The Story of a Dance Choreography of “Pasaka Festival”: The Creative Process

Abstract

Dance choreography is one of the most challenging and exciting works of a choreographer.
Understanding various actual and historical facts and motivations are some of the few things to learn to create
a dance. Pasaka Festival exists since 1992 depicting the livelihood and religious belief of the participants.
However, many dance interpretations/choreograph made in the past about the festival, which the
ethnographer/choreographer observed that this variation of dance choreography defeats the real portrayal of
the festival interpretations and rituals. This study utilized an ethnographic-phenomenological type of inquiry
and observation. The researcher/ethnographer is a teacher and at the same time lived in the locality where the
research setting conducted. Thisstudy was participated by some selected dancers of Pasaka Festival, the Town
Mayor, Oldest Local in town, and dance experts to critique the dance choreography. Results revealed that
emerging themes were developed such as the creative process, the music, the props, the choreography, and
the costume design. Understanding the origin and the observation of an actual setting greatly helped the
creation of the dance like the Pasaka Festival. This creative process helped the Town realized the root of their
history through dance taken from the artifacts showing religious and livelihood of the participants.