Week 8 assignment: essay – interrelationships reflection apa format | Applied Sciences homework help

1. Without explaining that you are not dancing, represent a familiar human situation to a group by using movements that you believe are not dance movements. Is the group able to understand what you represented? Do they think you were using dance movements? Do you believe it possible to have movements that cannot be included in a dance? Are there, in other words, nondance movements?

2From Christian Science Monitor, December 4, 1970, © 1970 Christian Science Monitor. All rights reserved. Used by Permission and protected by the Copyright Laws of the United States. The printing, copying, redistribution, or retransmission of this Content without express written permission is prohibited. jac16871_ch10_254-275.indd 266 12/9/17 10:12 AM 267

DANCE

Alvin Ailey’s Revelations One of the classics of modern dance is Alvin Ailey’s Revelations (Figure 10-8), based largely on African American spirituals and experience. It was first performed in Jan- uary 1960, and hardly a year has gone by since without its having been performed to highly enthusiastic crowds. Ailey refined Revelations somewhat over the years, but its impact has brought audiences to their feet for standing ovations at almost every performance. After Ailey’s untimely death at the age of fifty-eight, the com- pany was directed by Judith Jamison, one of the great dancers in Ailey’s company. Some of the success of Revelations stems from Ailey’s choice of the deeply felt music of the spirituals to which the dancers’ movements are closely attuned. But, then, this is also one of the most noted qualities of a ballet like Swan Lake, which has one of the richest orchestral scores in the history of ballet. Music, unless it is program music, is not, strictly speaking, a pretext for a dance, but there is a percep- tible connection between, say, the rhythmic characteristics of a given music and a dance composed in such a way as to take advantage of those characteristics. Thus, in Revelations the energetic movements of the dancers often appear as visual, bodily transformations of the rhythmically charged music. Try to see Revelations. Several sites online present segments of the dance, but none show it in its entirety. We will point out details and structures, an awareness of which may prove helpful for refining your experience not only of this dance but of modern dance in general. Beyond the general pretext of Revelations—that of Afri- can American experience as related by spirituals—each of its separate sections has its own pretext. But none of them is as tightly or specifically narrative as is usually the case in ballet. In Revelations, generalized situations act as pretexts. The first section of the dance is called “Pilgrim of Sorrow,” with three parts: “I Been Buked,” danced by the entire company (about twenty dancers, male and female); FIGURE 10-8 The Alvin Ailey Dance Company in Revelations, a suite of dances to gospel music. ©Zuma Press, Inc./Alamy jac16871_ch10_254-275.indd 267 12/9/17 10:12 AM 268

CHAPTER 10

“Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel,” danced by only a few dancers; and “Fix Me Jesus,” danced by one couple. The general pretext is the suffering of African Americans, who are, like the Israelites of the Old Testament, taking refuge in their faith in the Lord. The most dramatic moments in this section are in “Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel,” a statement of overwhelming faith characterized by close ensemble work. The in-line dancers parallel the rhythms of the last word of the hymn: “Dan´-i-el´,” accenting the first and last syllables with powerful rhythmic movements. The second section, titled “Take Me to the Water,” is divided into “Processional,” danced by eight dancers; “Wading in the Water,” danced by six dancers; and “I Want to Be Ready,” danced by a single male dancer. The whole idea of “Take Me to the Water” suggests baptism, a ritual that affirms faith in God—the source of en- ergy of the spirituals. “Wading in the Water” is particularly exciting, with dancers holding a stage-long bolt of light-colored fabric to represent the water. The dancers shimmer the fabric to the rhythm of the music, and one dancer after another crosses over the fabric, symbolizing at least two things: the waters of baptism and the Mo- saic waters of freedom. It is this episode that originally featured the charismatic Judith Jamison in a long white gown and holding a huge parasol as she danced. The third section is called “Move, Members, Move,” with the subsections titled “Sinner Man,” “The Day Is Past and Gone,” “You May Run Home,” and the finale “Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham.” In this last episode, a sense of triumph over suffering is projected, suggesting the redemption of a people by using the same kind of Old Testament imagery and musical material that opened the dance. The entire section takes as its theme the lives of people after they have been received into the faith, with the possibilities of straying into sin. It ends with a powerful rocking spiritual that emphasizes forgiveness and the reception of the people (the “members”) into the bosom of Abraham, according to the prediction of the Bible. This ending features a large amount of ensemble work and is danced by the entire company, with rows of male dancers sliding forward on their outspread knees and then rising all in one sliding gesture, raising their hands high. “Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abra- ham” is powerfully sung again and again until the effect is almost hypnotic. The subject matter of Revelations is in part that of feelings and states of mind. But it is also more obviously that of the struggle of a people as told—on one level—by their music. The dance has the advantage of a powerfully engaging subject matter even before we witness the interpretation of that subject matter. And the way in which the movements of the dance are closely attuned to the rhythms of the music tends to evoke intense participation, since the visual qualities of the dance are pow- erfully reinforced by the aural qualities of the music. PERCEPTION KEY Revelations 1. A profitable way of understanding the resources of Revelations is to take a well- known African American spiritual such as “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” (see Figure 9-4) and supply the movements that it suggests to you. Once you have done so, ask yourself how difficult it was. Is it natural to move to such music?