Trance Dancing - Gaining Access to Alternate Reality

I have a pretty long and strong dance background. Danced since I was 3 until early 20s. Danced ballet and contemporary all those years. I was big in the rave scene and went clubbing a lot (not your preppy top 40 type clubs either). There is nothing like some good trance/electronic music to dance too.

Dancing and the music that goes along with it is a huge passion of mine to this day. Music moves me. I literally feel it inside of me...and my body has the urge to dance. I havent in awhile and I really miss it!

Great thread!

[edit on November 7th 2009 by greeneyedleo]

reply to post by greeneyedleo


Put some good music on and then DANCE

Good for the soul.

My favourite hardstyle song of all time.



Happy Hardcore

Trance/Rave music is meant for just that, opening your mind and meditation. It is different for everyone who listens to it. For me it feels like energy and space. To me it feels like meditation where you aren't thinking and can "feel" all that is around you.

reply to post by Spiramirabilis



I'm actually responding to both posts. So much to view in the first, we could discuss the similarities between the Kalahari San and the Chechen in that they both do what I call the 'snake dance. The Sioux dances also, in the tendency towards bent knees and backs, which is an important point that I'm going to continue stressing throughout this thread.

Another thing that runs throughout much of trance dancing is the use of adornments which make a sound with each step. That seems to be a universal as much as the 'bent forward' posture.

On another note, the aboriginal dancers from OZ were into kicking up lots of dust, but I notice a lot of similarities between their style and the South African San. It wouldn't surprise me to find out there are cultural connections

On your second post, I enjoyed the drumming the first two vids, but the Zar performances are bang on for this discussion. It's all about the healing effects. The third one (Maken) you posted was great. Using the drums as part of the dance makes such great sense. Total involvement using the entire body for both making and moving to the beat. Now I have to search for great gypsy dance music after seeing it.

I ran across an interesting blog with an excellent video showing a unique dance variation of buddhist symbolism in China, no less.

Ceramic pots from the Sun Chia Chai excavation site in the Chinghai province depict colorful dancing figures dating back to a time before the first Chinese characters were written. Around the 4th-millenium BC, the people of the Neolithic Yang-shao culture arranged group dances in which they would "lock arms and stamped their feet while singing to instrumental accompaniment."

balloflove.blogspot.com...

Deeper into Chinese dance, we have Sun Style Tai Chi:

www.youtube.com...

Pretty tame compared to some of the vids we've touched on, but no less important to the discussion. I'm sure we'll be tounching on that subject even more.

reply to post by mr-lizard


A lot of Ektoplazm's music is on YouTube and it really is great stuff to get you into a positive headspace. I'd find it hard to dance to most of it, though.

Proton Kinoun - Light Echoes



Nothing wrong with it.

Originally posted by greeneyedleo
Music moves me. I literally feel it inside of me...and my body has the urge to dance.

That's the ENTIRE point of this thread and something that a lot of people seem to be lacking- either the urge to dance or an unwillingness to give into it.

I'm almost positive that there is a relationship between the breakdown of a society and the negligence of partaking in the dance.

Originally posted by Phlynx
For me it feels like energy and space. To me it feels like meditation where you aren't thinking and can "feel" all that is around you.

Wise words indeed.

Loved the beat in both Headhunterz and Special D's vids. It's that simple one-two hard beat that gets me jumping up and down.

London Calling does that for me too.

Today, the kids just don't know how to dance to rock and roll.

Here's Sam Roberts singing on it:

www.youtube.com...



Replaced dead vid with live link

[edit on 8/11/09 by masqua]

reply to post by masqua


the thing that got to me when I was going through all of it yesterday were exactly some of the things you just mentioned - the circle - the bowing - the musical adornments - the drumming of course - how universal so much of it was even when they were all so different

I was completely hooked yesterday - watching the dances - I have to say there is something about that very first one - the Chechens - beautiful and surreal

...but the Zar performances are bang on for this discussion. It's all about the healing effects. The third one (Maken) you posted was great. Using the drums as part of the dance makes such great sense...

one of the reasons I am so interested in this subject is because when you asked at the beginning about getting lost in the dance - I remembered that feeling - and although everyone feels it (men included) I mostly remember we women - a whole dance floor of us - just dancing until we were barely conscious :-)

don't want to turn it into topic for women only, because it really isn't - but there is something to this pull for women I think

...Now I have to search for great gypsy dance music after seeing it...

this morning I almost posted something - but didn't want to hog your thread :-)

in Italy - something called the tarantata - and then tarantism - will lead directly into some gypsy stuff - all of it fascinating

if you haven't already found it let me know - I can put it together - fascinating - but again - focused on women

reply to post by masqua


I love trance, especially Psy-trance.

Was actually just at Nocturnal, beautifully done. Quite the EPIC adventure and unique experience.

Trance dancing is different for everyone, I'd call it unique dancing.

Originally posted by Spiramirabilis
if you haven't already found it let me know - I can put it together - fascinating - but again - focused on women

Please put it together and lets both hog this thread together

I have seen gypsy dancing and know how it can spin that wonderful web.

Here's the 'base-line' I'd like to keep throughout, though, because I believe that music has deeper meaning than we give it credit for. The fact that we can get so physically involved with music that we might flail about in spasmodic ecstacy, fall unconscious and even nose-bleed indicates an important way our brains are hardwired.

Goosebumps, neurology and Daniel Levitin:

While listening to music, neuroscientist Daniel Levitin, asks the questions “where do goose bumps come from?” and “what’s going on in my brain that allows the goosebumps to happen?” Levitin leads a group of researchers as they investigate music’s fundamental physical structure; its biological, emotional and psychological impact; its brain altering and healing powers and its role in human evolution.

www.thirteen.org...

The 10 minute 'Gee Whiz' interview on CBC's The Hour:



An hour long interview with the professor at the Google office in San Francisco:



Levitin has worked as a musician with Stevie Wonder, Van Morrison and Santana.

Well worth listening to the Google vid to understand the overall intent of my thread.

[edit on 8/11/09 by masqua]

Originally posted by Psychonaughty
Trance dancing is different for everyone, I'd call it unique dancing.

YES!!!

So nice to see that so many. like yourself, are 'getting' what this thread is all about.

Trance dancing is all about having a personal experience with the beat and accompanying instruments, whether vocal or through violins or sitars. It's about 'losing oneself' in the dance and I can tell, by your words, that you've experienced that kind of ecstacy.

When dancing with hundreds of others who are also lost in the same physically straining music/dance union, one still feels 'within oneself'.

Funny thing is, though, that the more people are joined into the dance, the better the feeling becomes... it's pure heaven at times.

reply to post by masqua


:-)

will do

in the morning when my thinker wakes up

reply to post by masqua


The shamanic approach can take you to mystical places.
The informal type of this dance is quite an experience.www.youtube.com...

Especially when combined with the sacrament.
I am truely blessed to be accepted by my NA brothers in the NA Church.

reply to post by masqua


It is the losing of the illusive seperateness, and the gaining of the singular unity that all is. Everything is one with everything all is but a singular infinity.

reply to post by masqua


finding stuff... :-)

but in the meantime - I forgot to say earlier that I thought that Chinese video was just beautiful - also the Tai Chi. Delicate and subtle. The Tibetan video I included is so different from the rest - different meds for different conditions maybe

but these interviews - this is exactly what I've wondered - both for music and also visual art (a whole other thread in that). Maybe we really are wired for all this -

I remember thinking the first time I read that light/pattern can trigger an epileptic seizure that our brains must be receptive to things we aren't necessarily aware of - color/light/pattern

rhythm/tone - harmonics

I wonder about OCD - counting, repetition, rhythym, patterns and movement might be part of some internal system to soothe - like lullabies - or the way babies (and adults) are lulled to sleep in a car

maybe some kind of biological reset button - and why dancing would be very therapeutic

I'm just starting in on the hour long video now...I'm sure Mr. Levitan has either gone way past that - or he would just laugh at me

:-)


[edit on 11/9/2009 by Spiramirabilis]

Yesterday I stumbled and linked myself into a whole area of gypsy related articles/videos - but did not save them. Today cannot seem to stumble into the same area - so still looking...

here is the Tarantata:

Dancing mania

Dancing mania... was a social phenomenon that occurred primarily in mainland Europe between the 14th and 18th centuries; it involved groups of people, sometimes thousands at a time, who danced uncontrollably and bizarrely. Men, women, and children would dance through the streets of towns or cities, sometimes foaming at the mouth until they collapsed from fatigue.

Scientific explanations
Although no real consensus exists as to what caused the mania, some cases, especially the one in Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle), may have had an explicable physical cause. The symptoms of the sufferers can be attributed to ergot poisoning, or ergotism, known in the Middle Ages as "St. Anthony's Fire". It is caused by eating rye infected with Claviceps purpurea, a small fungus that contains toxic and psychoactive chemicals (alkaloids), including lysergic acid and ergotamine (used in modern times as a precursor in the synthesis of '___'). Symptoms of ergot poisoning include nervous spasms, psychotic delusions, spontaneous abortion, convulsions and gangrene; some dancers claimed to have experienced visions of a religious nature.

en.wikipedia.org...

Tarantism

Tarantism is an alleged, possibly deadly envenomation, popularly believed to result from the bite of a kind of wolf spider called a "tarantula"...The stated belief of the time was that victims needed to engage in frenzied dancing to prevent death from tarantism. Supposedly a particular kind of dance, called the tarantella, evolved from this therapy...

It has been suggested that the whole business was a deceit to evade proscriptions against dancing.[citation needed] John Compton proposed that ancient Bacchanalian rites that had been suppressed by the Roman Senate in 186 BC went underground, reappearing under the guise of emergency therapy for bite victims.

The phenomenon of tarantism is consistent with mass psychogenic illness.

en.wikipedia.org...

Tarantella
The term Tarantella groups a number of different southern Italian couple folk dances characterized by a fast upbeat tempo....

... The "magico-religious" tarantella is a solo dance performed supposedly to cure through perspiration the delirium and contortions attributed to the bite of a spider at harvest (summer) time. The dance was later applied as a supposed cure for the behavior of neurotic women...

The Tarantella is a dance in which the dancer and the drum player constantly try to upstage each other by dancing longer or playing faster than the other, subsequently tiring one person out first.

en.wikipedia.org...

Ancient Dances related to Tarantella Pizzica

In Egypt these ancient dances go by the name of Zaar; in Algeria , they are called Jarjabou; in Tunisia Stimbali. In Morocco , they are performed by the tribe of the Gnavas, who claim Ethiopia as their country of origin. In Southern Italy they are called Tarantella Pizzica.

The trance dance is a ceremony that aims to harmonize the environment and its participants, it is a form of passing knowledge and healing, ether on a spiritual or psychological level, of problems that may result from suppressed wishes or needs or from some socially-induced repression.

The trance dance is not a form of entertainment, nor it is an exorcism. Its sole aim is to heal the body and help the person. All people who partake in such a ceremony have the duty to support the "sick" person to the best of their abilities.

www.artship.org...

link to interesting (old) documentary in Italian with English subtitles
www.youtube.com...




so, here we go...


the name of the dancer is Ophelia :-)

just liked this one - more a traditional tarantella - Pizzica - without the hysteria

because I thought this was hilarious (and twisted):




[edit on 11/9/2009 by Spiramirabilis]

Well, I managed to find a few Gypsy dances searching with 'Roma dances':

(the first is the best)
www.youtube.com...
www.youtube.com...

I'm sure there's much more to find, but I'd like to answer what you've brought to the table first. Tarantism is a concept that falls neatly into the 'dancing for healing' idea. Once again, it's no different than the most ancient traditions we know about.

The screaming, falling into swoons, it's all so reminiscent of trance. Letting go with a passion. Those flagstones can't have been kind to the knees either. Pizzica I really liked as well and the steps remind me of the Sioux vids without the bent posture. While viewing the styles of dance, I noticed quite a few similarities to the way Roma move; quick steps and really very active. One more thing about that first Roma video... did you notice the hands and legs clapping so obvious in traditional German dance?

On the topic of banning dances which you touched on, I believe it's been a practice of not just the old Roman senate, but a large portion of monotheistic religions as well. It almost seems as if it was a policy set to discourage that 'personal' spiritual connection and have it as a part of church ritual itself. I've often thought that the initial resistance to rock and roll came first from the pulpits and then, as it grew in prevalence, the media and the police. There's more to this story yet. Rock and the way young people have been dancing to it for almost 3 generations now is directly tied to Africa. We can't talk solid rock without getting into The Blues. Black America is where it all started on this side of the Atlantic. I'm going to touch on that later in the thread. It concerns religion, song and dance altogether.

Back to neurology and goosebumps; can anyone else feel goosebumps with this song by Spiritualized?




Just where is that God Spot in our brains? Can anyone else provide an example where that effect is felt? I'm interested in seeing if it is something that happens universally with certain songs.

Goosebumps... such a cool physical response to music. Better than 'earworms', imo.

[edit on 9/11/09 by masqua]

reply to post by masqua



Real trance dancing....

www.youtube.com...

and.........

www.youtube.com...

Some of those from a decade ago I would categorize into acid jazz. I wanted to share some chill, twist, ambient, shamanistic, trances: (I don't do techno hehe)

First one, you can feel the faster samba moves and fade into a slower ti chi and back to a samba, and the possible trance stomp if desired:



A more southern hemisphere jungle beat and ambience:



Hard-core trance, not ambient (and no techno beats!)



Very sexy soul beat, vocal trance:



Shamanistic (meditative moves):



Stomp, trance dance:



I have so many more... yet I would love to be able to just switch jobs and go DJ a trance dance rave scene!!!

Originally posted by masqua
That's how we can regain our community, our universal spirit and touch alternate realities.

I'm interested in your thoughts on this. Trance dancing involves some dangerous aspects since not every spirit in that alternate realm is friendly. There are dangers as well and I'd like to discuss them too. Are we afraid to lose ourselves in dance? Should we be? Is it worth the risk?

I think we need to dance more, trance more, and as you say gain access more to these other realities in whole because if we don't we lose them to other that try to control them.

I don't believe in hallucinations.

Survivor of the 90s rave scene over here in germany

dancing 8 hours and more nonstop every weekend for several years was great

you were part of a collective and not an individual

the music took you on a journey where the music was the star and not the dj

the music moved in curves just a like a sinus curve with ups and downs gradually increasing to a huge climax where a lot of energy filled the floor

you could really feel the emotions wanting to cry and laugh at the same time

you know the score?

stupid internet...

meanwhile - found this on the trail

The Orb playing "A Huge Ever Growing Pulsating Brain That Rules From The Centre Of The Ultraworld"

18 minutes of the finest Ambient ever made

Part1



Part2


[edit on 12-11-2009 by Fett Pinkus]



[edit on 12-11-2009 by Fett Pinkus]