Contact Improv and Other Partnering Styles by Jessie Wise

Through taking contact improvisation, I have learned some good techniques for partners to learn how to get in-synch with each other. I have done a lot of ballet partnering and have also been involved in swing dancing for a while now and have really enjoyed learning and doing ariels. In general the lifts are very momentum based. After taking contact improvisation, I feel like it would be valuable for swing dancers to learn a little bit more about weight sharing.

I think that swing aerials would benefit from using gravity more effectively. Sometimes I feel like my partner and I “muscle” through some of the lifts. The lifts would probably be easier for the both of us if worked with using the momentum of weight sharing and more connection between the two of us. To start off, I think that some of the beginning exercises that we practice would be good to get connected and in tune with each other. One exercise in particular that I thought would be very helpful is when two people grab hands and lean away from each other and play with weight that way. Working with the tension between the two of them would help with some of the ariels that deal with swinging and momentum. Another exercise that I thought would be very helpful is when one partner stands, bent at the waist so their torso is parallel to the ground, and allows for the other one to lay on their back and really melt their weight into the standing partner. Many lifts have moments in them in them where you sort of pose in a position and I think that it would be more comfortable and less straining if both people were giving their weight appropriately to each other instead of being stiff and resisting against each other. And one last exercise that I think would be valuable is the one in which one partner runs and jumps into the other’s arms, and the other catches and uses momentum to swing the “jumper” around. For a lot of swing lifts, the dancers start apart; this exercise would help the partners get in tune and timing with each other and teach them how to use momentum to their benefit. I think that some of our contact improv exercises would definitely help two partners to be in more in-sync and efficient together.

I thought that while I was sharing about my personal thoughts and discoveries about this subject that I would look up where contact improve and other partnering forms have intersected in the past. And I really could not find that much information, which I found interesting. I know that a lot of modern partnering incorporates contact improvisation but besides that, I think that because the form is so new, that there has not been a lot of integration.