Contemporary has no fixed style — it blends ballet, modern and jazz into one language. What that actually means for how you get started.
"Is contemporary basically ballet, modern, or just… dancing with feeling?" The honest answer: contemporary has no fixed style — and that's exactly the point. Unlike classical ballet or ballroom dance, there is no single contemporary "school" with a defined set of steps.
Contemporary dance is a melting pot: it blends elements from ballet, modern dance, jazz and lyrical into its own movement language. The big difference to modern dance: modern is codified — techniques like Graham or Cunningham have fixed rules for body placement and movement quality. Contemporary stays deliberately open.
You notice this immediately in class: a lot of contemporary choreography grows out of improvisation, not preset step sequences. So you won't just copy movements, you'll find your own from day one. That makes the start unfamiliar, but also honestly freeing — there's no "wrong stance" the way there is in a ballet position.
What you still need: a solid technical base. Contemporary looks free but demands high-level body control, strength and flexibility — just without ballet's tight formal vocabulary.
Train Smart. Play Hard. — in contemporary that means: learn the tools first (contraction, falling, floor work), then build your own movement language with them.
Contemporary developed as an evolution of modern dance, which itself emerged in the early 1900s as a reaction against strict ballet. Where modern pioneers like Martha Graham or Merce Cunningham built their own named techniques with fixed rules, contemporary, as the younger movement, stayed deliberately undogmatic.
Modern is codified — fixed techniques (Graham, Cunningham, Limón) with clear principles. Jazz brings syncopated rhythms and more energy, originally from African American social dances. Lyrical almost always tells a story through the music, with flowing lines and a strong emotional focus. Contemporary borrows a bit from all of them but stays more open and technically demanding than lyrical.
Ballet works with turnout, stretched lines and vertical alignment. Contemporary deliberately breaks that: contraction, floor work and off-balance moments are core. Dancers coming from ballet often first have to learn to fold the center inward instead of stretching it out.
A typical class starts with somatic warm-up (body awareness rather than pure stretching), moves through floor work into the space, and often ends with an improvised or semi-improvised phrase. There's rarely a single "correct" execution — the teacher gives impulses, you interpret.
Contemporary looks free but isn't a free pass for sloppy technique. The best contemporary dancers often have classical or modern training behind them. As a beginner you build that foundation alongside the free movement.
Because contemporary combines floor work, off-balance movement and contractions, a thorough, body-awareness-based warm-up matters more than pure stretching. Warm up your spine, wrists and ankles especially before you hit the floor.
In your first weeks, make sure your studio has a real Marley or sprung dance floor — hard floors without give noticeably raise injury risk during jumps and floor work.
In a trial class, ask specifically which technique the teacher draws on — Graham-, Cunningham- or release-based. That tells you more about the class's style than any website description.
And: watch one or two videos of company work before your first class (e.g. Nederlands Dans Theater or Akram Khan). You'll recognize the movement principles in class much faster once you know what to look for.
No. Modern dance is codified — techniques like Graham or Cunningham have fixed rules for body placement and movement. Contemporary developed later, combines elements from modern, ballet and jazz, and stays deliberately more open and undogmatic.
No, but it helps. Contemporary demands body control and strength at a ballet-like level but works with different principles — contraction instead of stretch, floor instead of pure verticality. Many studios offer contemporary explicitly for beginners with no prior experience.
Because a large part of the choreography has historically developed out of improvisation. That trains you from day one to find movement impulses yourself instead of just copying steps — a core skill that carries you through more advanced training later.
A real Marley or sprung floor with give. Contemporary combines jumps, floor work and falls — on a hard surface, injury risk for joints and spine rises noticeably.
Contraction & Release: Contemporary's Foundational Technique