Elemental Dance - Elemental Music

Translated by Margaret Murray. In 1924 Dorothee Gunther and Carl Orff founded a School for Gymnastics and Dance whose influence unfolded between the Weimar Republic and the end of the Second World War. In this book seven authors present the entire dance, musical, pedagogical and historical aspects of this school in which Carl Orff's idea of Elementary Music took shape. A comprehensive documentation section comprises articles by Gunther and Orff from the 1920s and 30s, reviews of artistic and educational work as well as largely unpublished photographs. Out of this there emerges a multifaceted and lively picture of a great approach to the art of dancing and an improvisatory music practice, arising out of the kindred collaboration between the dancer Maja Lex and the musician Gunild Keetman. Michael Kugler, born 1942 in Munich, studied Musicology and School Music. After five years teaching in a high school he moved in 1973 to a lectureship at Munich University and since 1994 has taught Music Pedagogy privately. He has published articles on Afro-American music, rhythmics, Orff-Schulwerk, and elemental music and movement education.