After 11 years in the making...
I am ready to share my new book with the world Teaching and Learning Dance Through Meaningful Gestures.
It is the crystallization of all that I've learned and taught through experimentation. It is what I consider essential in the training of a performer as well as a dancer, and how to teach movement and dance, distilled over 35 years as dance teacher, scholar, and pedagogue across 3 continents.
Teaching and Learning Dance through Meaningful Gestures
will be released on January 1st, 2025 on Amazon!
Teaching and Learning Dance Through Meaningful Gestures as a companion to my first book, Unveiling Motion and Emotion. My first book was a memoir in which I shared my experiences as a dance artist.
Teaching and Learning Dance Through Meaningful Gestures is a deeper exploration of training and artistic realization.
Teaching and Learning Dance Through Meaningful Gestures explores basic exercises, visualization exercises, active imagination, and artistic application. I explore how technique is a philosophy and a theory, and how the body is an instrument for expression.
Teaching in three languages—Spanish, English, and Italian—has had a profound effect on me: I have found clear explanations, metaphors, and stories that communicate my approach to training. I have written this book to foster dialogue and community between the three cultures that I have been a part of, to share the knowledge and experience I've gained over the past 35 years, and to advocate for thoughtful dance training. This text will be accompanied by Todd Carroll’s photographs to illustrate the book.
Why I’m Writing This Book
Someone asked me recently about this book. Why do I want to give away my secrets as a dance pedagogue for the past 35 years? My answer, I’m not giving away my secrets. There are no secrets. Knowledge needs to be shared. My job is to spread the word so that more people are happy, fewer people suffer injuries, and the dance field advances.
I feel that a strong foundation in technical and artistic education as a dancer and/or performer is the prerequisite to becoming a professional. As a dancer/performer, you must know your tools. A sculptor must have a profound knowledge of her materials, such as clay, to be able to manipulate and create with it. If you are a painter you understand color theory at a deep level. You need to know fundamental things about your medium in order to develop your technique. This is not a secret.
Over the years, many of my students around the world have asked me to record my exercises and make them available as online videos or voice recordings. I decided to write a book instead because I want to share underlying principles and fundamentals. This way readers can develop their own methodologies and exercises using their own creativity! I feel strongly that art education must provide tools for people to be independent thinkers.
Creative Team:
Writer: Anabella Lenzu
Photography: Todd Carroll
Editor: Christina Graybard
Illustrations: Rathi Varma
Graphic Designer: Isabel Webre
Promotion and Distribution: Gianna Guzzo
“Ms. Lenzu is a deeply knowledgeable and sensitive educator to the many colors that make artists who they are capable of becoming. This book is a wonderful resource exploring her many years of pedagogical study and should be shared to give voice to this vibrant artistic journey.”
“Anabella’s insightful, deep-in-detail, and masterful new book equips dancers and dance educators with a wealth of practical knowledge.
Her methods are not just precise, concise, and valuable, but also practical, providing a clear direction that is an essential tool for success in any teaching art form.”
“Teaching and Learning Dance Through Meaningful Gestures” is both instructive and inspirational. Lenzu generously shares her insights into dance pedagogy honed over 30 years of dancing, teaching, and choreographing. The book is a most powerful teaching guide and deep dive into the choreographic process that will aid students and teachers alike.”
“Rarely do I read a book that is in total alignment with my own values and philosophies as a dance educator. Teaching and Learning Dance Through Meaningful Gestures by Anabella Lenzu is that book, thoughtfully challenging old modalities of training so dance educators can meet the educational needs of students training in dance with a more humanistic and holistic approach. Through years of experience, Ms. Lenzu offers a new way forward for dance, one that honors traditional methods of training, while simultaneously inviting educators to introduce new methods that address not just the body, but the mind and spirit, in an effort to further unlock the potential and humanity of dancers today. I wholeheartedly recommend this book to any dance educators looking to bring their teaching practice into the 21st century and beyond. ”