How to say dance in french
How to Say Dance in French
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Dance in French is Danse
Example Sentences
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Ma danse préférée, c'est le tango.
My favorite dance is the tango. Source
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Elle l'a regardé danser.
She watched him dance. Source
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Tu ne peux pas chanter et danser le Vendredi saint.
You can't sing and dance on Good Friday. Source
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Tom n'a jamais vu Mary danser.
Tom has never seen Mary dance. Source
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Elle dirige un studio de danse.
She runs a dance studio. Source
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La vie ne consiste pas à attendre que la tempête passe, elle consiste à apprendre à danser sous la pluie.
Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it's about learning to dance in the rain. Source
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Elle ne voulait pas danser avec moi.
She didn't want to dance with me. Source
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Vous savez que je ne danse pas.
You know I don't dance. Source
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Je veux que tu danses avec moi.
I want you to dance with me. Source
More Examples of
Dance in French-
Il y a un bal à la Maison française vendredi prochain.
There is a dance at the French House next Friday. Source
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Profitez de la soirée au bal.
Please enjoy yourself at the dance. Source
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Je me demandais si vous aimeriez aller au bal avec moi.
I was wondering if you would like to go to the dance with me? Source
Looking for something a bit more visual? Check out our infographic on Dance in French with example sentences and translations.
Useful Links
- Collins Dictionary
- Cambridge Dictionary
- WordReference
- Wiktionary
- Google Translate
- Tatoeba
- bab.la
- Glosbe
- Linguee
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Practice "Dance" and thousands of other words and phrases in French on Clozemaster!
| French for dance is the regular ER verb danser, covered here in all the tenses used in modern French. To powerfully embed like the French for dance - danser the employment of memory joggers like cartoon pictures showing a silly though memorable scene is extremely effectual. So, if you want to know how to say dance in French, how to express the verb in all the main tenses, here it is. The 6 Simple Tenses of the conjugated verbdanser - French for dance
The Verb Conjugating Tables below for danser, encourage you to practise your French verb drills both by PRONOUN (vertically), and by TENSE (horizontally). Keep doing these many times.
Present Indicative Tense conjugations ofdanser the French for danceprésent de l’indicatif je danse Imperfect Indicative Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for danceimparfait de l’indicatif je dansais Simple Past or Past Definite Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for dancepassé simple je dansai Future Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for dancefutur je danserai Conditional Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for danceconditionnel je danserais Present Subjunctive Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for danceprésent de subjonctif que je danse The Four Compound Tenses of the French for verbdanser - the verb ‘to dance’ in FrenchPast Participle ofdanser is:dansé -danced. 
Compound Past, Present Perfect or Past Indefinite Tense conjugations ofdanser - French for dancepassé composé
Here’s the French for dance conjugated with all the pronouns in the present perfect tense. Past Perfect Indicative or Pluperfect Tense conjugations ofdanser - dance in Frenchplus-que-parfait de l’indicatif
Here’s the French for -dance conjugated with all the pronouns in the past perfect tense. Future Perfect or Future Anterior Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for dancefutur antérieur j’aurai dansé Conditional Perfect Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for danceconditionnel passé j’aurais dansé Imperative Tense conjugations ofdanser, the French for danceimpératif danse Present Participle ofdanserdansant - dancing Menu of Conjugated French verbs like danser
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© Develope, batman jeté, tandu batman… French is the language of ballet
Wherever a dancer works, he will always find a common language with colleagues from other countries, and this language will be French! Demi-plie, batman jete, batman tandu, batman tan d yu jete, ron de jamb pa r ter,…… Stunningly beautiful words and no less beautiful movements! How did it happen that the French language and ballet, and with it all modern choreography, turned out to be inextricably linked? People have always danced, inventing an infinite number of movements. Dance is the most beautiful form of art in which creativity, pure aesthetics, physiology and psychology intersect. In a sense, the dance teacher from the fairy tale "Cinderella" was right: in any incomprehensible situation, dance!
History of ballet
Ballet originated from the dance culture of European nations.
The word ballo in Italian means to dance, and the verb ballare means to dance. It was in the traditions of Italian masquerades and folk festivals that the vocal and dance genres ballata and balletto were formed - recitation of poems and singing mixed with dancing. Balletto arrived in France from Italy with Catherine de Medici, who brought with her the fashion for theatrical performances and "gallant dances". Once in the luxurious halls of the French royal court, balletto has become more complex, elegant and has moved away from folk roots. The first court Ballet comique de la Reine (Queen's comic ballet) was staged in 1581 by the Italian Baldasare da Belgiojoso. Gradually, this genre naturalized in France and waited for its finest hour during the reign of Louis XIV. The young king participated in productions from the age of 13, and under him ballet became not just art and entertainment, but an instrument of politics and diplomacy.
For example, in view Ballet royal de la Nuit (Royal ballet of the night) the king performed six roles, the performance was performed seven times in front of a respectable audience, among which there were many foreign diplomats. The performance consisted of forty-five performances, in which allegorical, mythological, exotic and chivalrous subjects were interspersed with picturesque and comic scenes. At the end, the Dawn Star appeared, followed by Aurora and her retinue. And when the sun appeared, everyone parted, and Aurora proclaimed in verse: LE Soleil Suit C ’ EST LUUIS (The Sun, which follows me is Louis Young) . Then the king danced the grand ballet finale, accompanied by Honor, Grace, Love, Dignity, Victory, Fame, Justice and Glory0003 Louis XIV ET LA Mise EN SC è DU Pouvoir Absolu , Author of Gabriella Azaro, 2013).
Gradually, under the burden of state affairs, the Sun King left the stage, but the court ballet fulfilled its task: it created an “ideology” from the performance and, through the allegory of the victorious Sun, established in the collective consciousness the image of Louis XIV as an absolute monarch. Ballet was the king's greatest passion, and in 1661 Louis founded the Royal Academy of Dance, bringing the art form to a professional level. By the way, the Academy of Music appeared only eight years later.
The first serious classification of ballet terms was carried out by Raoul Auger Feuillet. In 1701, he published the work of Chor é ographie ART De é CRIRE DANSE (choreography or the art of describing the dance). which was given a description of all dance movements according to the method of dance teacher Pierre Beauchamps. Later this classification was improved by Pierre Rameau in work Ma î tre à danser (Dance Master, 1725) - This manual recorded all the basic steps and movements of classical dance still in use today.
They were named, of course, in French.
A decisive role in the establishment of French as the official language of dance belongs to the French Academy. She did her best to ensure that the vocabulary of classical dance, which was formed during Beauchamp's time and immediately after, remained practically intact in the French version.
The basic element and starting point of the dynamic part of the dance is the step, and this postulate has not changed since the time of Louis XIV. Each ballet step represents a certain sequence of movements, so all steps are carefully classified, cataloged and identified. The very word "step" in French sounds [pa] - pas , and, as if by magic, these two sounds launch a whole series of images from the world of pointe shoes and ballet tutus in the average person's brain - pas de deux, pas de trois . Who went to dance school in the course! When my daughter recounted what they did in the choreography, I was amazed at the abundance of French words.
Without knowing French, the young dancers diligently performed pas droit en avant, pa droit en arrière, pa sure and dedan, pa sure and deor . What do these magic words mean?
In the aforementioned book Choreographie ( 1701), Raoul Feuillé described and drew five positions of the position of the legs, which had been fixed a little earlier by the royal dancer and dance teacher Pierre Beauchamp. Based on these choreographic positions, all steps, movements, figures, pirouettes, jumps and revolutions are lined up to this day. Choreography is a very methodical and well-organized discipline, everything is thought out to the smallest detail, which allows you to decompose the dance into separate components. All movements are named perfectly simply, logically and compactly. Moreover, compactness is lost when trying to describe movements in another language. For example, develope (developp é) means a kind of batman - the working leg slides from the 5th position with the toe on the skating leg, rises to the knee, extends forward, sideways or back, and then drops to the 5th position.
And all this development! Below are a few more examples, but without detailed descriptions. avant [ ] 9Olo [assembly] jump with legs extended in the air or jump with landing on two legs0003
Battement Fondu [batman Fontya] Soft, smooth, “melting” movement
Battement Frapp [Batman Frappe] Movement with a blow, or shock traffic
Balanc é 9000 [Balan Swinging motion
Changement de pieds [changement de pied] Jump with change of legs in the air
Grand – grand
grand pli grand é 0004 Deep squatting
Grand Battement Jet é [Grand Batman Plie] Throwing foot to
Grand Fouette [Gran Fuete] 9000 soft, elastic plié in various movements
Frappé batman shape with knee bend; a quick kick with the foot of one leg on the ankle of the other leg with an accent “from oneself”
The word "fondue" is now known to all lovers of cheese, chocolate and French cuisine, in general.
It means "melted", which is quite recognizable from the description of the movement - soft, smooth, "melting". Whichever word you take from this or from another list of choreographic terms, they are all living words of the French language. And what are pas de chat worth [ pas de sha], i.e. cat step or pas ciseau [ pa Siso] , known as scissors . In fairness, it should be noted that separate Italian terms are used in classical dance, for example:
Adajio slow part of the dance.
Allegro [allegro] jumping
Arabesque [arabesque] flight pose, the name of the pose comes from the style of Arabic frescoes.
Even they came to all languages indirectly - through French. How did this process physically take place?
Development of ballet
French ballet was literally exported to the Russian Empire in the middle of the 19th century, when the choreographer Marius Petipa came to St.
Petersburg. Together with him came his art, methodology and terminological dictionary. Not everything went smoothly for the French dancer and choreographer - he saw ballet in his own way, refusing the format of "light entertainment" to which the public was accustomed. As the researchers write, at some point he was ready to retire, but unexpectedly the theater management decided on an experiment - to put the ballet to the music of a professional (not "ballet") composer. Thus began work on the fairy tale "Sleeping Beauty" together with P.I. Tchaikovsky. For its time, it was a pioneering work – brilliant music and brilliant staging strengthened each other without obscuring or competing. The audience was ecstatic! This was followed by The Nutcracker and, finally, Swan Lake. Did you know that Petipa is not the first director of Swan Lake? Twenty years before him, the choreographer Reisinger took up this ballet and ... failed. Now it's hard to believe it, but the fact is that the premiere of Swan Lake turned out to be a failure! Twenty years later, Petipa returned to this idea, believing that the perfect music of Tchaikovsky was ruined by the unsuccessful production of Reisinger.
Today, the Petipa-Ivanov version is considered classical and is danced all over the world! Experts say that it was Swan Lake staged by Petipa-Ivanov that marked the beginning of a new page in the history of Russian ballet, and from that moment on, imports turned into exports, which was greatly facilitated by historical events. After the revolution 19For 17 years, Russian dancers poured into the United States of America and the countries of Western Europe, bringing with them a wealth of knowledge and, of course, terminology. This is how ballet gradually developed throughout Europe - albeit far from the French capital and its influence, but using a French glossary.
French in the modern world of dance
Today, along with the Parisian school of classical dance, there are various stylistic models in the world, among which the Danish, Italian, Russian (Vaganova system), American and Cuban schools are considered the leading ones. In fact, the founders of classical ballet are the Italian and French schools, and despite the fact that they were influenced by the Vaganova system and certain Russian-language terms, the very vocabulary of the Paris Academy, which began to take shape under Louis XIV, managed to maintain its positions.
Even in the work "Fundamentals of Classical Dance" (1934), which formed the basis of her nominal system, choreographer A.Ya. Vaganova used French terms to describe the order of movements in the lesson in order to practice hands and coordinate movements. Exercise should start with plie, then ron de jamb par terre, batman fondue, batman frappe, ron de jamb en lair, petit batman, develope, grand batman jette . We can say, thanks to A.Ya. Vaganova's status of the French language was officially fixed in the Soviet ballet, as Latin was fixed in medicine or Italian in music. This happened in other countries as well. For example, when the great Italian dancer, choreographer and teacher Enrico Cecchetti, who danced on the stage of La Scala in his native Milan, at the Mariinsky Theater in St. his school in London at 19At 18, he taught the English using French terminology. From the point of view of language, this terminology was as foreign to him as it was to his students. But from the point of view of the dance, everything was clear, and this is the main thing!
At some point, a new phenomenon appeared in the world of classical dance: not knowing French made it difficult to master ballet terminology.
The point is not only in terms, but in the logic of the sequence of movements in training and in performance! If you understand the meaning of words développé, soutenu, en l'air , etc., it's much easier for you to remember them as terms. Given the processes of globalization in the modern world, English is increasingly entering this territory. For example, principal dancer or pointe shoes do not cut the ear at all in places far from Paris and France. From this, one could conclude that at the moment ballet speaks French exclusively in France, and the presence of French is directly proportional to the geographical and / or cultural proximity of the modern dance school to France. Music historian José Juan Pacheco Ramos ( JOS é Juan Pacheco Ramos , Universitat ILles , Spain ) conducted a study and explored these world -wide lords) classical dance.
Not always there are direct indications of the need to learn French, because the site is most often conceived as an advertising and marketing tool. And yet…
American Ballet Theater organizes, for example, Project Pli é to train dancers from disadvantaged social backgrounds who find it difficult to break through to the professional level. The Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet in St. Petersburg independently organizes French courses. Along with other schools such as John Neumeier's Hamburg Ballet, it offers a comprehensive, multi-year training program for dancers. José Juan Pacheco Ramos did not stop there, he studied the videos posted online by these and other groups to make sure that indeed, steps, movements and figures are still called as they were called at the dawn of ballet. Based on all the data obtained, the researcher concluded that most schools do not directly indicate the need to study French, while using the full arsenal of French-language terms, the rejection of which would lead to long descriptive constructions, as we could see for ourselves in the second part of this article.
Moreover, in our list, descriptive constructions are halved so as not to overload the reader's attention. List of schools and troupes visited by José Juan Pacheco Ramos:
- Royal Ballet, London, UK
- Academy of Russian Ballet A.Ya. Vaganova, St. Petersburg, RF
- Escuela Nacional de Ballet de Cuba, Havana, Cuba
- John Cranko School, Stuttgart, Germany
- Academy of Choreography at the Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow, RF
- A number of schools in Japan
- Houston Ballet Academy, Houston, Texas, USA
- Ellison Ballet School, New York, USA
- School of American Ballet, New York, USA
- Scuola di Ballo del Teatro alla Scala, Milan, Italy
The sites are usually presented in the language of the country, provided with an English version, and their purpose is to attract new students and present their productions. At the same time, French words were constantly encountered by the researcher at every step.
And this means that all over the globe from the USA to Japan, teachers and students, communicating with each other in the language of the country, use French terms to refer to ballet movements. And these terms have remained unchanged for more than three hundred years!
This article is based on research published in the journal Gerflint (Research Group for the Study of French as a Language of International Communication).
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Shall we dance?
What to do? / culture /
Author Ann Claire Delorme , publication date 28 May 2020, 16:11
© surachetkhamsuk / Adobe Stock — Five, six, seven, eight! We join the family choreography.
Not enough inspiration to keep the kids busy? While looking forward to your next holiday in France, let them discover the art of French dance! Travel through the history of ballet with the Paris Opera, experience hip-hop or develop your choreographic talent with the House of Dance in Lyon... We will take you behind the scenes of the dance, visiting the rooftops of the Opéra Garnier itself!
Experience the world of ballet with the Paris Opera
Voir cette publication sur Instagram
Une publication partagée par Opéra national de Paris (@operadeparis) le
What is the connection between electronic music and ballet? The answers are provided by Aria, the new digital platform of the Paris Opera (for mobile devices and tablets) - the perfect solution to get to know the art of choreography with the whole family! Videos, images or quizzes in French and English.
.. With the help of a chatbot, you will quickly become a know-it-all in the world of dance.
Do you want to know more about the world of ballet stars and dance school students? Slip behind the scenes through the films of the interactive "3rd Stage": here you can enjoy the arabesques of the ballet of atoms in the futuristic Palais Garnier or follow the ascension of a dancing couple from the basement of the Bastille Opera to the rooftops of Paris, because dancing is also a journey!
Aria Platform (External link)
Clinanem - 3rd scene (External link)
Ascension - 3rd scene (External link)
Learn Hip Hop with La Villette Park
Voir cette publication sur Instagram
Une publication partagée par La Villette (@la_villette) le
Are your kids itching to start playing ball with their friends again? Let them wait a little while watching the online hip-hop football lesson from La Villette Park! Raise your arms, make one and a half turns and sway to the beat - the "Ball in a Circle" tutorial from Murad Merzouki, a famous French hip-hop dancer, is so exciting that even adults will want to dance!
Finally, to hone your talents in anticipation of the ball games, don't miss the online concerts broadcast on Facebook by artists included in the La Villette program.
Your kids will have to sweat a lot!
Murad Merzouki's ball (External link)
La Villette (External link)
Become a choreographer with the Lyon Dance House
Voir cette publication sur Instagram
Une publication partagée par Numeridanse (@numeridanse) le
Shall we try on the image of a choreographer? This is exactly what My Dance Company offers, one of the video games (in French and English) available on the online platform Numeridanse , coordinated by the House of Dance of Lyon (External link) . This is a unique opportunity to master some of the intricacies of the art of choreography: the size of the stage, the location of the concert, the choice of movements.
