Spirit of Competition
Although the highest scoring dancers are ranked according to their overall scores, dance schools and competition production companies emphasize that dancers are primarily competing against themselves, and thus competitive dance is not so much about competing, but rather is an opportunity to:
- Receive valuable critiques from dance professionals. Competition companies provide original judges' scoresheets and critiques and, in some cases, audio recordings of judges' comments to dancers, to help them improve their technique and routines.
- Watch and learn from other dancers. Dance schools often instruct their dancer to spend their free time watching other routines.
Dancers are expected to conform to proper etiquette at competitions. They are expected to be courteous to each other, to applaud other routines, to not enter or exit the auditorium during a performance, etc. Aside from these standard rules of etiquette, many competition companies impose additional rules. For example, American Dance Awards requires all dancers to say "thank-you" when presented with an award.
Read more about this topic: Competitive Dance
Famous quotes containing the words spirit of, spirit and/or competition:
“Facts as facts do not always create a spirit of reality, because reality is a spirit.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“Oh! thou clear spirit of clear fire, whom on these seas I as Persian once did worship, till in the sacramental act so burned by thee, that to this hour I bear the scar; I now know thee, thou clear spirit, and I now know that thy right worship is defiance. To neither love nor reverence wilt thou be kind; and e’en for hate thou canst but kill; and all are killed. No fearless fool now fronts thee.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Like many businessmen of genius he learned that free competition was wasteful, monopoly efficient. And so he simply set about achieving that efficient monopoly.”
—Mario Puzo (b. 1920)