Paths Thread

General Indication for Turning on a Path
Submitted by Charlotte Wile (scribe) - March 10, 2004

Following is a summary of one of the topics talked about at an informal in-house theory meeting held at the Dance Notation Bureau in June, 2003. The meeting was attended by Sandra Aberkalns, Ray Cook, Ilene Fox, Ann Hutchinson Guest, Mira Kim, Sheila Marion, Valarie Mockabee, and Leslie Rotman.

Discussion participants felt that Labanotation needs a general way to show turning on a path, i.e., the indication could be interpreted with swiveling or non-swiveling turns.

As it now stands, only specific statements are possible. For instance, Ex. 1 below specifies traveling with swiveling turns, and Ex. 2 specifies traveling with non-swiveling turns.

Ann Guest suggested changing the meaning of Ex.1 so it would become the general sign. Participants liked this idea.

How then would swiveling and non-swiveling be shown? Perhaps the notation’s stepping signs could be modified with sliding indications (to show swiveling) or space indications (to show non-swiveling). For instance, in Ex.3 the first three steps would not swivel, and the last three steps would swivel.

Path signs could similarly be modified. Several options were considered (Ex. 4 - Ex. 11). Participants liked Ex. 10 and Ex. 11 best.

If these new ways of showing turns on a path were adapted, the sign in Ex. 2 would no longer be needed.

At the end of the discussion the group felt they had reached a consensus on a proposal:
- Ex. 1 would be used as the general sign for turning on a path.
- Non-swiveling turns on a path would be specified as in Ex. 10; swiveling turns on a path would be specified as in Ex. 11. By themselves, these indications would leave open the number of turning steps that produce the path.
- A particular number of swivel and/or non-swivel turning steps could be shown by modifying the notation’s stepping signs, as in Ex 3.

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