Who Dances? The Dancer!: The Elements of Dance

The Elements of Dance
Dance can be broken down into the following five elements:
 Body
 Action
 Space
 Time
 Energy
These five elements are inter-connected; at times it’s hard to separate one from
the other. But as we discuss each one, we’ll include specific vocabulary used to
talk about dance and examine how each element can be manipulated to create
different results.
Body: Who Dances? The Dancer!

Imagine a body moving with rhythmic steps and motions, usually performing to
music. That’s dance. Sounds simple, right? Dance critic Walter Terry put it best
this way:
“No paints nor brushes, marbles nor chisels, pianos or violins

are needed to make this art, for we are the stuff that dance is
made of. It is born in our body, exists in our body and dies in
our body. Dance, then, is the most personal of all the arts . . . it
springs from the very breath of life.”
The human body is what others see when they look at dance. Sometimes the
body is still; other times it may be in motion. A dancer can use the whole body, or
emphasize individual body parts, when moving.
When you watch dance, try to notice the position of the body. Is it symmetrical,
with the right and left sides doing the same thing, or not? What shape is the body
making? Are the shapes sharp and angular, or soft and rounded? Is the body
curved, twisted, or straight?
Just as some colors in a painting may be more vibrant than others, you may
notice dancers who have exceptional body control. They have worked hard to
train their bodies (essentially their instrument of expression) to achieve superior
balance, strength, and agility. Pay extra attention to how dancers use their breath
when working through a dance phrase, or series of movements.
Dancers use their bodies to take internal ideas, emotions, and intentions and
express them in an outward manner, sharing them with others. Dance can
communicate this internal world, or it can be abstract, focusing on shapes and
patterns.
In this excerpt from George Balanchine’s Apollo, you can see how the dancers
use individual body parts to create a beautiful effect in space. The three
ballerinas touch their toes to the male dancer’s hand, and then link their arms
through his.
George Balanchine's Apollo (Pacific Northwest Ballet)

George Balanchine's Apollo (Pacific Northwest Ballet)
1:41
Action: The Dancer Does What? Moves!
Action is any human movement involved in the act of dancing. What do dancers
do? They move—this is the action they perform. Movement can be divided into
two general categories:
 Non-locomotor or axial movement: Any movement that occurs in one

spot including a bend, stretch, swing, rise, fall, shake, turn, rock, tip,
suspend, and twist.
 Locomotor movement: Any movement that travels through space
including a run, jump, walk, slide, hop, skip, somersault, leap, crawl, gallop,
and roll.
Action includes small movements like facial expressions or gestures, as well as

larger movements like lifts, carries, or catches done with a partner or in a group.
“Action” is also considered the movement executed as the pauses or stillness
between movements.
Dancers work together with a choreographer to practice and refine the action of
the dance. When the action has been “set,” or finalized, the dancers must
memorize their movement sequences in order to be able to perform them.
Watch the Mark Morris Dance Company perform L’Allegro il Penseroso ed il

Moderato. The action of the dance includes slaps and claps, falls, prances,
jumps in place as well as turns from side to side.
Mark Morris: L'Allegro, Il Penseroso ed il Moderato | Three Excerpts

Mark Morris: L'Allegro, Il Penseroso ed il Moderato | Three Excerpts
2:41
Space: Where Does the Dancer Move? Through Space!
We’re not talking about the final frontier here! We’re talking about where the
action of dance takes place. Dance moves through space in an endless variety of
ways.
To better explain, here are some ways a choreographer or dancer thinks about
space:
 Level: Is the movement on the floor, or reaching upward? Are they

performed high, medium, or low?
 Direction: Does the movement go forward, backward, sideways, right, left,
or on a diagonal?
 Place: Is the movement done on the spot (personal space), or does it move
through space (general space, downstage, upstage)?
 Orientation: Which way are the dancers facing?
 Pathway: Is the path through space made by the dancers curved, straight,
or zigzagged? Or is it random?
 Size: Does the movement take up a small, narrow space, or a big, wide
space?
 Relationships: How are the dancers positioned in space in relationship to
one another? Are they close together or far apart? Are they in front of,
beside, behind, over, under, alone, or connected to one another?
The list above helps us understand how to think about movement through space.
Imagine how many ways you could perform a simple movement, like clapping
your hands if you ran it through the different concepts listed above. Remember,
space can be both indoors and outdoors, and some dances are created with
specific spaces in mind.
The action in Paul Taylor’s dance Esplanade is very simple, consisting mostly of

walking and running. Notice how the concept of space is explored in a variety of
ways as the dancers constantly change direction and orientation. Their
relationship to one another also keeps shifting. At times they form two lines,
passing through one another. At other moments, they move in unison. Watch for
both straight and curved pathways and think about how many ways the
choreographer was able to manipulate the element of space.
Paul Taylor: Esplanade

Paul Taylor: Esplanade
2:01
Time: How Does the Body Move in Relation to Time?
Choreographers have to make decisions about timing. Are their movements
quick or slow? Are certain steps repeated in different speeds during the work? If
so, why? We can think of time in the following ways:
 Clock Time: We use clock time to think about the length of a dance or
parts of a dance measured in seconds, minutes, or hours.
 Timing Relationships: When dancers move in relation to each other
(before, after, together, sooner than, faster than).
 Metered Time: A repeated rhythmic pattern often used in music (like 2/4
time or 4/4 time). If dances are done to music, the movement can respond
to the beat of the music or can move against it. The speed of the rhythmic
pattern is called its tempo. \
 Free Rhythm: A rhythmic pattern is less predictable than metered time.
Dancers may perform movement without using music, relying on cues from
one another.
The element of time is easily noticed in Step Afrika’s work. The action of the
hands slapping and feet stomping creates the complex rhythm that the audience
hears.
Step Afrika!
Step Afrika!
1:36
Energy: How? The Dancer Moves Through Space and Time
With Energy!
So now we have bodies moving through space and time. Isn’t that enough? Not
quite. We need the fifth and last element of dance—energy.
Energy helps us to identify how the dancers move. What effort are they using?
Perhaps their movements are sharp and strong, or maybe they are light and free.
Energy also represents the quality of the movement—its power and richness. For
choreographers and dancers, there are many possibilities.
The effort the dancers use can communicate meaning, depending on the energy
involved. A touch between two dancers may be gentle and light, perhaps
indicating concern or affection; or it may be sudden and forceful, indicating anger
or playfulness. Energy is crucial in bringing the inner expression of emotion out to
the stage performance.
Some ways to think about energy are:
 Attack: Is the movement sharp and sudden, or smooth and sustained?

 Weight: Does the movement show heaviness, as if giving into gravity, or is
it light with a tendency upward?
 Flow: Does the movement seem restricted or bound, with a lot of muscle
tension, or is it relaxed, free, and easy?
 Quality: Is the movement tight, flowing, loose, sharp, swinging, swaying,
suspended, collapsed, or smooth?
The element of energy is important in this performance of dance team Kaba

Modern. The dancers use a sharp, percussive attack and have pauses between
movements that break the flow. Kaba Modern, like other hip hop groups, has a
sense of weight. They bend their knees and frequently move to the floor.
Kaba Modern
Kaba Modern
1:12
Finally, a great way to remember the five elements is by thinking of the
acronym BASTE: Body, Action, Space, Time and Energy.

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The Elements of Dance

Dance can be broken down into the following five elements:

Body: Who Dances? The Dancer!

“No paints nor brushes, marbles nor chisels, pianos or violins

George Balanchine's Apollo (Pacific Northwest Ballet)

 Non-locomotor or axial movement: Any movement that occurs in one

Action includes small movements like facial expressions or gestures, as well as

Watch the Mark Morris Dance Company perform L’Allegro il Penseroso ed il

Mark Morris: L'Allegro, Il Penseroso ed il Moderato | Three Excerpts

 Level: Is the movement on the floor, or reaching upward? Are they

The action in Paul Taylor’s dance Esplanade is very simple, consisting mostly of

Paul Taylor: Esplanade

Some ways to think about energy are:

 Attack: Is the movement sharp and sudden, or smooth and sustained?

The element of energy is important in this performance of dance team Kaba

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