LA FUNZIONE DELLA MUSICA NEL TEATRODANZA DI SASHA WALTZ E PINA BAUSCH.

Abstract

The goal of this project is to re-examine the relationships between movement and musical form in contemporary dance theatre, placing the focus of our analysis on the reception that is on the global effect of spectacle. The focal point of romantic ballet was dancers virtuosity, that’s why – grounding on some “low quality” scores – ballet music wasn’t considered as dignified as absolute music, wrongly so. At the beginning of 20th century, esthetical, technical, historical and sociological factors determined a turning point, which, instead, allowed gestures to express the affects: Korperkultur, a tradition that comes from the Delsartian theory, permitted dance to acquire expressive sense. Starting from Rudolf Laban, dance becomes an independent art form, concentrating on bodily expression: music was no more the inspirer of the movement, but becomes a sort of “external entity”, giving it only time and rhythmic limits. In the first chapter we contemplate the historical premises, together with the dancers and choreographers – such as Isadora Duncan, Mary Wigman, Loie Fuller, Ruth St. Denis, Kurt Joos and Valentine de Saint-Point – who led off the development of modern dance in Europe. They prepared the grounds for the different dance theatre conceptions to come: dance theatre is a form of performance, in which dance, words, gestures and movement coexist, as well as music, which – as stated by Pina Bausch, the “inventor” of this kind of performance – is a very important component of the dance spectacle. This project will examine exclusively the production of two choreographers, Pina Bausch and Sasha Waltz, who is viewed by some scholars in a way the heiress of the former. We will take into account only some pieces of their whole production: for Bausch Orpheus und Eurydike, (one of her first creations) Kontakthof in the three 1978, 2000 and 2008 versions and Vollmond, one of her last pieces. We didn’t choose Waltz’ more abstract creations, but those of her last periods, on classical music, namely Dido and Aeneas, insideout and Jagden und Formen. Confronting the different musical demands of both choreographers and the way they built the movement sequences, in chapter 4 to 9 we will analyse piece by piece the musical score and the choreography, trying to discover how the relationships between music and movement develop in the spectacles taken into consideration: in opera as well as in non-narrative performances. As a methodological basis in comparing those structures, we will use the principles given by Paul Hodgins and Stephanie Jordan. Exposed in chapter three, the global significance, which is produced by the interaction between music and dance will then be analysed according to the audiovisual studies of Nicholas Cook.