How Did Merce Cunningham Influence Dance

Dance can show us a variation of things whether it is a story plot or retelling history events. Dance becomes an art when done with passion and enthusiasm. The audience can connect and respond with the dancer if done properly. When we use dancing in a story line musical we are attempting to give the audience a deeper understanding. As every story every musical has a “moral to the story” or main idea.

Graeme Murphy, past artistic director of the Sydney Dance Company is known to be Australia’s greatest and most productive choreographer, of all time. Through the 30 years of being artistic director, Murphy has created outstanding pieces and inspired

Alvin Ailey’s movement style has been shaped and moulded constantly as he moved through his life. Whether it was personal experiences or key dancers he worked with, each individual story is told through his works and tells the story of Ailey’s life.

Alvin Ailey was a famous choreographer/dancer also founder of his own dance company (AAADT). Inspired by many, (including Katherine Dunham and Horton) he began dancing at the age of 15 where he found his love for dancing. Ballet, jazz and Broadway were the three main dance styles Ailey loved. These styles can also be recognised in nearly all of his choreographies. As choreographic styles identify the constituent features, when it comes to Ailey’s work we can clearly recognise them, through the movement used.

In 1958, the same year the company was founded, they had their first performance at the Young Men’s Hebrew Association. At the time Ailey was the principal dancer, choreographer, and artistic director. During that same year Ailey created the “Blue Suites” his first full-scaled piece. The emotional work’s topic was blues. The Station Wagon Tours allowed the group to travel around the country in 1960. They then became the resident company at the Clark Center for Performing Arts. This is where he choreographed Revelations one his most influential and popular works. The company has achieved many accomplishments throughout their history. They toured East Asia and Australia for Kennedy’s “President’s Special International Program for Cultural Presentations.” Later receiving the Kennedy Center Honor for lifetime contribution to American Culture. The Alvin Ailey School was founded in 1969 and is now a member of the National Association of Schools of Dance. One decision that Ailey made changed the history of the company forever. He switched the all black company to a multi-racial group. By doing this he showed how dance was something that we all share and we are all equal in. Sadly Ailey passed away on December 1 1989 due to AIDS. After his death new artistic director Judith Jamison lead the company to even more success and maintained old traditions. From the

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).

Dance is one of the most beautiful, expressive forms of art known to mankind. It expresses joy, love, sorrow, anger, and the list truly goes on for all the possible emotions that it can convey. Dance not only can express how one feels, but it can tell a story or even be used to praise a higher power. Dance has intricately played an important role to every culture over the course of time. Two forms of dance that have not only stood against the test of time but have influenced the development of other various styles of dance is none other than Classical Ballet and Modern Dance.

(New York Times) However he focused on rhythm and style made up for physical issues. After landing a few broadway choruses and spots on television shows, Fosse was spotted by a talent scout from MGM in 1952. (New York Times) After moving to Hollywood, he worked on two movies in 1953, Give a Girl a Break,The Affair of Dobie Gills, and in Kiss Me Kate where he choreographed a pas de deux, or part of two with Carol Haney.

Alvin Ailey was an accomplished dancer and choreographer whose African-American heritage influenced his works in the 20th century. His successful dance career has gained international recognition and acclaim thus rendering a significant legacy. Ailey’s background as a dancer and choreographer had many strong influences from social, cultural, economic and political aspects during his early life. His African-American heritage has greatly influenced his works. Alvin was the founder of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (1958-), galvanized and stabilized an African American presence in theatrical dance. An outstanding performer, choreographer, company director, and mentor to scores of dance artists, Ailey oversaw the growth of his small, pick-up group of seven dancers into a large, carefully managed, internationally-renowned enterprise including several ensembles of dancers and a thriving school in New York City housed in the largest building devoted to dance in the United States. Along the way, Ailey changed the landscape of modern dance by developing new audiences for its performance through a consistent combination of exceptional artistry and wellcoordinated community outreach programs. In all, Ailey invigorated the art of dance with his distinctive creative imagination, his “blood memories” of cultural formations he witnessed as a child-- including the jook joint and the black church --and the strong survivalist ethic he learned as an African American man born in the

Mrs. Farrell’s book is quite technical when it comes to the lengthy descriptions of the dances she rehearses and performs; from a dancer’s view these varied conclusions of the types of movements she was dancing is quite astonishing. In fact, it adds a whole new level to the imagination that can come alive in a person’s thoughts when they read an expressive book. Although the technical explanations will excited, astound, and reveal how much passion and deep meaning ballet had in Suzanne Farrell’s life, but a reader, who may not be involved in the arts will be unfamiliar with the ballet and musical terms in

Dance is an ever evolving form of art; in much the same way that one can categorize and differentiate between eras and styles of architecture one can also do so with dance. These eras at times have sharp delineations separating them from their antecedents, other times the distinction is far more subtle. Traditional forms of dance were challenged by choreographers attempting to expand the breadth and increase the depth of performance; preeminent among such visionaries was Seattle born dancer and choreographer Mark Morris. Mark Morris' began as one of the millions of hopeful individuals attempting to simply make a career in dance; he not only succeeded but managed to have a lasting effect on the entire landscape of dance.

I decided to research one of the most influential Modern Dance pioneers; Martha Graham. Graham’s contributions to dance has often been compared to Picasso’s contributions to art and Stravinsky’s to music; in my opinion she opened up many new opportunities and possibilities for dance including the ability to learn free expression and honesty through movement.

The Repertory Dance Company Fall Dance Concert was held at the Mannoni Performing Arts Center. The dancers involved in this dance concert are part of the University of Southern Mississippi Dance Department meaning they are either pursuing a degree in dance or teach dance at a university level. Both students and faculty had the opportunity to present work during adjudication to be chosen to be presented at this concert. I particularly enjoyed this concert because, while all of the dances presented were a part of the broad genre of modern dance, each dance had such a unique aesthetic so the concert still provided a great amount of variety to keep the audience captivated. The two pieces I have chosen to review represent this variety very

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.

She later moved back to New York and resigned from Daly's theater company. She began performing on her own with limited success. In 1899, she performed Rubaiyat and shocked the audience with her skimpy costume (it showed her bare arms) and with the movement of her dance (Splatt 34). It was the beginning of her "new dance" and was unlike anything anyone had ever seen before.