Synchronization: Metronomes and Dancers in Search of a Common Pulse
I like the premise behind this popular video "Synchronization." At first you'll see five metronomes on a table oscillating in a random fashion -- the pendulums are not moving in rhythm which each other because they are "uncoupled." They do not share a common pulse which directs them to move in a unified fashion.
But when the five metronomes are placed on a board that rests on two slightly rotating soda cans, they become coupled devices and the metronomes, after an adjustment period, become synchronized. It's this common pulse that creates the unified action.
In a 2000 New York Times Article, "Making Order Out of Chaos When a Crowd Goes Wild," Henry Fountain explores the sources of synchronization that reach back to 17th Century Dutch mathematician Christiaan Huygens who observed that pendulum clocks placed on the same wall would eventually find the same beat -- they were coupled together by vibrations transmitted through the wall. [via Networked Music Review]
This New York Times articles focuses on how randomness can become ordered. For example, why does clapping at the end of a performance start out in a haphazard fashion but evolve into synchronized clap in some instances? Researchers now have a scientific basis for understanding these transitions from chaos to order.
What I would like to find are choreographers and dancers who have incorporated these ideas into their dances. How do dancers intentionally go in and out of rhythmic synchronization and use the music or other sounds to eventually find a common pulse? And what types of coupling and uncoupling have been experimented with in choreographed and improvised dance performances?
