How do I break choreography into sections I can actually learn?
Cut on the music first — every eight counts — and then at the places the body changes state: a change of direction, a level change, a turn, a breath. Each section should be short enough to hold in your head as one shape, usually two to five seconds. Learn the sections, then learn the joins between them as if they were sections too.
Cut on the eights
Count the music. Almost all popular music phrases in eights, and choreographers set to those phrases, so the count one of each eight is a natural seam. Number the eights in the routine; a thirty-second piece is usually four to eight of them.
Then cut on the body
Inside an eight, look for the moment something changes: the weight travels the other way, you go down to the floor, you turn, the arms switch from small to big. Those moments are where a section wants to end. A section that contains one shape is learnable in a few runs; a section that contains three is not.
Rebuild with the joins
Learn section one, then two, then drill the last count of one into the first count of two ten times. That join is a section in its own right. When one-into-two is clean, add three the same way. Never run the whole thing until every join has been drilled; running it early rehearses the mistakes.
Step by step
- Count the music. Find the eights. Number them.
- Mark the changes. In each eight, note where direction, level or energy changes.
- Learn one section. Feet, then arms, until it runs without thought.
- Drill the join. Last count of one into first of the next, ten times.
- Add the next. Repeat until the whole piece is joined.