Thread: Question for group choreographers

I've been choreographing group dances for my student troupe for over a year now. I am not a natural choreographer so I find it extremely challenging (yet extremely rewarding).

I tend not to like choreographies where everyone does the same thing, yet it's pretty hard for me to come up with multiple moves for the same thing while still getting the timing right (especially since when I work on choreos it's just me and I have a hard time visualizing what it looks like as a group.) However, my goal is to start adding different moves for different dancers (so we're not all doing the same thing).

How do you do it? Does it just take experience? Does it take a certain type of visualization? Does it take talent/natural ability?

I want to take this:


And make something more like this:

Well it looks to me like you're already doing a lot of what they're doing.

1. They are *mostly* all doing the same thing. It's only in three spots where they are doing different things. A lot of it is just changing formation.

2. When the Oriental Divas are doing different things, those different things aren't massively different. Dancer A does something while Dancers BCDE are shimmying, then Dancers B&C do the thing that Dancer A was doing, while Dancers ADE are shimmying, and finally Dancers D&E do the same thing Dancer A originally did while Dancers ACE are shimmying.
You can replace "shimmying" with "posing" or "undulating" or "figure 8-ing" or "whatevering"

3. There was one spot where they were doing stuff in Cannon. This is easy so long as your dancers can count, or they can take their cues from their neighbouring dancer well. It works best when they're in a nice formation where the Cannon is going to show. Lines, straight across the stage (as in the Oriental Diva's clip) or diagonal, or perpendicular to the stage can all work very well. If you have a larger group, you can make the lines curve in a half circle or an S curve.

4. You can break the big group into sub-groups, and giving each sub-group some small difference. E.g. you're all doing the same footwork thing but with Dancers ABC doing one arm thing and Dancers DEF doing a different arm thing. Or the same hipwork, with Dancers ACE doing it flat-footed and Dancers BDF doing it on demi-pointes.
The sub-groups can be fluid, so that it's not always Team A & Team B.

HTH!

when working on it at home, yes, i dance the "different roles"

i make story boards on paper, like they do for movies, with crosses for the dancers, and arrows, and move them around

for really big groups, i decide on the formations, the overall LOOK first, then on the steps. i keep the arms for last. especially when they are doing different things the arms i often need to see what it looks like with the whole group before deciding

yes, you get better and better at visualising. things that before i needed to try out with the girls, i now can better and better see at home what will and what will not work. the amount of time i need to go "aargh, no that wont work", decreases

it's good to do this kind of work with a troupe that trusts you, were you can "learn" your choreography skills by trying out different things with the bodies in space. but after a while you can do it in your head

seperate the music, i mean, write down the different layers you hear, and see if you can use that for different layers of dancers

it's all about balance for me. exciting enough, but not toooo much happening at the same time. i also need a theme, topic, mood, to make it work

i wished i had some video's of the a-team and raks pro stuff to show you, but you'll have to wait till the dvds is ready

of and dont think of it only in terms of formations (where people are in space), but also in terms of directions...how they get from a to b, from formation a to b, so that it works with the music. when seeing other peoples groups choreo's i often find that a bit a obvious, sterile, etc.

Thanks ladies. This advice is immensely helpful!

Some additional ideas:

* Choreograph a simple sequence of moves that face the front, side, back, side. Then get each dancer (or group) to start turning the sequence one after the other. I like doing this because you can keep the moves simple, yet it takes up quite a bit of time to complete the whole sequence. Mind you, it can look really messy if not executed well!

* For more complicated variety, divide your group into two and alternate dancers/change formations a few times in the dance eg:

1. Take turns being the stars. Group A dances while Group B act as moving wallpaper on the sidelines. Then both do a travelling move in one direction, to bring Group B on and Group A exit.
2. Big circle, little circle - Group A form a clump in the middle and perform a stationary sequence. Group B form a large circle around them and dance around the circle.
3. Partner up pairs with one A, one B. Get them doing the same moves with one facing back one facing front; similar moves with some sort of difference (eg: different arm position); two sequences of moves at alternate times (eg: A shimmy while B snake arm, then reverse); travelling moves that revolve around each other.

* Use assymetry to make it interesting. Have you ever seen a Balanchine ballet? I watched one and it was a revelation. His choreography had different dancers doing different things in a kinda random way, but creating an overall balance. For eg, you've got 7 dancers arranged across the stage in a non-linear fashion. Dancer 2 does a stand-out move. A while later, dancer 7 does, then dancers 1 and 5.

As to the question of how you do this - I am spacially-challenged and cannot visualise formations. I can choreograph moves to the music easily, but I need to see my class in action to work out formations. Also to tidy up arms and other things that affect the overall appearance of the group. Sometimes I'll give the class the basic moves and let them 'play' with it, then stand back and watch the results. This gives me some options to choose from.

Now I just watched your dance. It's really lovely. I couldn't help having 'staging' ideas flood into my head. As an eg of some of the things I mentioned:

- The combo you do at 1:04 is a perfect one to do facing different directions, or the front-side-back-side idea that I mentioned. If this were my dance, at that point, I'd suddenly have the girls at the sides turn and do this combo facing outwards, while you face forward.

- At 1:45 you do a lovely travelling combo with diagonal arms. That'd be a perfect one to pair up with one partner facing forward, one back. Then move the combo as pair in the same direction (so person A, facing front, travels to her R, but person B facing back travels to her left). Turn and repeat facing the other way.

OK, I'll shut up now and leave your choreography alone!

Originally Posted by jewelbellydance

* Choreograph a simple sequence of moves that face the front, side, back, side. Then get each dancer (or group) to start turning the sequence one after the other. I like doing this because you can keep the moves simple, yet it takes up quite a bit of time to complete the whole sequence. Mind you, it can look really messy if not executed well!

Heehee- I call this the "London's Burning" technique!

I really search for music that will make my job easier. I look for songs that have definite sections and transitions. Question and answer sections are great. Also sections where the phrasing repeats like 4 repetitions of a drum roll. I saw that in the second video where they took turns turning as the music repeated.

Two examples of songs that I used quite successfully are Efred by Hakim and Tigi ya Matigish.

I don't like things *overly* complicated- I am not running a 3 ring circus, I do want attention focused in a specific place. There are a lot of good suggestions already which I don't want to repeat- I like to start out, as I listen to the music, by picking out parts where I want a specific formation, or a specific dancer/group to be featured. From there, it is much easier to fill in transitions. I choreograph the featured parts first and then figure out how to get everyone else where they need to be. One neat thing about group choreos is that you can cover a potentially akward transition (like getting out your veil) with a spectacle somewhere else.

I am not good at visualizing, I have to physically play out the parts, so group choreos can take a long time. It can go faster if dancers are willing to map out & model, and it *always* undergoes a little bit of change once I see it on the dancers.

The videos are not working for me right now (slow connection) so I don't have specific suggestions, but I hope this helps!

Originally Posted by artemisia_danst

seperate the music, i mean, write down the different layers you hear, and see if you can use that for different layers of dancers

This is the magic ticket for me. Obviously, you don't want anything in your choreo that isn't in the music. If you let the music guide your choreography, it isn't difficult.

1) Layers in the music -- Group A interprets the rhythm with simple movements while Group B takes center stage to interpret the melody (or vice versa, depending on whether the melody or rhythm is most prominent during that section of music). Or one group just hits accents while the other takes the main phrases.

2) Call and response. Group A does something then watches while Group B does the same thing or something slightly different, depending on the music. It's important for whichever group isn't dancing to make a show of directing their gaze to the other group so the audience knows where to look. The non-dancing group can be posing or doing a small time-keeping movement.

3) Floor & standing groups. For American-style choreos that incorporate floorwork, I always choreograph for one group to remain standing, mainly because I have students who cannot get down on their knees easily. So the standing group may be slowly circling while the floor group is doing seated omis, for instance. The idea is that the two sets of movements mirror each other at this point.

Am I the only person who cringes at the sight of student troupes doing call and response? I'm not talking about C&R between musicians, or C&R between a dancer and a drummer, but two halves of a student troupe awkwardly taking turns at doing nothing. Personally, I wouldn't go beyond eight counts max of one side not dancing, and actually, I'm tempted to say four. If you are fortunate enough to have committed students who don't mind a lot of practice at stuff that doesn't look like dancing and don't mind being corrected like store mannequins, then maybe this isn't so bad, but a lot of what I see passing as "dramatic posing" is really "ungraceful, self-conscious standing around with bad body lines." If a choreographer wants to go the alternating do-nothing route, then you really need to be prepared to teach students about posture and carrying muscle tension in the body and maintaining theatrical facial expressions (not that teachers shouldn't be doing this anyway...), because when students don't have these skills, the routine devolves into alternating bouts of looking dorky.

I think the other thing that bothers me about C&R is that its success really depends on being able to make it look lively and spontaneous when it's presented as a challenge routine. Now, again, if you've got a group with good stagecraft skills, you can probably pull this off, but when you don't, and the audience can see that Side B isn't watching Side A with the right emotion (anticipation, bemusement, panic at whether they'll be able to keep up, cockiness, whatever vibe you're going for) and appearing to react in the moment, the piece loses its fizz. What could be more boring and artificial looking than an obviously over-rehearsed group where some of the students aren't even paying attention to the challenge being laid down by the other side? Challenge routines have to look like improvisation, even when they're not, or they just look canned and phony.

I guess the bottom line is that if your students have good stage skills and expressive personalities, C&R may be a good choice. If they don't (not that advanced, not that committed, or not that charismatic), I think you're better off moving them around in patterns or facing them different ways for interest.

I think one of the simplest methods of creating some interest in group choreo is to have "opposition" in movement direction, as mentioned specifically by jewelbellydance.

Ex: folks on stage left have their left ("outside") arms up, folks on stage right have their right (still "outside") arms up, and anybody caught in the middle has both arms up. Say everybody is doing hip lifts: stage lefters use their right (inside) hips and stage righters use their left (inside) hips; those in the middle could do a step lift in place or do a flat-footed tick-tock in place.

Ex: similarly, folks on two sides of the stage can travel to their "inside" or their "outside;" middle folks (if more than one) could alternately travel to either side (farthest back doing as the stage lefters do, next person forward doing what the stage righters do, etc). If only one middle person, he/she could move forward and back.

Ex: folks can travel in opposition in circular, square or triangular patterns.

I usually begin my choreos with a good deal of simplicity. Simplicity doesn't have to equal "boring" . . . as a matter of fact, simple can be very powerful. Then, as a song progresses and builds, I try to build some progession (such as opposition) into the choreo, as far as the ability of the group allows.

Choreographing for a group has been fun for me. Many times, group choreo is more exciting and fulfullling than any solo choreo!

Deborah

Sometimes I'll wake up with the vision of a whole group dance in my head, complete with what music, formations, changing rows, level changes, costuming. As if it just sprang into me. That's really exciting for me; and I am not quite sure how it happens.
I am usually thinking about dance, music, time, space, when I am daydreaming or "idle", so it's as if something got tapped into I guess.
So I turn it over in my head, then I sketch it out, dance out the parts, mark musical directions. I use a regular spiral notebook. I have them everywhere. Then I start breaking it down for patterns, and definitely keeping it simple enough so it is doable. Rather than add, I usually have to subtract from the original concept. Frenetic groups, overly complicated patterns that require memorization overload, too much activity, busy-ness = no good for me.
Then I try out the framework on whatever the group is; classes or my troupe members usually. Sometimes what I visualized doesn't work at all. It's a process.
There's lots of great tips in all the posts above for working it all out.
Making an organic pattern that doesn't look forced, as in, Now! level change! Directional opposition! etc just-for-the-sake-of, but flows with the music, and makes use of the excitement, energy, and possibilities of a group is my goal.

call and response to me really doesnt mean the other halves being mannequins. but yes, that takes work!

we've done work with dramatic poses, slower movements, floorwork, etc etc; there are many solutions. it also involves some, eh, let's call it acting!
as you say
"posture and carrying muscle tension in the body and maintaining theatrical facial expressions", i've worked for HOURS on that with my student troupe. dedicating whole sessions to these kind of techniques, rather than the actual choreography.

Originally Posted by Tourbeau

Am I the only person who cringes at the sight of student troupes doing call and response? I'm not talking about C&R between musicians, or C&R between a dancer and a drummer, but two halves of a student troupe awkwardly taking turns at doing nothing. Personally, I wouldn't go beyond eight counts max of one side not dancing, and actually, I'm tempted to say four. If you are fortunate enough to have committed students who don't mind a lot of practice at stuff that doesn't look like dancing and don't mind being corrected like store mannequins, then maybe this isn't so bad, but a lot of what I see passing as "dramatic posing" is really "ungraceful, self-conscious standing around with bad body lines." If a choreographer wants to go the alternating do-nothing route, then you really need to be prepared to teach students about posture and carrying muscle tension in the body and maintaining theatrical facial expressions (not that teachers shouldn't be doing this anyway...), because when students don't have these skills, the routine devolves into alternating bouts of looking dorky.

I think the other thing that bothers me about C&R is that its success really depends on being able to make it look lively and spontaneous when it's presented as a challenge routine. Now, again, if you've got a group with good stagecraft skills, you can probably pull this off, but when you don't, and the audience can see that Side B isn't watching Side A with the right emotion (anticipation, bemusement, panic at whether they'll be able to keep up, cockiness, whatever vibe you're going for) and appearing to react in the moment, the piece loses its fizz. What could be more boring and artificial looking than an obviously over-rehearsed group where some of the students aren't even paying attention to the challenge being laid down by the other side? Challenge routines have to look like improvisation, even when they're not, or they just look canned and phony.

I guess the bottom line is that if your students have good stage skills and expressive personalities, C&R may be a good choice. If they don't (not that advanced, not that committed, or not that charismatic), I think you're better off moving them around in patterns or facing them different ways for interest.