I’ve seen ballroom dancing competitions on TV where couples would be called off the dance floor by the sitting judges. In Singapore, I’ve heard of the All-Babes Cineleisure Dance (ABCD) Battle in which I suppose dancers battle on stage where they will be judged by either actual judges or the crowd’s cheers.
But a dance-off for contemporary dancers?
While The Royal Dance Off holds competitions where dancers battle with each other, albeit not exactly at the same time, and judges determine who moves on to the next round too. Yet, Paradigm Shift: a contemporary dance battle leaps over conventions.
Two dancers face off each other in a box, and to move on to the next round the dancer must manage to outshine his or her opponent. The audience decides who gets to the semi-finals. In deciding the winner, a panel of five judges decides who is the victor. Its structure is free-form, there are no exact rules. The crowd have given support so such a diverse cast of dancers. Anything goes.
Paradigm Shift is the brainchild of Hwa Wei-An, a company dancer of Frontier Danceland. ‘It is time to remember why we dance. To remember what moves us. To relive the moments when we were first inspired to point our feet or spin on our heads or fly through the air in a grand jeté or backflip’ reads the details section of Paradigm Shift's Facebook event page. ‘Paradigm Shift is about reconnecting contemporary dance to these reasons for moving. Come to show-off; come to enjoy the music; come to have fun and fool around; come to share your dance in conversation with another person.’
From the morbid lyrics of heavy metal songs to the lighter side of things. The dancers let it loose in the battle. Some touch on absurdity: with Adele Goh turning into a fish and her opponent Zaihar using his hand to slice her open and eat her, all in good humour. Even the showcase by Wei-An, the other company dancers from Frontier Danceland, and two of the judges shared this fervent, quirky energy. The mood is infectious, everyone bobs to the music as they cheer, roaring to support all the dancers on the dance floor. It was like having a jam session in a dive bar, where everyone is having fun.
The DJ joins in the fun too. Somehow Wei-An smoothly integrates the more 'behind the scenes' role of the DJ, bringing him into the dance floor, rather than render him a total stranger to the people there. Avant garde morphs into Bossa Nova, jazz flows into classical; the music was also dancing that evening.
The breakout star? Ms Adele Goh, also a company dancer with Frontier Danceland. As her opponents create a world she makes it her own, drawing the other dancer and the audience into her movements. Her opponents are only too happy to join, finding the joy in all the madness.
It is with utter fascination as I witness people breaking out from their shells, getting comfortable with a total stranger, evolving their styles instantaneously into something completely out of their comfort zones (imagine dancing in silence for a battle).
As the battle boils down to the finals, it was less about fighting for victory, and more about moving with another person.Dancers learned from each other and made instant connections, dancing in tandem with each other. I'm also immensely happy to see the audience being so incredibly receptive of genres they know less about too.
I'm not sure where this will lead to, given the relative youth of Singapore's dance scene. Though in its first iteration it shows promise. It's free-form tests instantaneous creativity. If anything, it showcases the enthusiastic showmanship among the dancers in Singapore. However, there is much more left to explore.
What all of us have seen is in that studio was something close to magic. If it sets out to shift paradigms, perhaps it has already enough of a push.
You can view videos from that evening here, and photos from that evening here. You can also read about my thoughts on this post here.
If there are any facts that need to be clarified or amended, do email me at [email protected].
