Jaques-Dalcroze
ORDERBY-NAME: Jaques-Dalcroze, Emile
OTHER-NAME: Emile-Henri Jaques
BIRTH: 6 July 1865; Vienna, Austria
DEATH: 1 July 1950; Geneva, Switzerland
CATEGORY: Performing Arts & Sports
DISCIPLINE: Music Composition; Music Education; Rhythmic Dance
ASSESSMENT: Jaques is internationally known as the creator of a rhythmic dance movement now referred to as “eurythmics”
LANGUAGE: French; German
EDUCATION: Conservatoire de Musique (1877-1883)
ACHIEVEMENTS: Developed an approach to musical education now known as “Dalcroze eurhythmics”, which involved movement of the entire body; Composed music for orchestra, chamber orchestra, and piano; Composed music dramas; operas; choral works; Composed nearly 1700 songs; Wrote many books related to teaching; Created a school in Hellerau, Germany where ear training, keyboard improvisation, music theory and practice, rhythmic gymnastics, Swedish gymnastics, dance, and anatomy were taught.
MAJOR-WORK: operas - Riquet a la houppe (1883); Onkel Dazumal (1905); Les Jumeaux de Bergame (1908); Sancho Panca (1897). Writings - Le Coeur chante: Impressions d’un musicien, (Geneva, Switzerland, 1900); Vorschlage zur Reform des musikalischen Schulunterrichts, (Zurich, Switzerland, 1905); La respiration et l’innervation musculaire, (Paris, France, 1906); The Jaques-Dalcroze Method of Eurythmics, H.W. Gray (New York, NY, 1920)
PARENTS: Jules-Louis; Julie Jaques
SPOUSE: none
SIBLINGS: (one sister)
CHILDREN: none
DETAILS: Emile Jaques-Dalcroze believed the human body was the original instrument. This philosophy led him to develop a physical method of responding to music. He trained students in the use of their bodies to improve their intellectual understanding of and ability to perform music.
Jaques-Dalcroze understood “le sens musculaire” (i.e. the sixth sense, or kinaesthetic sense as it is called today) to be the unconscious controlling force behind multiple qualities of human movement. Emile did not equate his movements with “dance”; he referred to the movements which included skipping, lunging, and pulling a partner as “rhythmic gymnastics”.
As a child he and his sister were introduced to music, theater and opera by their parents. After moving from Vienna to Geneva, Emile enrolled in the Conservatoire de Musique, where he studied for six years. After that, in Vienna, Paris, and Algiers he studied with individuals, including <studied under> Bruckner*. It was during his one season in Algiers that North African music inspired his interest in human movement and its relation to rhythm.
During his early 20s, Emile changed his name to Emile Jaques-Dalcroze. It has been suggested he did this so as not to be confused with a French polka composer of his era. It was at this time his career as a composer began. Inspired by Swiss folk music, he composed a wide array of pieces from music for orchestras, to music dramas, operas, and approximately 1,700 songs. Jaques-Dalcroze was described as being highly imaginative. In addition to composing, he was drawn to teaching.
When he was only in his mid-twenties, Emile accepted a position as “Professor of Harmony” at the Conservatoire de Musique de Geneve. He taught there for 18 years, and it was at the Conservatoire where he developed the rhythmic gymnastics which made him world-famous.
Jaques-Dalcroze explored different movements with his students, ultimately trying to find better ways for his music students to hear and spontaneously respond to music. Together, they progressed from musical basics such as singing and breathing to more elaborate expressions which included movements such as carrying imaginary weights and making cannons. Students used imagination, body awareness, and cooperation with each other in carrying out the rhythmic gymnastics led by Professor Jaques-Dalcroze.
Breathing and walking were two essential elements to Emile’s rhythmic philosophies. His instruction included many breathing exercises which helped his students get in touch with the energy of their breathing. He also utilized alternating light and heavy walking steps.
Students’ movements were sometimes done in groups and included imaginative thought as well. For example, Emile would have the pupils imagine they were resisting a piece of elastic while moving. He had been an acting student at the Comedie Francaise, and this training contributed to his imaginative teaching style. Jaques-Dalcroze also studied the natural movements: running, skipping and jumping, in addition to walking and breathing.
Jaques-Dalcroze also recognized social and cultural aspects of human motion. He believed given artistic movements are all cultural products of their time, reflecting social and environmental conditions of a nation and that a community’s mental condition can be revealed through their music and movement. He believed each country had its own rhythm, and that rhythm and music were the basis of human emotion. He emphasized music as the most powerful means of education. He encouraged a strong mind/body connection and felt rhythm was the means to bring them together.
To publicize his work, Jaques-Dalcroze traveled throughout Europe and North Africa giving lectures. In addition, his: Methode Jaques-Dalcroze was published in both German and French.
Emile wanted to teach rhythmic gymnastics at the conservatory, but they refused to allow him to do so. This drove Jaques-Dalcroze to open his own school. In 1910, he opened a training college in Hellerau, Germany called “Bildungsanstalt Jaques-Dalcroze”.
He directed this progressive school for four years and hundreds of teachers and professional students enjoyed ear training (“solfege”), rhythmic gymnastics, keyboard improvisation, music theory, anatomy, and advanced music-movement study, known as “plastique.”
Many of Emile’s students there went on to become prominent musicians, dancers, and actors. These included dancer Marie <taught> Rambert*, who worked with <taught> Nijinsky*. Two American dancers influenced by Emile’s rhythmic gymnastics were Doris Humphrey and Ruth St. Denis. Wherever they performed and taught, these prominent artists helped spread his new movement principles throughout North America and Europe.
Jaques-Dalcroze’s approach to movement came to be known as “eurhythmics”, defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as “the art of harmonious bodily movement especially through expressive timed movements in response to improvised music.”
Eurhythmics does not have rules and thus is not technically considered to be a “method”. Jaques-Dalcroze considered it to be more of an experience, and felt it was necessary for one to have personal experience with it in order to understand it.
He did not have strict instructions for pupils to follow; rather, he provided only suggestions and guidance. Emile taught students to know their own selves first and employ all their faculties when practicing music and movement. He believed joy was also a necessary element in music education in order for students to learn most effectively. To this end, he referred to his exercises as “games”.
World War I broke out in 1914 and Emile Jaques-Dalcroze openly criticized the German military. He closed his school and moved to Switzerland. In Geneva, he opened yet another school, Institut Jaques-Dalcroze. He taught there until his death in 1950. Eventually the Institut became state-supported, and still today Emile Jaques-Dalcroze’s influence is felt, as the school continues to educate international students in his method of music education.
EXTRA CONNECTIONS: None
ONELINER; Emile Jaques-Delcroze, who started eurhythmics
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2003. Retrieved October 28, 2003, from http://www.galenet.com.
Encyclopedia of World Biography, 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale Research, 1998.
Juntunen, Marja-Leena and Westerlund, Heidi, “Digging Dalcroze, or, Dissolving the Mind-Body Dualism: philosophical and practical remarks on the musical body in action”. Music Education Research, Sept 2001, Vol. 3 Issue 2 p.203-215. (AN 5392964) Academic Search Elite, EBSCOhost.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online. Retrieved October 28, 2003, from http://www.merriamwebster.com.