Assignment: Attend a dance performance of your choice and write a 350-word review (that’s roughly one page) with 11 point font – Tahoma, Arial or Calibri are fine—no cursives, even though one might consider them “jazzy.”. Please note that you must be an observer of this dance performance, so do not write one about a show that you are dancing for.
Note: You cannot write a review about a performance that you saw before this semester. The point to this assignment is to have you watch a live performance with the vocabulary in mind that we have started developing together in class these past few weeks.
There are several free dance performances in Conwell Theater on Campus; you can see a list of events through the Boyer College Website: http://calendar.activedatax.com/temple/EventList.aspx?fromdate=9/1/2014&todate=9/30/2014&display=Month&display=Month&view=DateTime)
For a list of dance performances in the Philadelphia area, you can check out the following website: http://www.philadelphiadance.org/
Here are things to consider for your paper.
1. Brief but sufficiently detailed description of the event (name, location, players/performers, overlying theme)
2. Description of the performance in your own words, with thought to overlying theme(s) (if any) and modality of expression (performers did works very different from one another but all connected by a common theme or thread/there was no commonality of theme but the way people worked on the stage kept the evening together because, etc. etc. etc.)
3. Things to consider (these are not mandates but things to think about as you write. In any case, your review, if you are on the right track should inevitably touch upon at least one or more of the below topics:
A. Did the dance pieces have music or were they performed in silence?//Was there improvisation or was everything rehearsed down to the finest detail and simply reproduced? Were the dancers dressed in a particular way that added to their performance (costuming)?
B. Was there audience engagement, did the public appear interested? Did the performers purposefully attempt to involve the viewers? Was there requested or voluntary audience participation? Was their special lighting that influenced the works you saw/listened to?
C. Is there anything about the performance you saw that can be directly connected to anything you have learned in these first several weeks of class? Anything relating to the assigned readings/listening/classroom discussion/studio movement practice sessions?
Pleasurable/unpleasant/indifferent experience for you? Why?
*For this writing assignment a bibliography will not be necessary (unless, of course you cite a specific source in relevance to what you’re reviewing and discussing as a means of supporting a point you’re making. If you’re comparing, contrasting and/or connecting the performance to ideas we’ve discussed in class, then you are a primary source. If you access information from the Glass text you can simply reference the author and pages in parenthesis immediately following the citation. If it’s a quote, please use proper grammatical markings. And—oh, yes, do spell check!
Another excellent way to check a written assignment for errors in syntax and comprehension is for you to read your work aloud; I guarantee you, oddities, errors and other incredible “Eew” situations will pop up and you could save yourself from, if not a problematic situation, a fairly embarrassing one.
