Movement and music

I was one of the kids at Lithuanian folk dancing group that sat on the sidelines most of the time. About half of us in the group did. We weren't picked for more than one or two dances. We weren't the graceful ones. Our basic polka steps might be rough, or we forgot the choreography. I was definitely one of the ones who had a hard time remembering what part came after what other part. I'd draw a blank in the middle of a dance about which way I was turning next.

At 12 and 15 years old, even at 17 years old, I considered myself to be a pretty bad dancer.

Partner dance changed that for me. One long, boring summer I remained at college, a friend and I signed up for a ballroom dance class. The teacher was this small, fierce filipino woman, probably about 60 years old, who was pretty big on us holding our heads and arms just so during a waltz. And about the manners and politeness of dancing. She was friendly, you could see she loved dancing, but she was tough. And I loved it. I even sewed myself a dress to wear to our class outing to this beautiful old ballroom in Indianapolis, the Indiana Roof Ballroom.

I came out of that experience thinking that maybe I liked dancing, and not just watching dance. And maybe I wasn't that bad at it.

A year later, I was in Cambridge, England and joined the largest student dance club in the world. I think they had some 2000 members, and classes on anything from swing to lambada (oh yes, I danced the forbidden dance, along with some 12 other nerdy Cambridge students). I didn't get asked to dance very much at the social events, usually watching as some lead came up to look at the eyes of the woman to my right, at my neck, then the eyes of the woman on my left. But, I kept liking dancing, and I felt like I really "got" east coast swing.

I love the music, all the big band and jazz music of the early part of the last century. And the format of dancing, where a follow had to just react, instead of remember a routine, turned out to be my salvation. I have a pretty spotty memory, it turns out, which serves me just as poorly on the dance floor as in a physics exam where I have to regurgitate answers to questions I've solved on home works all semester long. But I can sure kick some ass when it comes to hearing and playing with a beat, improvising, and following.

Turns out, I'm actually a good dancer.

And over the years I've gotten more and more interested in watching dance performances. I know now that choreography is not my skill, but I love watching someone talented doing it. Mostly through modern dance and street dance. Ballet is not my thing. Neither is standard ballroom dance anymore. But tell me that the auditions for "So you think you can dance" or "America's Next Dance Crew" are on, and I'll cancel my plans to watch.

Lucky coincidence number one, my husband likes this kind of dance, too. We left a party in Cambridge, Massachusetts once to go watch the Harvard Society of Black Engineers Step Competition. Awesome. We watch movies like Drumline - also awesome. And lucky coincidence number two, some decent dance performances come through Zurich. Totally awesome.

Last night we saw Kidd Pivot doing a piece called "Dark Matters," which blew us both away. It was a powerful piece, about mortality and free will, about the universe. Sad, comforting (to me, at least, to see evidence of the thoughts that I identify with on a public stage, meaning that other people go there in their minds, too), beautiful, strong....spiritual. It was like going to a revival meeting. It left me quiet and in awe, left both of us that way, on the train trip home. And it made me think that you just can't have science without art, and vice versa. Talk about human free will, for example, and once you split off research from experience and physical musical performance, you have an incomplete treatment of the topic. You need both, to cover all of human experience. I think I just became a much more ardent supporter of the arts in education. If you keep the science and drop the art, you are missing something.

And even better, this is part of a dance festival this spring, here around Zurich. Next we go see Akram Khan's Vertical Road. Then later a new piece by this group, La La La Human Steps. Finally on the list, Conny Janssen Danst.

I am anticipating more awesome.