Suggestions for Choreographing a Dance
Richard Powers



The big picture


  • Choreography is not just stringing together steps and figures.  That can be boring.


  • First, ask yourself why the audience is there.  What do they want to see?  What would interest them?  Why should they like your piece?  Or even if they don't like it, how will it impact them?  (Art doesn't have to please.)  What will hold their attention at each moment?  Keep your audience in mind during every step of your design.

    Why?  This helps prevent one of the most common mistakes in choreography — self-indulgence.  Many beginning choreographers approach their choreography as simply "I love to do this!," assuming that viewers will enjoy watching, as much as dancers enjoy dancing.  That's assuming too much, and your audience may quickly lose interest unless you know how to hold their attention and make it meaningful for them.

    Another form of self-indulgence is a choreographer who thinks, "This work has meaning for me.  Too bad the audience doesn't understand it, but at least I'm satisfied."  The choreographer just wasted the audience's time.  But I'm sure this isn't you, or else you wouldn't be reading a page on how to be a more effective choreographer, so let's move on.


  • Think big.  You may have to settle on some compromises down the road, but begin your creative process with the highest ideals.  Even plan on revolutionizing the field.  Make history.  If you don't succeed in revolutionizing the field, that's fine, but your piece will be better for aiming high.

    Avoid the opposite attitude:  "Yikes, I have only a month until the show! I hope I come up with something decent before then."  That's a self-pressured attitude of avoiding failure, which is the opposite of an optimistic attitude of making history.  Either attitude will be apparent in your final work.


  • All arts are highly individual, so every guideline on this page may have exceptions.  These guidelines are not rules, but suggestions, gained from years of experience and observations, to help you design a more engaging, entertaining, artistic and/or meaningful choreography.




    The specifics


  • A good place to start is by asking yourself what's the unique character of the dance form you're choreographing.  Which qualities distinguish it from other dance forms?  Highlight and expand those qualities.


  • Your first impression on your audience is extremely important.  Everyone tends to make snap decisions based on the first impression they get.  Confirmation bias is human nature.  "The goal of the brain is to validate what it already believes."  Based on that first impression, viewers decide how good they think you are, then rarely change their mind.

    If their initial impression is that you're great, and you mess up a minute later, no problem.  That mistake won't even register, because it doesn't confirm their positive bias.  They'll think, "That's OK; mistakes are normal."  But if their first snap judgement is that you're not very good, that same mistake will loom large, as confirmation of what they initially thought.  And they will tend to continue to ignore your positive examples, because they don't confirm that negative first impression.  People can change their minds, but it takes three times as much effort to change their mind, compared to getting them on your side at the outset.

    Your first impression includes the moments before you begin dancing.  If your viewer can see you, they're already forming an opinion, even if the music hasn't started yet.  Give thought to your entrance onto the stage, or whatever is happening immediately before your dance begins.  What else can you do besides standing in place waiting for the music to begin?

    To make a strong positive first impression, put a disproportionately large amount of time, thought and effort into shaping that first impression.  Better yet, follow that up with another outstanding moment half a minute later.  "Yes! I knew I liked this piece!"

    But this isn't a hard-and-fast rule.  None of these suggestions are.  You can also begin with a quietly simmering start, to engage your audience's curiosity.  But in most cases, making a strong positive first impression is important.


  • Utilize contrast to keep the audience interested.  Otherwise they tend to acclimate and zone out soon.
  • You will want to develop contrast within the piece and also contrast between the different dances.  Contrasting elements include angular vs. curvilinear, gentle vs. strong, slow vs. fast, consonance vs. dissonance, order vs. chaos.  If you're doing a partnered dance, vary dance positions — waltz, skaters, open, akimbo, solo, etc.  Contrast the numbers of dancers onstage, or who are in motion.  Use tension/resolution dynamics.  Use space, silence, freeze-frames and voids for contrast.

    That's just the short list.  You can think of many other qualities to contrast.

  • If your piece is more than three minutes long, follow the Golden Mean suggestion:  Create a major change of level (an especially noticeable contrast) 60 to 70 percent through your piece.

  • Give special consideration to floor patterns.  Break up line-of-direction.  Use the entire stage.  Design visual patterns formed by dancers.  Use contrast in arranging different patterns.

  • However don't let the quest for contrast destroy the unique character of a dance.  Novice choreographers often make the mistake of throwing every trick they know into a piece, resulting in a choppy mess which is hard for an audience to follow.  As mentioned above, it's important to select one characteristic motif for a dance and develop it fully, so that the audience comes to understand and appreciate the quality which differentiates this dance from others.

  • Don't neglect the less interesting passages of a dance form.  Simple choruses or quieter moments between fancier figures provide a useful contrast.  Choreographers often make the mistake of editing out slow parts until all they have left is the shouting.  The pacing of dances often breathes... don't forget to inhale before shouting.

  • Musicality
    Janice Garrett, a Stanford Dance Division guest choreographer, was asked for the secret of her success.  She replied that she closely listens to the music so many times that she becomes intimately familiar with every phrase and nuance, before she begins choreographing.  Then it's just a matter of expressing in motion what the music is saying at each moment.  Of course her genius with arranging bodies in motion is more than that, but it's significant that she places the music first in her process, and the musicality of her work is indeed striking.

    On the larger macro scale, match musical breaks, accents, lyrics and crescendos / diminuendos with physical versions of the same.  On the more subtle micro scale, see if instrumental changes, melodic lines and counterpoint can be expressed in motion.  I'm not saying that a choreography needs to be programmatic, but audiences find it satisfying to feel correlations with the music as they're watching your piece.  This is primal and universal.

    Of course once something is identified as primal and universal, there will be minds that rebel against the "obvious."  When Walt Disney created the ultimate visual expression of music for its time, Fantasia in 1940, some choreographers decided it was more sophisticated to go in the opposite direction, divorcing their movement from the emotional impulses of the music.  But that backlash was in the 1950s.  We've gotten over that by now.  There is nothing unsophisticated about acknowledging universal responses to music, and it may even be a key to your success.


  • Dance, as any art form, can be used to express emotions.  What emotions do you want to convey with your piece?  Keep these in mind as you're designing your work.  Revisit the emotional aspect as you develop your piece.


  • Do you want to develop any relationships and interpersonal dynamics?  A simple romance?  Competition or one-upmanship?  Cat and mouse game?  Jealousy?  Manage à trois?  Relationship to someone in the past?  Fatal relationship?  Someone wanting to belong or feeling left out?  Other group dynamics?


  • Have all motion evoke a natural motivation, if you can.  Make it clear that the dancer went there, and did that, for some reason, rather than merely being directed by the choreographer.  For instance, they respond to the movements of another dancer, or a space opens up and they go for it, or the music suggests the movement, or their momentum carries them there, etc.

    You want your dancers to appear to move in a natural, musical, artless manner so that every motion moves naturally or logically from the previous one, unselfconsciously, but still executed with great precision and confidence.  The art of choreographing is concealing the artifice of choreography.


  • Our life, or rather our memory of our life, is composed of moments.  Many of these moments are as brief as snapshots.  Similarly, a choreography may likely be remembered for its notable moments.  Achieving a mood for an hour is good, but will likely not be noticed or remembered as much as vivid moments are.
    Choreograph for the moments you want — a few startling, strong or memorable moments.  Work hard to make those few focused moments spectacular, even if they're difficult and take a lot of time to perfect.  Spend more of your time on the most memorable moments.  Then surround them with phrases to highlight those key moments/movements, using contrast and continuity, pacing, etc.

    Good stage scenic design puts the work where it's noticed, highlighted, not hidden in a dark corner.  It's the same with choreography.  Highlight the most significant moments, placing them where they can be clearly seen, not obscured in a flurry of busy movement.  Be aware that the rest of the material is used wisely to set up these key moments, so make the other material efficient, easy for your dancers to memorize and master quickly.

    Similarly, keep in mind that a well-designed dance will never hide its best features.  Make sure the audience has the clearest view and the best viewing angle of your more important steps and figures.

  • If you have different dancers doing different things at the same time, draw the audience's eye to the part you want to highlight.  A stage is large, and viewers hate it when they miss something good because they're looking at someone on the opposite side of the stage.  Therefore have the soloists (or whoever you want the audience to watch) do something to draw attention to themselves before their highlight.  Or have the key dance movement dive into an "active area" which the audience is already watching.

    This is choreographing "filmically", knowing who you want the "camera" focused on, for each moment.  Then once you've chosen your key moments, do what you can to draw the audience's eye to that person or couple before they're "on camera".  Large movements or lateral travel always work, or making a noise.  Or quieting down everyone else.

    A part of the "audience eye" perspective is knowing in advance at what elevation your audience will be.  For instance, if they are at the same floor level as the performers, don't design a choreography that will only make sense if viewed from above.

    And keep in mind how close or far away your audience is from the performers.  If close, focus on the dancers expressions and relationships, and micro gestures.  If far away, develop the broader shapes of groups and paths.  As you're choreographing, visualize every moment of your work from the actual viewpoint of your audience, as opposed to designing abstract geometries and concepts.

  • Recurring themes.  One way to add continuity to your piece is to have a recurring movement theme throughout your piece.  This is different from the overall theme of your work, your topic, intent, mood or story.  A recurring movement theme is an identifiable movement that returns, and then returns again in a modified version.

    You don't need to choose this recurring theme at the outset.  You might be a few hours into your choreography, and a move may almost accidentally occur to you that seems especially characteristic of your piece.  Consider using that move again several times through your piece.


  • Think Show-Biz.  You can construct your piece like a theatrical production with three acts.
    Act 1)  Your first impression.  You don't get a second chance to make a first impression, so make it strong.

    Act 2)  As if writing a good mystery drama, think about which clues they need to know first  And what are the actors' motivations (in this case the dancers' motivations)?  How will it resolve?  The drama of your dance has clear parallels to a mystery.

    Act 3)  The big finale, meaning their final impression, so they leave your piece satisfied in some way.
    This isn't a requirement, but it's a fun way to make a choreography.


    In addition to your responsibilities to your audience, you also have responsibilities to your dancers.
  • Be efficient with your dancers' rehearsal time.  This includes running efficient rehearsals, of course, but there are also choreographic considerations.  Try to get the maximum theatrical effect from the minimum of difficulties for your dancers.

  • Only have your dancers learn something difficult if they will be seen or featured doing it.  I've seen many new choreographers make the mistake of choreographing difficult-to-execute footwork and figures, resulting in overly long rehearsals and frustrated dancers, only to have the footwork lost in a swirl of motion.  Or belaboring a difficult figure that is no more effective than an easy one.

    An unnecessarily difficult choreography not only creates stressful and fatiguing rehearsals, but it impairs the final performance as well, as your performers' faces show concentration and concern.  If your choreography is a little easier, your dancers can focus on performance flair, with a confident air, instead of hoping that they can get through it without screwing up.

  • Design especially logical phrases and timing patterns which will be easier for your dancers to remember than random steps and timings.

  • Use the individual talents of your dancers.  Ask them what special skills and talents they have.

  • Ideally your dance should be physically and musically enjoyable (or in some other way rewarding) for your dancers to perform.

  • These suggestions are especially important if working with amateur dancers, or professional actors who are new to dance.  Seasoned professional dancers probably won't mind a few (but not too many) of the above-mentioned difficulties.


  • How to arrange the dances in your concert:
  • When arranging a suite of dances into a concert, consider placing your best one last, as the finale, and your second-best first.  Or maybe vice-versa, first and last.  First impressions are important.  You don't want to spend the rest of the concert trying to change your audience's mind from a weak first impression.  Beyond that, the dance order is up to you.  Maybe you want to place your next best in the middle, or as your second dance, to reinforce your audience's impression that they like your work.

  • If a single choreography is long, ten minutes or more, you can use this same guideline within one piece, starting and finishing with your most impressive material.


  • This next one concerns a specific niche:  You'll have a special challenge in staging 19th century social dances.  The problem is that 19th social demeanor was intended to be modest, not drawing any attention to the dancer.  Stage performances are the opposite.
    19th century dance masters suggested that "on entering an assembly-room, all thought of self should be forgotten. The petty ambition of endeavoring to create a sensation either by dress, loud talking or unusual behavior is to be condemned."  In terms of dancing style, "dance with modesty, neither affect to make a parade of your knowledge; refrain from great leaps and ridiculous jumps, which would attract attention toward yourself."  150 years ago the ideal social dancer was almost invisible.  The obvious problem in staging these dances is that historically accurate humble, understated dancing tends to bore audiences, who have acclimated to broad theatrical movements and virtuoso footwork.

    So there is a spectrum between exact authenticity and theatrical effect.  Modern audiences are not the same as period audiences, so if you want to convey the effect that a dance had 150 years ago, you may have to exaggerate some aspects of the dance to achieve that effect.  The film "Moulon Rouge" is effectively impressionistic, not focusing on the details of how it looked and sounded, but how it felt to be living then.

    You have to make your own choices on this broad spectrum between understated authenticity and theatricality.  There are no right or wrong choices — your choices are yours.  Everyone is different in this balance.

    Or keep the original understated style and find other ways to be interesting onstage.


  • Other considerations:
  • If you want a video of your choreography to be posted on YouTube, test the recording of your musical selection on YouTube in advance, to make sure that it won't be flagged for a copyright violation.

  • Give thought to your entrances... anything except standing onstage waiting for the music to begin.  Perhaps use a different kind of entrance for each dance.

  • Consider the many ways in which specific costuming might enhance your piece.  Maybe integrate costume colors into the color palette of the stage.  Use costume colors to enhance the emotions you want to express.  Consider how the flow of fabrics can enhance the movements you're creating. 

  • Ask yourself whether special lighting is necessary, or how lighting will help highlight the important aspects of your work.  Use lighting colors to enhance emotions.  When looking for ways to add contrast to your work, consider the role lighting can play.
    These are not minor considerations tacked on to the bottom of this page.  Entire books have been written about the costuming and lighting of stage productions. 
  • Consider noises or sounds made by your dancers, ranging from small exhalations of effort or surprise, stamps/slaps/etc., to speaking or singing.

  • Consider how you might use props.

  • Consider integrating other media, projections and effects.


  • Enjoy the process of making a piece.  You'll be tempted to focus only on the final result, so don't miss the satisfaction of the creative process, and the joy of dance, along the way.





    © 2002, 2011 Richard Powers

    More thoughts and musings