Hi to all,
Reading through some of the dance literature I have, I came across the following:
(Quote)
DYNAMICS
This term was first used in connection with ballroom dancing by H. St. John Rumsey. In his book, 'Ballroom Dancing Simplified', he fully described the science of force as applied to motion (definition of dynamics) in relation to the art of the ballroom.
In actual fact the dynamics of dancing supply the basis for practically every rule of technique which has ever been formulated.
(End of Quote)

date ? .. please

Walter Laird would have recognised and agreed with the statement.

From what I hear of Walter Laird he was really interested in the physics of dance. Apparently, he had some sort of scientific or engineering background - wonder what he did exactly ?


I too would be interested in the book but I imsagine it is probably out of print now.

Interested,

You may be interested in the following LINK.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/stories/66/a4165166.shtml

Thanks. I looked that up and enjoyed reading it very much.

I would really like to get my hands on that paper that was referred to within the feature. If anyoneone has a reference for it I would be interested.

Also if anyone has any details of any of Scrivener's articles and how to obtain them (I assume now of print ?) that would also be appreciated.

I believe the pre dominant theorist in the " physics " of dance was Scrivener.

Not only writing about it, it was also part of his daily teaching mantra .

I dont remember Walter being as specific as Len .

Walter was very technical and body " shape " oriented as i recall, whereas Len was more about the " dynamics " that produced movement for flight ( among the other important aspects )

"date ? .. please"

My guess would be around 1925, which pre-dates anything in my library.

Hi to all,
Thank you for showing an interest in my post. My 'quote' came from, 'The Ballroom Dancer's Handbook', by A.H.FRANKS, reprinted in 1944.

I found the following LINK to be very interesting regarding dance books.

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Parthenon/9101/bib/B11.html

Thanks for the link, luv2.

The list is very interesting. It seems to exclude Howard and Scrivener (but I could be mistaken).

jj