Chapter 1: Why great music is a foundation for great dance

“Dance is music made visible.” – George Balenchine

“Musicality” is often a scoring criteria in dance competitions. Musicality makes perfect sense in tap, which is the most musical form of dance. Tap is a form of percussion. Tap dancers in particular are keenly aware of musical concepts such as tempo and beats. Many tap dancers also play a musical instrument in addition to their feet. So it’s quite natural for tap dancers to work on the ‘musicality’ of their performances.

But for other styles of dance, it may seem odd that “musicality” is a desired characteristic. Why is ‘musicality’ one of the attributes that good dancers have? In order to understand why, let’s examine what musicality in dance means. While there may not be an agreed-on definition of musicality in dance, it often refers to the concept of how connected the dancers are to the music. The idea of connecting to the music goes beyond simply moving in time with the music. Musicality covers a range of ideas – Do the dancers give the audience the impression that they “feel” their music? Does the dancers’ performance seem like it fits hand-in-glove with their soundtrack? Does it feel like the music was written exclusively for this particular dance performance? If these ideas compose the concept of ‘musicality’, then it’s clear why having excellent ‘musicality’ is one of the highest compliments dancers can receive.

In addition to dance, there are other disciplines which marry visuals to soundtracks – motion picture and musical theater are the most prominent. One of the most famous film composers of all time is John Williams, who has been the exclusive composer of Steven Spielberg’s movies since 1972. In a recent interview of both Williams and Spielberg, Williams was asked what his job was. His insightful response was that his job “is to inform and improve the process of storytelling through music.” 

In a certain sense, a dance routine can be thought of as a three minute movie. Many of the elements of movie-making are needed to create a dance performance – costume, hair, makeup, props, lighting, a stage, ‘action’, and of course, a soundtrack. When viewed through this lens, one better understands how music enhances visuals, because most of us can instantly recall motion picture soundtracks that have frightened or excited us – the terror of the Jaws theme or the thrill of Star Wars just to name two of John Williams’ classic compositions. To get a better understanding of what music delivers to film, visit YouTube and search for “movie scenes without music.” There, you’ll find a number of famous movie scenes with the music removed. Nothing but the dialog and ambient sounds remain. For the most part, these scenes devoid of music entirely lose their meaning, and most importantly, they completely lose their emotional impact. 

Building on the foundation of a soundtrack, a choreographer can use movement synchronized to music to tell a story over time. That story is often an emotional one, and can even move an audience to tears or to laughter. 

Some may question the importance of creating beautiful soundtracks for dance. Does one thump or awkward break in a popular song really ruin an otherwise beautiful dance performance? That decision is up to every choreographer or dance studio owner. Does a jarring sound break the audiences’ enjoyment of a graceful dancer? Most would answer yes. 

Are dance competition judges going to deduct points because a dance teacher did a poor job editing a song? On the surface of it, the answer should be no. Judges do their best not to penalize a dancer for something out of the dancer’s control. But during a long weekend with very long days, judges can’t help but take in all aspects of a performance, not just the dancer’s movement. 

In a March 2023 episode of Making The Impact podcast, a competition judge mentioned how jarring it is when a dancer exits the stage during a part of the music which does not “feel” like the end…. The judge is caught off guard that the routine has ended. I have seen this happen on the competition stage as well. This speaks to how important musical cues are to the audience’ perception of the performance’s story arc from beginning to end. As audience members, we naturally expect that it should be easy to discern when a dance routine has started and when it has ended, and are startled when there is a disconnect from our expectations. 

Inexperienced music editors may not have a good understanding of song structure. When confronted with a song which is too long for choreography, they may think the way to transform the song into a soundtrack for choreography is to simply start at the beginning of the song, and then fade it out at the desired length of the routine. While this may be the easiest way to change the song’s length, it is never ideal.

Here’s why: A good song takes the listener on a journey… a journey which has several waypoints, including a beginning, pinnacle, and ending. From an introduction, the song develops and explores, and eventually reaches a peak before coming to a conclusion. A song which fades out in the middle is like starting out on a journey only to become stranded halfway through, never reaching the most exciting part of the trip. Being stranded in the middle of a journey is never a good experience. It ruins what was otherwise a lovely trip up until that point.

 This stands in contrast to a well-edited song which takes us on the same journey as the full-length song, from beginning, to development, to the pinnacle, and finally the last destination, but does it in a shorter time, with fewer detours along the way. The beautifully edited song takes the same journey as the original song, but lingers for less time in some areas, and may avoid optional stops entirely. The beautifully edited song gives us a shorter trip, but ensures that we experience all of the most exciting and important parts of the journey. 

When a song is faded-out without care as to where the fade-out occurs in the song, it is a disservice to the dancers. In routines with an ill-conceived fade-out, hearing the song’s volume start to drop is the dancer’s queue to exit the stage. When the fade-out happens at a point in the song where it doesn’t make sense, the audience is taken by surprise. By the time the song reaches silence, the dancer is already in the wings. After a few more seconds go by, the surprised audience realizes the performance has ended and begins to applaud. This unfortunate scenario robs the dancer of being on stage to receive the audience’s applause – applause that they surely richly deserve after so much hard work that they and their teachers have put into creating the performance. With today’s technology and resources, there is simply no reason that any dancer should ever perform with anything less than flawless music.

It is up to each dance studio owner to decide how important it is for their studio’s routines to have beautiful soundtracks. But in any case, it’s worth keeping in mind that dance students are impressionable youngsters who are going through the most formative times of their lives. Each dance student will hear their group and solo songs hundreds of times in the course of a season’s rehearsals. This music forms the soundtrack of their lives. For that reason alone, every dancer deserves that music to be as perfect as it can be.