Creating and Choreographing Dance
Domain 2: Creating and Choreographing Dance
This domain tests movement invention, improvisation, choreographic devices, form, and the revision process. Questions often ask you to identify the device or form used, or to choose the best next step in developing a motif.
Core rules and concepts
- The elements of dance are body, energy, space, and time (BEST). Use them to vary movement: body parts, effort qualities, pathways and levels, and tempo and rhythm.
- A motif is a short, memorable movement phrase. Choreographic devices develop it: repetition, retrograde, inversion, augmentation, diminution, canon, fragmentation, and accumulation.
- Form organizes phrases: AB, ABA, rondo, theme and variation, narrative, and chance. Form is the large structure; device is the tool.
- Improvisation can be structured by prompts, constraints, scores, or contact improvisation. It is not random; it has intent and reflection.
- Collaboration and revision matter: record phrases, give descriptive feedback, and edit for clarity, safety, and copyright.
Worked example
Given a motif of a reach, turn, and sink, build a study. First repeat it exactly to establish the motif. Then use retrograde (sink, turn, reach) in a second phrase. Next, set the original and retrograde in canon: Dancer A begins, Dancer B enters two counts later. Finally, arrange as ABA, with the canon as B. The reasoning: repetition makes the motif legible; retrograde creates contrast without new material; canon adds texture; ABA gives closure.
Traps that cost marks
- Calling canon a form rather than a device.
- Using improvisation to mean no structure; exam answers reward clear constraints.
- Developing every phrase at once, so no motif is recognizable.
- Ignoring copyright when using existing music or choreography.
- Forgetting safety and spatial awareness in contact work.