The Music Stopped: Dancers, Rehearsal Directors, and the Rehearsal Process

Abstract

Within professional contemporary dance, remounting dance repertoire in a rehearsal process can involve navigating a myriad of factors alongside learning and refining choreography. My research proposes the notion of a dancer-centred (Knox, 2013) rehearsal process as a means to deconstruct potential hierarchies present within dance culture and to highlight the experiences and needs of dancers in a rehearsal process. Through interviews, this ethnographic study has engaged seven professional contemporary dancers currently working within New Zealand’s dance industry. My aim is to uncover potential affects a rehearsal director may have on dancer needs in a rehearsal process. To explore this notion, a dancer-centred lens is utilised to view the rehearsal process from the needs of a dancer. Themes of dancer agency, self-actualisation, wellbeing, belonging, and self-esteem are amalgamated with dancer-centred theory to extend meanings and understandings of dancers’ needs in a rehearsal process and to present the potential effect a rehearsal director may have on dancers. This thesis extends previous research on dancer-centredness (Foster-Sproull, 2017; Knox, 2013) into the realm of a rehearsal process and examines complexities within the rehearsal director-dancer relationship through seven participant dancer experiences of rehearsal processes. This study contributes to growing scholarly research into the voice and the role of dancers and rehearsal directors.