Revisiting Ballet through Groove

Julie Pecard

How can groove influence ballet language to bring forth movement signature and support new meaning? I aim to uncover how groove can bridge classical form and movement signature by developing a method based on groove, revisiting ballet terminology, and allowing the performers to find their movement signature. Resilience has emerged as an accompanying concept that provides a base when generating movement. I research, create, and perform work that is anchored in Western Contemporary Dance. In my practice, I search for connections between the dancers, the concept, the music, the rehearsal process, and the performance. Questions I ask myself are: What are threads that help all involved connect to the work meaningfully? And how do we all come out of the creation with a sense of authorship? I often invite personal memories of the dancers into the work to make it more relatable, finding that commonalities emerge to connect us. The themes I base my concepts around are identity, finding a place of belonging, home, and womanhood. I have chosen to approach this research with varying lenses: my personal experience both in life and in the studio, through poetic writing, relating to thinkers and choreographers, and through the creation of Lost Threads. There is an analytical approach through depicting what in groove can serve ballet. I have based my research on music theory and transferred knowledge to an embodied practice around groove. I have analyzed the biomechanics of ballet movements, precisely 8, adding how language can contribute to another level of experiencing movement. I define resilience as the process of finding one's centre, and how the process toward equilibrium can be used to generate drive and inspiration, relating this process to choreographic scores and improvisation. The counter side of this research is the poetic approach I have taken through writing and sketching. This world offers further possibilities to uncover more knowledge on the connection of ballet and groove, performers and movement signature, resilience and improvisation. I’ve come back to my roots of ballet and gone deeper into the ground, emerging with an innovative practice through groove. Daring to search for innovative ways of bending classical form. Fontys Academy of the Arts, Codarts, Master Choreography COMMA, Master Arts, Cohort 4: 2023-2025

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Julie Pecard - Revisiting Ballet through Groove - 2025