English speakers use the term “belly dance” to describe solo, improvised dances from the Middle East and North Africa that feature intricate movements of the shoulders, chest, and hips. Where Did the Name “Belly Dance” Come From? It isn’t a…
Looking Back at the Russian Revolution 2017 marks the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution, which occurred in March and November (Gregorian calendar) in 1917. The pair of revolutions saw the disassembly of the Tsarist autocracy in favour of the…
An extract from The Edinburgh Festivals: Culture and Society in Post-war Britain by Angela Bartie On Sunday 24 August 1947, the first Edinburgh International Festival of Music and Drama opened with a service of praise in St Giles’ Cathedral, the…
In 1917, Erik Satie faced a spiritual dilemma—the challenge of giving voice to death, to nothingness. The composer had begun setting fragments of Plato’s narrative account of Socrates’s final days and death. Satie wanted the music to be ‘as white…
![‘Spanish Entree Performed by Mr Desnoyer’, Anthony L’Abbe, A New Collection of Dances [London, c.1725], plate 74, appearing in MONSIEUR DESNOYER, PART 1: 1721–1733, DOI: drs.2013.005969](https://euppublishingblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/spanish-dance.jpg)
Below is a beautiful illustration of ‘Spanish Entree Performed by Mr Desnoyer and choreographed by Anthony L’Abbe’. Full of jumps, turns and entrechats, a virtuoso vocabulary runs throughout the solo. Appearing in the article, “The Celebrated Monsieur Desnoyer, Part 1:…
“Dancers are experts in mental processes such as memory, timing and motor cognition, and the study of dance can provide insight into these basic processes…. At the same time, several changes in psychology and neuroscience, make dance a more attractive…