Running choreography and routine technique exercises is a necessary part of training, but you should also craft your lessons to cultivate something deeper within your students—an instinctual trust of their bodies that allows them to release tension, loosen their minds, and live more freely within movement. 

Through an intentional practice, help your dancers develop their mind-body connection and build the skill of muscle memory, the act of the body understanding what it has to do without the dancer’s conscious thought. This will undoubtedly expand dancers’ possibilities as artists and set them up with confidence as they move into a fast-paced industry. 

Building the Skill

Building muscle memory takes determination, clarity, and focus. With her students, Kristen J. Lee, the dance program coordinator and an adjunct professor at Hofstra University, tries to dispel the idea that this simply refers to a laid-back rinse-and-repeat of moves so they become second nature. Remember most importantly that it’s not about the quantity of repetition, it’s about the quality of the work behind it.“It’s the body actively listening to how your muscles are in relationship to rhythm, environment, and sensation,” she says. Whether you’re leading a technique class or a choreography rehearsal, start repetitions of the basics slowly, focusing on correct alignment and sequencing, and then increase complexity over time. 

Continue to help your dancers find new ways of retaining information. “Notice what [their] body naturally connects with first—rhythm, pattern, direction, sound, counts— then, instead of always relying on that, invite in other pathways to keep [their] brain-body connection alive and flexible,” suggests Lee. It helps to use vivid imagery while describing particular aspects of a step or posture, allowing the dancer to picture their body in a more visceral way. Avoid cueing too sharply, and instead ask them questions about how something feels inside, and encourage them to give a descriptive answer.

You can also discuss mental practices that will activate neural pathways to help establish physical retention. Melissa Hunter McCann is currently the dance captain and a swing at Moulin Rouge! The Musical on Broadway. As a performer who doesn’t get to be onstage every day, she finds that visualization can be hugely beneficial in maintaining her muscle memory. “Thinking your way through your choreography or tracks and visualizing how you are going to do it helps when repetition might not be on your side,” she says. “You don’t always have to be physically doing the steps. The mind-body connection in dance is stronger than you may realize.” Encourage your dancers to think about the details of their technique and choreography often, even outside of the studio. They can intertwine this practice with other parts of their day, while they’re riding in the car or walking through the hallways at school, for instance. 

Just remember that it’s important for all parties to go through this process with sharp intention; otherwise a dancer’s body, especially a young one, can end up calcifying incorrect techniques that become difficult to undo. As a teacher, take note of what habits a student might have already unknowingly embedded into their muscle memory. That “can illuminate imbalances or other habits that are not serving their bodies long-term,” Lee says. 

In order to relearn new patterns, rooted muscle memory needs to be interrupted and then rebuilt correctly. Approach this with patience and always explain to your dancer why something needs to be adjusted. “It’s imperative that young dancers remain receptive to relearning basic movement principles and be open-minded to different perspectives,” Lee comments. “When movement feels ingrained, small shifts can sometimes seem overwhelming, but when a dancer can remain malleable and not too habitually locked, that’s where growth happens.”

The Payoff

Emphasize to your students that training their muscle memory will help free themselves of focusing on the logistics of how to perform a certain movement or sequence, then opening up space and energy for their real artistry to thrive.

In her role as Moulin Rouge’s dance captain, McCann sees how this skill applies in the professional world. It’s her responsibility to teach new cast members the show’s fiery choreography, and she relies heavily on the dancers having a strong sense of muscle memory that allows them to learn and retain steps quickly. That way, rehearsals can be efficient, and the emphasis can be on the qualities that make a performance shine. “Muscle memory is your strong foundation, the blueprint.” she says. “Once that’s established, picking up choreography is less challenging, and you can then layer in your stylistic choices, musicality, different textures, nuances, and acting beats.” This is when dancers feel and look their strongest, because they’re able to release the fear of imperfection and trust their bodies to remember what they’ve learned over the years.

Cultivating your students’ trust in what’s happening physically and mentally while they’re dancing will help them move into different spaces and styles with less fear. Niki Saludez, an original dancer in Hell’s Kitchen on Broadway and a teacher of weekly Street Styles classes at Broadway Dance Center in New York City, has relied on his ingrained, unconscious sense of technique to carry him through the industry and stay adaptable: “I’ve always thought that a practice of consistent and thoughtful repetition, whether it’s street-dance foundations or ballet, allows you to have confidence while learning new material because you already have something established to pull from. It gives you an inherent understanding of how to approach a move that seems foreign.” Choreographers are always eager to find dancers who can not only grasp their movement quickly, but, as Saludez points out, “are already able to contribute their own perspectives.”