Too much technique? What is it?

[Amanda (was Aziyade)]

Just curious -- what do we think of when we hear the word "technique" ?

Is there a way to have too much technique? Not enough technique? Where is the balance?

If you have flawless technique but no soul, can you LEARN to have soul?

How important is having good "technique" to you as a student or a teacher?

What constitutes good "technique" ?

Can you name a dancer you enjoy watching who has what you would consider excellent technique?

(I'll post my thoughts after I hear some of yours.)

 

[alosha]

The first thing that comes to mind when I hear "technique" is safety. To be sure you are doing moves in a way that allows you to still be dancing in six months! The second thing is quality of movement. But you cannot learn (IMO) to have soul. You either have it or you don't. BUT, if you're not quite to the place where the technique comes easier (practice practice practice!) then your "soul" can be overshadowed.

To me technique is really important. My first teacher taught me NOTHING about posture, and how to execute movements. She just told me to do it. So I'm un-learning all those nasty little habits (thank goodness I only danced with her for three months!!!!!).

What constitutes good technique? I think "good technique" is the place where muscle memory has fully taken root and you start to really dance with the music.

 

[Daimona]

:think: Thinking of dance as a language, technique would be both the vocabulary and conjugations.

If your vocabulary is limited, you are only able to make simple sentences, and most probably you will use combinations and sentences you have learned from your teacher with small variations.

As Alosha said, it is also a question of safety.
To make good sentences, you would also need to know a lot of grammar and know how to conjugate. It is possible to make some kind of sentences, but they will probably sound strange to others and your body will probably get hurt because you are dancing in a way that will be harmful to your body.

Understanding and interpreting the music would be like constructing the sentences. In some ways, this could be learned, but you would need some talent - soul - to do it properly and get to the core.

If you have a large vocabulary and flawless grammar, you might be excellent, technically speaking. Your technique might be impressive, but if you don't have soul, it won't be poetry. You know how to make grammatically correct sentences, but they won't be original. To make original poetry that touches your audience, you need soul. You may learn how to fake soul using cliches, but cliches aren't original poetry...

But - on the other hand, if you have soul, but have been too afraid to show it, you can learn how to get in contact with it and show it to your audience. And as with good technique and safety, it is a matter of practice and guidance.


Did this make sense to you?

A dancer with both excellent technique and soul is Aziza of Portland/Montreal (and I'm going to a workshop with her in Stockholm, Sweden this weekend! :dance: )

 

[shiradotnet]

I think of technique as the vocabulary that enables you to say what you want to say with the day.

To use a linguistic analogy, for the last year and a half I've been learning Arabic from audio CD. I've learned a lot. However, if I were to have a conversation with an Egyptian woman who does not speak any English, it would be a very, VERY limited conversation because I know very little vocabulary at this point. I just plain wouldn't be capable of saying much to her, and certainly wouldn't be capable of discussing anything of any complexity.

And so it is with dance. Your dance technique will impose limitations on your ability to express what you hear in the music. For example, suppose a certain flourish in the music feels to you as though it should be expressed with a deep standing backbend followed by a drop to the knees. If you can't do that backbend and drop then you'll be unable to express what you're feeling would fit the music.

Now...

There is such a thing as excesses in how you use language. Think of the Bulwer-Lytton writng competition that occurs each year, which essentially mocks a writing style that is too flowery, and too filled with show-off vocabulary words. Similarly, in dance technique, cramming too much crazy layering and too many show-off moves into one's dance will obscure the artistic message. That's actually why I'm not much of a fan of Suhaila's, Kaya's, and Sadie's style - they all seem much too busy, so full of showing off their party tricks that the artistic message of the dance is lost.

 

[Aniseteph]

Did this make sense to you?

Yes, perfectly. The language analogy is spot on.

 

[Amanda (was Aziyade)]

The language analogy is perfect, so let me take it a step further:

I'm reminded of two quotes:

Omit Needless Words

Eschew Obfuscation


lol. Do you think certain dancers REALIZE that they are speaking in "florid prose" ? Or do you think it's become so important in classes and workshops etc that we layer movements and shimmy over everything while balancing a sword on our hip while dancing on glasses -- that students especially think we HAVE to be able to do 32 fouettes on the head of a doumbek or we're not really "skilled" ??


Daimona, Aziza is a GREAT example. She has amazing physical and technical skills but she doesn't throw it all at you at once, and she's so enjoyable to watch. She's a great teacher, also. You'll love her!

 

[Aniseteph]

Do you think certain dancers REALIZE that they are speaking in "florid prose" ?

I expect there are plenty who think that that is the whole point.

 

[Oona]

When I hear the word technique, (for beginners and improvers) it makes me think of the entire execution of a move from the shape being made, the muscles used, and the 'clarity' of the move as well as the safety. For more advanced students and professions, it makes me think of how all the moves flow together in cohesion to tell the story, emotion or just the magic of the music being interpreted.

The word 'technique' also seems to be used sometimes as the opposite of 'relaxed' dancing. 'Too much' or 'too little' technique, in my experience, has been in reference to this latter meaning.

I think I have seen 'too much technique' in this sense before and like others said, it's where the whole meaning of the song/dance get lots in flashy show-off moves. Because I feel the dance is a communication between the dancer and the audience, the dancer has to take the audience's feelings into perpsective when he/she dances and not overwhelm them all the time with fancy move after fancy move (what I'm thinking of is more high energy fast moves in particular). Sometimes, like in certain drum solos when the music's a bit wild this may be appropriate for a time. But the dancer and the audience both need time to breathe, to be excited, to take in what they're experiencing, to 'feel' the music, to go 'aaaaaaaaaaahhhh'...it is a series of ups and downs like a roller coaster ride. If it's all bam*bam*bam* bam* with moves all the time, well wouldn't that be a bit of a boring ride...I mean it would be a nice view for the dancer, but...

I don't think I've ever seen someone not have enough technique, but it's usually poor technique rather than lack of techniqe I see, be that poor posture, out-of-control moves or whatever.

As a student, good technique is essential to me. My problem at the moment is that I do pretty darn well in techniques classes and workshops. I also have less of a problem 'letting go' when solo dancing than a lot of people I know...I have a sort of emotionalness and fluidity to me. But I have a problem getting the two sides to come together, one or the other is always running the show and I'm struggling to get them to balance out.

Dancers with what I consider good technique --
Khaled Mahmoud, Ranya Renee, Lulu Sabongi and tons more, but I don't have all day!

I don't think you can learn to HAVE soul. But I think most people have soul of some sort, it's just whether they have discovered it in themselves yet in their lives that makes the difference or whether they've been best friends with it since day 1. Many of us are taught to hide the more soulful side of ourselves and it can be hard to 'learn' to take off the mask.

 

[adiemus]

I agree you can't be taught 'soul' - that's the emotion (in language analogy I think that's the process of choosing the words, the intonation, the body language that goes along with the speaking, and the purpose of the speech).

'Too much technique' is when the 'words' get in the way of the 'message' and all you're looking at are flowery metaphors but you can't actually understand what they're getting at. I always think of politicians who speak in so many cliches that they end up saying nothing!
Similarly in dance, the dancers who throw so many elements in that all you end up watching is which shimmy they're doing on top of which movement and are they really going to hang onto the sword and the zills while flinging a veil around?!!

 

[Reen.Blom]

Didem. )

 

[leila_yu]

As many members said in previous posts, technique means many things.It is a base of dance, you build everything else on the technique.Many dancers neglect the significance of the good posture, for example, which is one of the essentials.
Many girls tell me, for example that we are going too slow in the beginning.I tell them that they maybe hate me at that moment, but they will love me more in the future because of that .Once the basics are done badly, it is very difficult to change it.
Postures, muscle using, complete self control ...Movements one by one, then in combinations and so on and so on....Practise, practise, practise...all that will make a good technique as a final result.

But then we have the inner thing, which is not so easy to find in many dancers.A great master Mayodi told us in one of his workshops, something I'll remember forever- a good dancer dances with the music, but a GREAT AND REAL dancer dances IN the music!!!!!!!
We need to become one with the song, we need to get into the story, we need to "translate" the story and the atmosphere to our audience.

I do agree that technique is very important and without it, you can't actually dance, but the ability of a dancer to get someone deep inot the story and transfer the emotion and energy to her audience is the real thing.
Many dancers I have seen don't use too many movements and combinations, their dance is "simple", but so filled with energu and emotions that they make you feel like crying.They touch your heart.They move you.They make you think.That is beyond the best technique in the world.

Expressing emotions isn't smth that you can actually learn.Maybe you can up to some point, cause you can practise facial expressions and learn some "catches", but we can always see the difference between "the real emotion" and "the acting" one..Not that the "acting" one is not for respect, but it can never be as a natural one.
I admire to all dancers (and I especially mean the foreign, non-arabic ones) who have it in them.
One of the dancers that moved me so much that I actually cried is Yael Zarca, from France.I hope that I won't go out of the topic if I post a link to her video that made me cry.I watched that performance in Paris live and I was really touched.A video can't always give us the "real"picture and it's usually not as strong as seing a perfomance live, but I think you'll feel her energy
That is for me an example of a great connection and balance between an excellent technique and divine emotional expression.
YouTube - Yaël (France) Paris Egyptian Dance Festival 2009 - danseuse orientale / bellydancer

What do you think about her?

 

[adiemus]

so true - that connection with what the music is all about is more persuasive than the technique...and yes, that video is beautiful.

 

[Darshiva]

I think that technique comes with time - or at least that's what I tell my students. After about 5 weeks, I start having my students listen to a piece of music & analyse it, then I put it on again & they are asked to improvise to it using the analysis they just did. When I sit back & watch them I'm looking to see that they are understanding how to interpret the music, and have good posture. The technique is less important, although if I see someone struggling with a move that they "know" works with the music I will get up and cover it with them again.

Always relating things back to my classroom! The point I'm attempting to make is that technique is important - but that it is just as important as all the other areas of dance. I feel that the most important thing as a dancer is to have a good balance.

 

[alosha]

one thing too, is to remember that you dance because you enjoy it. If you get too caught up in trying to have the "perfect" technique, and the "right" interpretation, you lose the focus, and you become a robot on stage.

 

[Darshiva]

To me technique is really important. My first teacher taught me NOTHING about posture, and how to execute movements. She just told me to do it. So I'm un-learning all those nasty little habits (thank goodness I only danced with her for three months!!!!!).

Thank goodness you only had three months to unlearn! I was in the same boat, and I had nearly FOUR YEARS of unlearning to do! Hard work, but I eventually did it!

 

[alosha]

Thank goodness you only had three months to unlearn! I was in the same boat, and I had nearly FOUR YEARS of unlearning to do! Hard work, but I eventually did it!

I know. I got super-lucky. But those were my "formative" classes, and it was a horror. nearly never came back to belly dance...

 

[leila_yu]

Way to go Darshiva!!!!!Cause it is very, very difficult to do it!!!!!!!

 

[Darshiva]

Thankyou. It was hard work, as Alosha will tell you. Speaking of, I was quite surprised to learn that she had a similar start to dance given the quality of her dance that won her the best new dancer in another thread.

Back to topic - technique is important, just as important as everything else we do in dance.

 

[alosha]

Thankyou. It was hard work, as Alosha will tell you. Speaking of, I was quite surprised to learn that she had a similar start to dance given the quality of her dance that won her the best new dancer in another thread.

Its easy to win when there's no competition!

And thank you for the compliment!

 

[Darshiva]

That may well be. I'll have you note though, that I made no mention of how great you were for winning, just how great you were.