When my four-year-old daughter declared that she wanted to take part in her ballet school’s annual show this year, I confess that I tried my utmost to dissuade her (I know, bad mother: but I couldn’t face the driving to and fro for the daily rehearsals).
However, she insisted (see? good mother tactic: teaching the art of perseverance) and she promised utmost co-operation.
The result was that when she took to stage dressed as a cupcake – doing those little pirouettes – I couldn’t stop crying. So much so that I saw her whole performance through a blurry wet fog. And I vowed there and then that I would never ever roll my eyes at the thought of tying up another set of ballet shoe ribbons.
Ribbons, gelled buns, ballet shoes: this is all new to me; I have no concept of dance at all. I don’t think I even ever danced to the The Birdie Song. However, it seems I am not the only one lacking dance expertise: we are not a nation of dancers.
Last week, the National Statistics Office revealed that only 4,000 students – a mere one per cent of the nation – went to dance schools last year. Of these, 86 per cent were girls/women. Only 14 per cent were boys/men.
I am sure that historically as a nation, we haven’t always been so dance-deprived. I have this theory that that awful Żifna Maltija – that tedious ditty, which saw men and women in red forever exchanging scarves in slow motion – which was wheeled out and paraded at every national event throughout the 1970s and 1980s – spoiled our sense of Mediterranean music. Only now are we discovering that Maltese music was originally much more vibrant and the dances much more physical.
Historical accounts of everyday life in medieval Europe talk of copious amounts of dancing and singing going on. I’m sure Malta was no exception and people of all ages danced nearly every night.
On a Greek island, I had once stumbled across a village dance with about 200 islanders of all ages dancing in a huge circle. I’m sure this is what it must have been like here too, up to the time when we were colonised by those Puritan Brits.
Their lack of merriment and sheer snobbery were quick to take roots: up to a few years ago, even dancing at weddings was considered the ultimate pleb act.
To be sure, upper middle class weddings had live bands playing but it was deemed a ‘X’ħammallaġni!’ to God forbid tap your foot to their tune.
Thankfully this seems to be changing and people are easily persuaded out of their seats and on to their feet to dance the Zorba around the bride and groom.
This ‘puritan’ outlook did not just hit Malta. Barbara Ehrenreich in Dancing in the Streets, argues that ecstatic rituals, dancing, and merry-making are an innate human need, but have been systematically attacked by missionaries, governments and other anti-fun authorities over the past few centuries.
It is a pity, because, if you think about it, dance is a relief from the existence of work, work, work, which is stifling the life out of us.
Whereas in the past people would head to the village square for a spot of spontaneous dancing and interaction, today most of us can’t even take a step in the right direction.
If someone asks me to dance, I panic and bolt like a horse on a frozen lake. This nervousness is not a result of innate uselessness – it is a direct consequence of never having been taught how to dance. Consequently we have become too restrained and closed off.
This applies in particular to men. We have such a strong taboo about dancing men. To snap out of it, really, all we need to do is look at the Cuban ballet hunk Carlos Acosta – phwoar! – he has made ballet sexy and masculine even in the UK.
And think Argentina. A non-dancer girlfriend of mine who has been there still dreams of the tango dancehalls of Buenos Aires. She was “tangoed joyfully across the floor” by men who were so keen to impress with their dance prowess.
This is why I was keen for my daughter to join a ballet school. In truth, I think every school should, as part of the curriculum, have regular dancing lessons for boys and girls, so they grow up with the idea that dancing is fun.
For us older ones, there’s only one solution: we have to put on our dancing shoes and start shimmying and shaking. You too, reader.
Put down this paper and twirl your lady or your man round the kitchen and swing and laugh to the sound of samba.
krischetcuti@gmail.com