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Question: How should I notate choreography!?
How should I notate choreography!? I'm doing 10 hours of dance a week at the moment but I'm going to have more hours too!. In every class we usually do two or three different routines each week!. Thankfully I can remember most of them but I want to start notating them so I'm just wondering how other people notate choreographyWww@QuestionHome@Com


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker:
I think that the easiest way to keep a record of routines is with video and with digital cameras this is no longer prohibitively expensive!.

Video has many advantages over notation in that you can see what the move looks like and from there easily see how to change or improve it!. You can see the pace of a piece!. You can see easily the alignment and whether that can be changed and still work!. You also can see how costumes are performing (if that is important to you)!. Video (stored on computer) also makes it easier to file and therefore find what you are looking for long after you have forgotten the routine!.

It also doesn't take as long! eg The stance preceding a ballroom dance could read:

3rd pstn RFF, str8 B, alnmt 2wds FRT, RA- rxd + H- sht, LA- rxd + H- cht
(3rd position right foot forward, straight body, facing over right toe, right arm relaxed with hand at waist height, left arm relaxed hand at chest height)
and this is without actually moving - for some things you might want to make a record of facial expression, hand alignment, head alignment, body twist and so on and so on and so on (Obviously not everybody needs this depth of record keeping but you see what I mean)!. Labanotation does allow for many of these things but I personally do not find it easy to pick up - but that may be because I do not use it on a regular basis!.

Hope this helps and I haven't bored you into not reading this far!
All the bestWww@QuestionHome@Com

If you don't want to learn actual notation then draw stick men!. Otherwise Laban is a good notation to use!. lots of pages explaining it can be found on google!. its easy enough but you may need to print stuff off and refer to it for a few timesWww@QuestionHome@Com

You only need to learn what you will easily understand so you can use abbreviations like CW (clockwise) CCW (counter clockwise) etc!. Www@QuestionHome@Com