Recent ideas I'm exploring, by Tracy Helming, www.alimahdances.com

In a session with Suzanna , I recently explored grading the size of my movements into 5 levels: level 1 being small, and level 5 being HUGE. I then began grading them in terms of intensity as well: level 1 being very soft, ephemeral, floating, and level 5 being extremely intense, muscular, gooey, and with great tension. I found that by controlling these two components, I could better fit the movement to the music. It also helped me balance the architecture of the choreography. This gradation has also been helpful in my drum solos, where I find that I often need to give the percussive motions a level 5 intensity, but keep my arms at level 1 or 3 so that they have life and lift but are clearly just back-up to the main attraction.

Suzanna and I also played around with accents. Here is my newest experiment: make the accents tell a story, but let the rest of my dancing be simply musical.

Here is a favorite excercise that comes from Manon . We call it Snapshots. While dancing, inject small, quick unexpected changes of emotion. Play around with using the emotional spectrum that does not get excercised much in the dance: surprise, fear, jealously, pride, rapture, fullness, hunger. Because it is just a snapshot, we found that it comes across as a fleeting little texture - enough to intrigue but not frighten the audience.

Finally, some words of wisdom from a zen master: let your body move where it wants to go, not where you think it needs to go.