I love
German verbal portmanteaus. In order to
create big words for simple concepts, they just mash-up two or more words into
a multi-letter string such as the noun Handschuhschneeballwerfer (a person who wears gloves to throw snowballs) or the
verb Sontagspaziergangmachen (to go for a Sunday walk). I can’t help but wonder if we had a single
word for these activities, would we be more likely to grab friends or family
and head for the park on a wintry Sunday afternoon for a jolly snowball fight?
But back
to Bewegungschore. I googled ‘dance’ and
‘mood’ and hit the jackpot by stumbling across information on Rudolf von Laban,
a dancer and movement theorist who developed the concept of Bewegungschore in
the early 20th century. That
tongue-twister of a word translates as ‘movement choir’ where participants don’t
sing but rather dance together as a shared experience in the joy of
moving. He elaborated his vision further
with another mega-word, namely bedürfnislosigkeit meaning demandlessness as in
having one’s time and energy free to indulge in ‘festive exaltation’.
Well
now, what could be better really than to a bedürfnislosigkeit state on a Saturday a.m in order to
participate in a laughing, lively Bewegungschöre, shaking those parts of
your body with which you are in contact as you oscillate with a group of
like-minded dancers?
In Denver? Looking forward to seeing you some Saturday soon as we dance in a movement choir with Lia Ridley at Dancing the Soul, 950 Jersey St, Denver, CO 80220.
