View a full length dance concert and write a dance review!
Watch one of the dance concerts from the Online Dance Concert Resources page. You may want to take
notes during or after your viewing.
It is your turn to write a review! Remember a review is a personal response. Write from first person
perspective, avoid passive statements and descriptions and be bold with your interpretations! Do not refer
to time stamps. Assume the reader does not have access to the performance. Describe the action you want
the reader to understand.
Develop a thesis that compares 2 of the dances or sections of the concert.
Determine what movement or compositional tools will be the evidence to support your thesis. What did you
see or feel that allowed you to arrive at your thesis, how can you best describe this to the reader? Include
interpretive, analytical, and evaluative ideas about both works as well as 3 component descriptions to
support your thesis.
Format for your written review
Paragraph 1- Introduce your themes and provide context for your reader (who, what, when, where.) Finish
with a bold thesis statement that is either interpretive, analytical and/or evaluative, and compares two
sections of the dance concert you watched.
Paragraph 2- Analysis of section #1 in relation to your thesis
Paragraph 3- Analysis of section #2 in relation to your thesis
Paragraph 4- Any additional information/research that supports your thesis
Paragraph 5- Summarize your comparison.
All choreographers must be named and titles must be italicized. (In Martha Graham’s Lamentation…..)
Use the standard formatting for this course as stated in the syllabus. Please also include a heading in the
left-hand corner of the paper with first and last name, Lesson 04 Assignment, and the date.
Things to remember while watching and writing
You must view a dance performance/concert that is listed on the Online Dance Concert Resources page or
one that has been approved by your assigned teacher.
It is essential that you write a personal review of the concert you attend rather than summarizing reviews
you find on-line. Please see UW's policy on plagiarism: http://depts.washington.edu/pswrite/plag.html (Links
to an external site.)
Examples: Please keep in mind these are models for the types of sentences we are looking for, but not to
be copied and used in your paper.
"Two pieces from The Chamber Dance Concert, XXXX, and YYYYY allowed me to consider my preconceived notions of gender and relationships.”
"The choreography presented at Cornish Dance Theater was incredibly diverse in style and theme, however
in XXXXX and YYYYY, the choreographers played particular attention the use of the stage space to communicate ideas of community."
Sample Solution