Thread: Troupe Choreography

We are a small troupe and we are just beginning. Most of our troupe members work really hard are getting better some just like to come and have fun. (becasue of this their technique and knowledge of bellydance moves are not very good).
Now we decided to split a song among all members of our troupe, each member will come up with steps and choreography for a 20 second section. Everybody decided they would research and try to come up with intermediate or advanced combos.
The two members that like to do it for fun, thought they already knew what they needed to do and showed us the steps ( which are not belly dancing at all).
How can we tell them that we want them to research and come up with more advanced steps.
We have already had some issues because we asked them to work harder.

I think in a case like this, I would determine the style of dance you are doing and using that as a guideline for everyone to shoot for.

Example, you are presenting Egyptian style. Then all moves for the choreography would be based on presenting Egyptian Style to keep the choreography co-hesive.

Then you can simply state to the students who are not using Belly dance moves to simply say that it is not the style we are trying to represent. It is much better than saying I don't like the move you are doing, rather those moves are not the style we are representing in the choreo.

Thank you for your advice.
We actually stated at the beginning that this would be a tribal piece and that we should come up with tribal combos.

Originally Posted by shermie

We are a small troupe and we are just beginning. Most of our troupe members work really hard are getting better some just like to come and have fun. (becasue of this their technique and knowledge of bellydance moves are not very good).
Now we decided to split a song among all members of our troupe, each member will come up with steps and choreography for a 20 second section. Everybody decided they would research and try to come up with intermediate or advanced combos.
The two members that like to do it for fun, thought they already knew what they needed to do and showed us the steps ( which are not belly dancing at all).
How can we tell them that we want them to research and come up with more advanced steps.
We have already had some issues because we asked them to work harder.

The problem here is that there are too many chiefs and not enough indians. For really successful troupe work you need one director. I know this is perhaps not an option for your beginner troupe as you are all in the same boat, so to speak. Unless you can let go of individual needs and wants, you must work as a collective and this means taking on advice and being coached if needs be.

Chiming in with Kharis, choreography by committee rarely works, because there's no overall "vision". Ideally you need one or two individuals to direct the choreo, even when there is input from the other troupe members.

But if the troupe as a whole took the decision to choreograph in this way, then the troupe as a whole may have to accept it, and accept the moves that these members have contributed. If necessary you can tribalify them a bit, to make them work within the overall piece. I'm sure there will be other sections that need to be tweaked, to make sure they fit, so they probably won't be the only ones to have their section adapted.