In contrast, improvisation and personal interpretation of rhythm are core principles behind Latin America’s tradition of dance. From that time on, partnered social and competitive dance improvisation would be met with strict standards of technique and variation instructed and enforced by paid professionals.
This economically framed effort to standardize partnered dance in the West encapsulated as English dance standardization began to take scope in 1920 and the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing added the ballroom sector, later endorsing the English syllabus in 1929 (McMains, 81). In an effort to create standard technique and variation, the English embarked on what Juliet McMains calls a “crusade” that “ was couched in terns of propriety, morality, and decency, which only thinly veiled the obvious economic concerns: if dancing became a free-form frenzy with no standards or techniques, dance teachers would soon be out of jobs” (McMains, 80). “This tendency to foreground improvisation and playfulness, clearly in evidence at the emergence of the modern ballroom dance industry, is nearly absent from twentieth century social ballroom dance” (McMains, 71).
The English began this trend, utilizing classic European methods of standardization, rooted in styles like ballet, to lessen improvisation to secure the teaching of dance as a legitimate, solidified occupation. The early twentieth century, however, gave birth to the commercialization and standardization of Ballroom dance instruction, interpretation, and technique. In most cases, the man lead the lady thorough their own interpretations and understanding of the music/movements and the lady follows the man’s movement. Partnered dance in the early twentieth century was based on a tradition of improvisation between the heterosexually (and sometimes homosexually) paired individuals who followed a strict lead/follow dichotomy.
#Slow samba music professional
Both governing bodies publish regularly updated rankings of both professional and amateur couples and sponsor numerous competitions throughout the year, concluding with World and National championships, respectively. The American styles (known colloquially as Smooth and Rhythm) are regulated by the National Dance Council Associates (NDCA) and are competed only in the U.S. The international styles (known informally as Standard and Latin) are sectioned by the International Dancesport Federation (IDSF), standardized by the Imperial Society of Teacher of Dance (ISTD) under a collective syllabus, and competed internationally. Today, top dancers compete in one or two of the four major categories of Dancesport: International Standard, International Latin, American Smooth, and American Rhythm. Dancesport athletes today creatively interpret heavily codified, heterosexually partnered dances with a maximum level of bodily precision and physical training. The term Dancesport itself defines this type of ballroom dancing to be a hybridization of dance (in its artistic and creative definition) and sport (in its competitive and athletic sense). Progressively, the Dancesport samba of today resembles more closely the choreography, character, and bodily codification of Brazilian samba, although maintaining its translated appearance as athletic, dynamic, and European.Ĭompetitive Ballroom Dancing was renamed Dancesport in the 1980s to facilitate an international campaign to win Olympic status (McMains, 1). Throughout the late twentieth century, however, the rise of the Dancesport industry and competition world inspired new codifications of the samba to bring a more representative form of the original Brazilian samba to the competition floor.
Born out of the rise of Ballroom dance in Europe and the need to distance samba from black culture, the original European translations of samba represented a disinterest in the samba’s true cultural beginning and a desire for capitalistic gain. The Dancesport version of the samba differs drastically from the samba danced by Afro-Brazilians in Brazil, embodying a transatlantic and transcultural redefinition of the codified movement into a new environment. Today, Dancesport competition incorporates the samba into its International Latin category, along with the Cha-Cha, Rumba, Jive, and Paso Doble.
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