1 From Dance to Ballet

Whether in folk dance or as a ritual and religious act, dance is generally understood as movement to music. Rhythm is considered the conjoining element. The question of which practice has older origins is controversial: whether dance transfers the rhythm of music into the visual, or whether music draws from the bodily rhythm of dance and immaterializes it.^[1] Forms of dance reach back to the choric element in Greek theater and the ceremonies of Dionysian festivals. In Apollonian antiquity, music and dance were linked by rhythm, which had an ordering and stabilizing effect. Augustine mentions dance in De musica. He understands both art forms to be representations of a mathematically regulated divine world order. In the process of Christian theologization, the voice replaced the body as mediator in the liturgy. Word and image took precedence over physical-performative elements of devotional practice.^[2] In the Middle Ages, the level of melody was functionally subordinated to singing and dance in the lyrical genre of dance songs. Accompaniment by singing decreased, however, which led to a higher regard for instrumental dance music.