Jump Rhythm Technique^TM: Six Action-Ideas (Billy Siegenfeld, Copyright 2009)

In Jump Rhythm Technique, the goal is full-bodied rhythm-making – learning how to use the alignment concept of standing down straight to transform the moving body into an emotionally focused, rhythm-accurate percussion instrument. Six action-ideas move us toward this goal:

1. Being on the beat. This involves pulsing the body downward into the floor in equally timed intervals and in a quality of motion called swing-bounce. Full-bodied pulsing depends on relaxing all of the joints of the body and legs. Joint relaxation allows the upper body weights (the head, torso, and pelvis) to let go, fall through the legs and feet, and get grounded. Being grounded by standing down straight is a crucial first step in Jump Rhythm dancing -- it lets us feel the floor vibrate through our body each time we pulse against it. Because this floor contact gives immediate temporal feedback to our kinesthetic, tactile, and auditory senses, it tells us whether our body weights are falling on the beat.
2. Making clear rhythmic accents. This involves transforming the extremities of the body into drumbeaters. Drumbeaters make accents by striking against both actual and imaginary surfaces called drumheads. An actual drumhead is the floor. In tap dancing or step dancing, making rhythm involves striking the drumbeaters of the feet against the drumhead of the floor. Another actual drum- head is the body. In Patting Juba (or hambone), making rhythm involves striking the drumbeaters of the hands against the drumheads of the chest, thighs, and other body parts. The imaginary drumheads are the infinite number of spaces that surround the body. These, as well as the drumheads of the floor and body, are the surfaces that JRT’s four primary drumbeaters (the hands, head, and voice) and JRT’s secondary drumbeaters (the shoulders, elbows, hips, knees, and feet) play accents against.
3. Using the voice rhythmically. Vocalizing rhythm or scat-singing clarifies body-music in two ways. First, resonating sound through the voice box automatically engages the diaphragm. Engaging the diaphragm signals the pelvis to drop into its anatomically correct position. And dropping the pelvis allows the body to ground itself – as noted above, a necessary first condition for making full-bodied rhythms. Second, because the voice is a carrier of emotion and its sounds are felt inside the body, vocalization reinforces the expressive goal of dancing from the inside out.
4. Understanding musical concepts. This requires being able to analyze and embody concepts such as: note values (quarter notes, eighth notes, sixteenth notes); duple rhythm and triple rhythm; downbeats and offbeats; sharp (staccato) accents and explosive (sforzando) accents.
5. Understanding anatomical concepts. This involves learning about the bones of the skeleton; the muscles that move them; and how the skeleton’s architecture, when aligned according to the gravity-driven laws of nature, gives clues about how to move efficiently and injury-free using standing down straight as the basis of all alignment work. Jump Rhythm focuses the technical work on two bones in particular, the scapulas. Abducting one or the other scapula reinforces the idea of sidedness – directing the body weight toward the right side or the left side so that it can then drop downward through the arch of the right foot or left foot. Scapular abduction is nature’s way of grounding the body as it shifts from foot to foot. It is also Jump Rhythm’s way of anchor- ing the body weight through either the right or left foot at the moment of exploding an accent.
Expressing energy. The Jump Rhythm approach emphasizes learning to move by focusing on energy, and de-emphasizes learning to move by focusing on shape, or rearranging the body parts to conform to a particular “dancerly” or other idealized look. Learning how to use the drumbeaters to send energy out the body in precisely timed intervals is central to full-bodied rhythm-making.