L'essence du dance

L' Essence du Dance was my first music project that involved children. Dance teacher Christina Zavaliari asked me to compose a melody for seven of her little danseuses.

Since the age of her students varied from four to sixteen years old the idea I proposed was to show the evolution of a dancer from infant to teacher. For that we had to add two more charachters to complete the story, the adorable little infant in the beginning and the teacher at the end.

The melody follows the images. An infant in the beginning is followed by the lovely voice of the soprano Caterina Nikolidaki. Then the years of inoscence followed by a patient larghetto violin and flute. After that comes the time when the girl wears her pointe shoes. Things start to get "serious" with marcato strings and flutes dancing to an allegro moderato rythm emphasizing the energy of that age, the end of inoscence and by the drop of the pointe shoes the end of guidance. Puberty comes with the burn of the teenagers temperament through oversaturated expression followed by a forte cello and a capricious violin until the burst of adulthood where the rythm is sturdy, the character steady, the expression gracefull and the melody completes at a whirling crescendo that lands at her pointes.

the perpetual cycle continues..