Dancing frees the soul

When we talk about movement, we usually think of sport. Movement - i.e. dance - as a form of expression has largely disappeared from our everyday lives. «Dance lives where there is repression, where there is poverty. When people are satisfied and full, dancing is a thing of the past,» says Oki Degen, dancer and dance teacher from Basel. Born in Berlin, she teaches dance to around 200 children and young people at the Binningen-Bottmingen music school. Many pupils visit the dance hall for the first time during their primary school years and remain loyal to their dance teacher until they are adults. The 50-year-old originally comes from a contemporary dance background, but has also studied many folk dances and mixes different styles when working with children and young people. She likes to compare this to a chef who has the courage to experiment.

Playing rhythms from sheet music is a fun mental exercise.

Last year, the dance teacher launched a small survey. Oki Degen wanted to know from her students whether they liked dancing and why. «They looked at me like I was a horse,» she says with a laugh. «Of course we like to dance!» they shouted. The reasons varied depending on age. The younger children said that they felt happy when they danced. The teenagers are happy about the opportunity to break out of their everyday lives. «It's a basic human need to express ourselves with our bodies,» says Oki Degen. «Unfortunately, this form of communication is neglected in our society.» In the Balkans, says Degen, people dance in groups at practically every festival. This expresses more than small talk at the table. But even in the Balkans, dances are disappearing more and more. «As societies become richer, dance takes on a different meaning,» explains the dance teacher. «Trends like Zumba emerge, where fitness is done to music. That's also called dance.»

In our society, music enjoys a much higher status than dance. Wrongly so. Music and movement are partners. Movements can be set to music and music triggers movement. This can be illustrated with an exercise from music lessons: One child bends his knees gently, turns quickly and then stretches vigorously in the air. All the children repeat their own sequence in a quiet room and at their own pace. Now the teacher sets the movements of one of the children to music on the piano, so they always play the same thing parallel to the movements. The children will find out which sequence is realised musically and adopt it until everyone is dancing the same thing. Then the teacher changes the music a little and the children get involved in new movements. What happens? Music follows the movement, and movement follows the music. The children combine their personal expression with music and movement. They are part of the whole and yet travelling individually. They communicate through movement and sounds, without words. This only works if the children already have some practice in expressing themselves with their bodies. How do you move delicately?

Some children have to overcome themselves at first

What does a sudden movement look like and what does a combination of delicate and sudden look like? Trying this out and finding solutions can go hand in hand with both seriousness and laughter. Some children initially have to overcome themselves to use their bodies as a means of expression. In any case, trust and respect in the group are necessary in order to experience this little gem of a lesson. Music is not possible without movement. Just think of the playing technique and physical effort that every instrument requires. In the musical primary school, for example, the children learn to play the xylophone. On the one hand, it is about hand-eye coordination, on the other hand, the dosage of force presents some children with great challenges. It is not only practice that makes perfect, but also trust in one's own body.

The body learns very subtly and quickly if you trust it and let it do its thing.

Andreas Zihler, musician and music educator

«The body is ingenious,» says Andreas Zihler, Zurich musician and music educator. «The body learns very subtly and quickly if you trust it and let it do its thing.» Zihler is experienced in many areas: on the percussion of the Zurich Opera House as well as on West African drums. He is a trained mime artist and spiral dynamist (movement therapist) and teaches at various schools. When learning complex rhythms, he teaches his students to trust that the body memorises the movement. The children are no different. In the musical primary school, they experience music with their whole body. Rhythms are realised with body percussion, a legato (joining the notes) is painted on paper with large brushes, an accelerando (speeding up) is danced. Of course, music is also notated and children learn to play rhythms from sheet music. This is a mental exercise that many children enjoy. But the elementary experience of making music is that children feel a personal connection with what they are doing and with those who are doing it with them.

At Oki Degen, this connection is not only visible in the dance hall. Long before the lesson begins, pupils gather in the anteroom to prepare or warm up together with the little ones. Oki Degen is convinced that the lessons are more than just «right-left-right-left» for her pupils. Her own four children have also learnt to dance with her. The youngest was brought to dance lessons twice a week by her grandfather. And because the granddaughter didn't want to leave the place and continued practising outside with the other children, Oki Degen's father often had to wait outside the dance hall for hours. "My dad would take my cheeks in his hands and say: Oh Oki, if I had met you when I was a little boy - that would have been the greatest gift for me. I think I would have become a dancer too.

A dance in the park

Children are constantly inventing little choreographies. For example, when they run or dance around the lime tree in the park, then to the bench and back again following the lines of the paving stones. When was the last time you curved round an avenue of trees? Do it. And invent variations:

• Hopping, floating, swinging your arms or leaning into your side, on tiptoe, very low.
• Someone can dance ahead and the others can copy the movements.
• Take your children and their friends and their parents by the hand and meander around the trees together, changing direction on a signal.
• Change the formation: always two together, one against all or two large groups walking in a jumble.

A song sung to this helps to bring the whole thing into shape. Perhaps you could sing "Sur le pont d'Avignon", "Wenn eine tannigi Hose hät", "Zoge am Boge". Of course, you can also sing all the melodies in "la-la" and "jam-pa-pa".

Organising movement in everyday life - with music tips

Dance first, think later. It's the natural order! Dance first, think later, according to Samuel Beckett, that's the natural order. It is natural for small children to move spontaneously as soon as they hear music. It is often not easy for older children and adults to just dance and switch off. Many are no longer aware of their repertoire of possible movements. Here are five little exercises to do at home, which work with or without music:

• Move as if you were standing in a honey pot while vacuuming. - Music tip (with headphones): "Energy Flow" by Ryuichi Sakamoto.

• Tidy up the room with your children by all tidying purposefully and directly, but very gently - dabbing movements are created. - Music tip: "Lillies Of The Valley" by Jun Miyake.

• Walk to the letterbox with your child in slow motion. - Music tip: "My dearest, my fairest" by Henry Purcell.

• Dance with your hands only. Start with each finger individually. Test the radius of the wrists. Move through the room, always focussing on your hands, which dance one after the other and then at the same time. - Music tip: "Freedom Is A Voice" by Bobby McFerrin.

• Walk diagonally through the flat, as if on coals, on pebbles, over warm moss, through deep snow, on a tree trunk. - Music tip: "Royal Garden Blues" by John Kirby.