Why Contemporary Dance Feels Stiff at First and Where to Release Tension

When you learn a contemporary dance combination, one of the most common challenges is learning to move in the quality, which can leave the body feeling stiff and tight. Contemporary dance phrases are often made of lots of qualities that require contraction and release, weight shifts, soft bends and fluid continuity. When you’re focusing on learning something new, your effort can become unfocused and diffuse globally. So, you may have a locked elbow, lifted shoulders, stiffened torso, held breath and tensed hands.

This type of stiffness can result from a few common problems: bracing, tensioning, holding and controlling your body too much, and placing your limbs separately in the space rather than allowing them to move freely. Here are a couple of awareness drills to help:

First, start by lifting your shoulders up to your ears and release them down. Feel the placement where they want to be when they are not being pulled up. From there, lift your arms up and out slowly. Are your shoulders creeping up and back down as you lower your arms? Try the same movement, but shorten the length of the motion to make sure your neck isn’t compensating and using too much energy. This will help you feel the range of motion and placement necessary for the shoulder to maintain control without using too much energy.

Next, work with the torso by bending in and releasing or by contracting and releasing with soft knees. This will help you understand the energy of contraction/release or bending and releasing and how the rib cage, pelvis and spine are working together. Add in a weight shift or two in one plane to feel where the energy is coming from. This is important because you won’t be distracted by multiple traveling steps, complex arm movements, the tempo of the music, etc.

Finally, mark the dance slowly and take a close look at the areas where you usually hold tension or brace. How free are your hands? Or your jaw? Do your knees bend? Can you feel the muscles tightening up when you shouldn’t need to? The mirror in the studio can help, but it’s also important to tune in to your body and feel where your muscles are tensing up or where your movement is stopping abruptly rather than flowing freely. It’s important to feel the flow of energy through your arms so you can understand your arm pathways and how your body transfers that energy, which is another common stiffness problem. If you can feel the energy traveling through your body and your joints working freely rather than just replicating the shape, you’re on the right track.

While you mark the dance, think about the quality of each movement and whether they are big or small. This is where you can use some energy. When does the music or the choreography require that strong beat? Are there times where you should relax? This can help you understand what type of energy to use and where you’re tense when you really shouldn’t be.

You can also go through the dance with specific body parts: move the neck loosely in the dance, bend your knees when it feels appropriate, release your hands or tense them when it’s necessary, contract your torso without clenching your hands, etc. Again, it’s not about being completely loose, since you still want to engage, be in control and have support in your dancing. However, you can tense your feet in order to be grounded and balanced and release the energy in your shoulders, or you can release your hands to soften your contraction.

These types of awareness exercises are helpful because when you’re learning a combination, it’s easy to want to run the combo again and again. However, if you’re still tensed and tight, you aren’t going to fix the problem. Slowing down and tuning into your dancing and isolating the tension areas will help you understand exactly what’s going on and work more productively.