian experience changed forever the focus of Dunham’s life and caused a profound shift in her career. This initial fieldwork began a lifelong involvement with the people and dance of Haiti. And, importantly for the development of modern dance, her fieldwork began her investigations into a vocabulary of movement that would form the core of the Katherine Dunham Technique. Though many of Dunham’s primary influences lies within her multicultural experiences, Mark Turbyfill also seemed to play a large role in her future dance career, giving her private lessons despite his doubt in the opening of her student company (Kaiso! 187). Katherine Dunham has been list as an influence to “everyone from George Balanchine to Jerome Robbins, Alvin Ailey, Bob Fosse and Twyla Tharp. American dance, including ballet, modern dance, Hollywood and Broadway, would not be the same without her” (Aschenbrenner 226).

Berkeley’s creations were not meant to focus on dance. He envisioned an overall moving pattern, which he created by using moving bodies. He made the art of choreography a technique of design and visual mathematics, and combined this with his knowledge of film to bring his vision to life on the big screen. The skill of this multi-talented man brought Hollywood musicals to their full potential, creating a high demand for dance in films.

About three years later, Balanchine formed a group of four dancers, "Soviet State Dancers," that toured outside of the Soviet Union. His choreography for his dancers upset the traditional minded audiences during his tour, so his tour was not of the greatest success. On the tour, he met a man named Diaghilev, who immediately offered him a job that gave him a great deal of exposure. After three years of amazing experience, Diaghilev promoted Balanchine as a choreographer and made him master for his company. Balanchine was only at the age of 25. His unique style of dance was too advanced for the Soviets to handle. So Balanchine moved to Europe to start his own ballet company. He was not there long, Lincoln Kirstein, one of his fans who encouraged Balanchine to go to the United States to help establish a school of Ballet equivalent to those found in Europe and Russia. Little did Lincoln know that those words of wisdom were the start to a whole in Ballet world in the U.S.

Alvin Ailey, a well known second generation American choreographer and activist was born in Rogers, Texas on January 5, 1931. Ailey grew up poor in the small Texas town of Navasota. Although he did not have much growing up, it did not stop his drive to succeed. He became inspired by attending black church services and by the music he heard at the local dance hall. Because of this, Ailey left Texas at the young age of 12 and moved to Los Angeles. While in Los Angeles, Ailey excelled in different subjects such as language and athletics. He became inspired to pursue dancing after seeing the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo perform. In 1949, at the age of 18, he began to study modern dance with Lester Horton and joined Horton’s dance company the following year. Horton became Ailey 's major influence, as he was his mentor that gave him a foundation and technique that allowed him to grow artistically. Even though he developed his own style, he still used Horton’s technique that emphasized a strong fluid torso and ease of movement. In his years to follow, Ailey founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York in 1958. Ailey’s dance company became very popular because of its multi-racial modern dance ensemble. Due to his modern, jazz and ethnic dance styles, and extensive world tours, Alvin Ailey became one of the leading figures in the 20th century modern dance, making modern dance popular all over the world. Ailey is a significant artist to me because he paved the way for

We come to note the differences between the two pieces by Murphy and Bonachela, their style of dance being Contemporary remains the same but the movement used within to portray their intent is different and it is shown clearly.

Renowned choreographer Alonzo King is the Balanchine of a new style of dance, his style of dance, a style shying away from the expected and catapulting its audience into a state of wonderment. Alonzo King uses sharp lines intertwined with severe movements all engaging a classical technique in order to create movements, unseen to the dance world. King’s impressive résumé includes having trained with a number of world-renowned ballet companies, and setting works on an even more substantial number of companies, along with establishing his own celebrated company: Alonzo King’s LINES Ballet in San Francisco, California.

Born July 6, 1931 Donald McKayle grew up in Harlem, New York City and was raised by his parents Wilhelmina Cohen McKayle and Philip Augustus McKayle. As a young teenager, his English teacher helped spark an interest of African American history along with his neighborhood which was rich with “social dancing, culture and political awareness” (Jacinto, 2012, p. 1). This combination of interest in African American diaspora and influence of environmental surroundings would lead to inspiring and forming McKayle into a renowned dancer, teacher and choreographer. Prior to McKayle’s senior year in high school he saw a performance by Pearl Primus which made him realize he wanted to become a dancer. He went on to audition for the New Dance Group and was chosen as one of seven dancers. As a member of the New Dance Group he trained in a variety of dance genres under Sophie Maslow, Nona Shurman, Mary Anthony, Nina Golovina, and even Pearl Primus. His first choreographic work was with the New Dance Group entitled Saturday’s Child, which was a solo he performed. His time with the New Dance Group gave him a strong technical background and movement vocabulary that he would carry on with him as he joined the Contemporary Dance Group. It was then that he premiered Games, at Charles Weidman’s studio which “launched the young choreographer 's career” (Jacinto, 2012, p.1). This was the first time audiences saw him as a storyteller and social critic whose movement style played off of the human

“Go within everyday and find the inner strength so that the world will not blow your candle out” (A Quote by Katherine Dunham 1). Once one of the most successful dancers in both American and European theater, Katherine Dunham, a dancer, anthropologist,social activist,and educator, continues to inspire people throughout the world. Named America’s irreplaceable Dance Treasure in 2000. Dunham remains a name heard regularly in dance schools across the world (“Katherine Dunham Biography” 4). She is known for always trying to make a difference and in the process she has become of the world’s greatest humanitarians (Osumare 5). Katherine Dunham’s work in African American rights in the dance world and her creation of new styles of dance makes her an important figure in American dance History.

Charles “Cholly” Atkins was truly a class act. He definitely a leader in the entertainment industry, and he knew it. Not only was he amazing at various types of dance, he was a gifted singer, and a superb choreographer. His career started in the 1930s and the legacy of it extends even to today. His dancing style was like no others; he combined standard tap dance with modern dance and ballet moves to create amazing and eye catching tap techniques.

Reading Robbins, Global Problems and the Culture of Capitalism, Chapter 2 Labor, and watching the Mardi Gras: Made In China documentary delivered two contrasting emotions. When reading, it’s just like I’m reading for understanding, but when I watch what I’ve read about it put things into perspective. When reading two points that Robbins made really stood out to me in both the chapter, and the documentary, and they are discipline/control and labor.

MY THINH CAO December 19, 2014 Dance Appreciation DA-101-01 Research Paper Prof. Catherine Baggs Gene Kelly and his Contributions to Dance Dance is the only artform of expressive body language to inspire viewers. There are many different dance genres that people can freely choose depending on their preferences. Jazz dance is one which is popular worldwide today. In the1950’s-1970’s, there were many choreographers who contributed to the development of jazz, particularly Gene Kelly, a talented and creative choreographer, whose famous dance movie “Singin’ in the Rain” helped him emerge as a star choreographer with aptitude and abundant creative capacity.

If I ever met Jean Georges Noverre I would ask him how difficult it was to choreograph so many dances. He never actually got any awards but he was basically he was awarded by having so many opportunities to perform on big stages. The reason he had the 1th-5th position was to show where to put your feet and all the positions have his feet turned out because when the men would dance the wouldn’t go on pointe they would have healed on so he was showing you that they had healed on. One of his most popular dances is called the Swan Lake dance. People still perform this dance to this day.

Jerome Robbins was born on October 11, 1918 in New York City to Harry Rabinowitz and Lena Rips. His father, Harry Rabinowitz was a shoe keeper in Manhattan until he moved the family to Jersey City to start the Comfort Corset Company. When Robbins was young, there was already a spark of interest for music, dancing, and theater. However, he intended to study chemistry or journalism in college. This was never fulfilled due to the Great Depression and the financial struggles placed on his family. Robbins decided then to find employment in show business rather than working at the family company. This was the start of his dance and choreographing career. He is now a world renowned choreographer of ballets, theaters, and movies.

Mark Morris is known as one of “the most successful and influential choreographers alive, and indisputably the most musical” (New York Times). From Seattle, Washington Morris performed with companies like Lar Lubovitch, Laura Dean, Hannah Kahn, Eliot Feld, and

Martha Graham can easily be named the pioneer of modern dance, as her impact on the art form is often compared to that of Picasso’s on painting, Stravinsky’s on music, and Frank Lloyd Wright’s on architecture (Graham). Her greatest contribution to dance was her exploration of how to express abstract emotions through movement and giving a definition to an “American” form of dance. Martha saw dance as a platform to communicate raw emotion and meaningful social and political ideas with her audience rather than a form of mere entertainment, and in her effort to demonstrate how dance is a language, she also redefined American dance as it’s own genre rather being a melting pot of other cultural influences.