Customer Reviews

Dance and Music: A Guide to Dance Accompaniment for Musicians and Dance Teachers

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

A wonderful book that should be read by all teachers and dance accompanists who collaborate in the dance studio. Well written and direct, the information concerning music and its use for ballet class is equally informative for the teacher and the pianist. The rewards of the often mysterious and misunderstood profession of dance pianist are clearly explained. The importance of the relationship between dance and music are communicated along with an immense respect for the tradition of classical ballet.

Finally, a book about the rather obscure field of music accompaniment for dance class. This book is primarily for pianists, so it is good to keep this in mind. Teachers may find this book helpful too.
I give this 5 stars because it is one of the first and only books of its kind, written by someone with considerable experience in the field. Harriet Cavalli's humour and bluntness shine through, as she gives many suggestions on dealing with the nitty gritty details of this type of work, with many tips for the beginner on how to get started. It includes a considerable amount of music, which fills nearly the second half of the book.

As a teacher of ballet and not a musician I think we teachers acquire an understanding of the particular needs of accompanists very much the way they acquire an understanding of our needs, mainly by playing for class, and of course that means starting out there can often be little understanding so that it is only after some time that we teachers know how important setting a tempo for the pianist is, etc. and the pianist may come to learn how important it is to have a sense of the length and structure of the combination and not to speed up or slow down. I found this book in our studio and began to read it out of curiosity and i was very struck by Ms Cavalli's awareness of the teacher's needs, not just the pianists. I think it is a very good resource for both teachers and accompanists.

A remarkable/inspiring book in so many ways:i rather like Miss Cavalli's tone of voice... the only book i know which deals with the elusive (but vital) role of ballet accompaniment.

However,i do hope that future editions correct the truly terrible sin of not attributing any of the music examples to the various composers.The likes of Debussy and even Czerny deserve SO much better than this!

Also,a CD accompanying the volume would be a nice extra (as in Charles Rosen's Romantic Generation).