Dancing to My Roots: Reviving Armenian Traditional Dance in Gyumri

Dancing to My Roots

The class takes place in the gym of School No. 30, from 7 pm to 9 pm, on Tuesdays and Saturdays. It’s early June, which in Gyumri means cold and cloudy with more than a hint of rain. In the gym, however, things are beginning to heat up. Twenty or so dancers of all ages, mostly female, have already assembled and warmed up with a slow, simple dance, and, as Davit calls everyone's attention, the class begins.

Preserving the Dance

Davit is the founder of the Hrayrq Traditional Dance Company, along with some of the other senior members of the company. They are in their early-mid thirties; most have jobs and careers that take place outside of dance (one of them being our own dear Larisa from BR), but Hrayrq wasn’t created as an amateurs’ get together; dancing for them isn’t a mere hobby.

During the Soviet Union, our traditional dances underwent changes that not only changed their appearance, but even their meaning; heavily influenced by Russian ballet, our dances increasingly became the province of dance studios, halls, concerts, and “special” groups, where they were practiced to be “performed”. However, in the villages where they originated, they died out little by little. Groups such as Hrayrq are intent on both preserving and bringing back to the public’s attention the original dances danced by our ancestors throughout the centuries.

As Davit says, each dance - which is danced both by the young and elder - had its purpose in the life of the community: one dance, such as Yarkhushta, was danced to strike fear out of the hearts of the young men as they faced one another and slammed their hands against each other, testing their strength and courage, and firing up their spirit before a battle; another dance incorporated the movements made by the women as they churned butter, swinging the խնոցի side to side.

“Every movement in our dances has been inspired by the movements our ancestors made working in the fields, working with the animals, churning butter - there’s no movement that’s unnatural to the body!” Davit declares, showing us a dance inspired by the villager’s movements as he pushes his plough.

“Our dances are never danced solo; our dances are meant to engage the entire community, to bind us to one another; it was a way for the community to come together and resolve all their conflicts, reconnect, and grow together.”

Davit’s Intensity

As the dancers start, Davit watches like a hawk, stopping the dance with a bark when displeased by what he sees. If you meet Davit in the street, you’ll meet a seemingly happy-go-lucky young man, always smiling, cracking jokes, and unprepossessing; this is not the same Davit in dance class.

Here, his powerful, muscular body is taut, like a bowstring about to fly; his voice is strident, his brows are furrowed, and from the very other end of the room you can feel his intensity; when he’s displeased, he’s not just angry - he’s positively wrathful!

It’s easy to become intimidated by his ferocious passion and painstaking attention, but his bark’s worse than his bite. Every time he stops and demands to know why we’re so unserious about our commitment to our culture, our dance, our homeland, since we’re unwilling to practice at home, the senior members patiently wait with a smile, exchanging a whisper with their neighbor (Artash immediately cracks a joke, Mamikon frowns, while Margarit loudly sighs and shakes her head with a twinkle in her eye); there’s a reason why Davit doesn’t yell at them: they’ve practiced, sweated, slipped and rehearsed to the point that when they dance, they appear as one body - each movement controlled, each gesture elegant, each jump and spring executed perfectly in sync.

You stand there, breathless in admiration or, in my case, limping alongside, but what appears as something already perfect and smooth is clearly wanting in Davit’s eyes.

“Էս ի՞նչ կընե՛ք”, he’ll demand the group, turning off the music as we falter to a halt. The younger members, especially beginners like me, stand there red-faced from exertion as he prowls the circle.

Learning as a Beginner

When it comes to beginners, they simply throw you into the water and say Swim. You’ll quickly find yourself linked arm-in-arm as you swing round in a circle, trying desperately to remember the steps, only to find out that what already appeared incomprehensible was merely the slow part - now comes the flying!

Of course, they don’t throw you into the deep end without a life vest; as you’re leaping inelegantly alongside the elegantly prancing mountain goats, an experienced member will be shouting in your ear - “Now left, now back, right foot here, left foot there - wait for the beat! There you go!”

I was quickly adopted by Margarit, a member from way back. She’ll grab my hand and, half-exasperated, half-amused, skillfully yank my body in time to the music as we dance. It’s tough love, but love nonetheless. She’ll spend time after class going over the same steps with me, laughing and showing off.

When she dances it’s like watching jello on strings perfectly executing kochari. She always has a wisecrack to throw back at Davit who loses his straight demeanor and cracks up, and often pranks a partner dancer - like me.

When I’ve grown too cocky (which basically happens anytime I remember any four consecutive steps correctly), she shouts out to Larisa, who usually dances on my right, and, together, these two ladies smash into me from either end like two hockey players.

Highly professional, dastardly mischievous, these ladies got your back even as they tease you for swaying your hips very unArmenian-like (an unexpected affliction of mine).

The Heritage of Dance

In the space of two months, attending just once a week, I’ve danced all kinds of dances from the different regions of the Armenian Highlands, each one with its own particular style, story and meaning.

For Davit, it's not enough that we learn the movements; he wants us to understand the heritage that comes with each dance.

What’s amazing is the incredible breadth of our dance style, and what’s breathtaking are the men and women of Hrayrq, shoulder to shoulder, dancing.

I’ve been to churches in Armenia that were seemingly untouched by time: they offer up a chance for you to experience for a moment another age, another world, but it’s only when I’ve watched Hrayrq dance, that I’ve actually felt time come to a full circle. These bodies recreate and reinhabit the same gestures, movements, and breaths that were danced by our ancestors thousands of years ago.

Time stops when they dance.

A Spiritual Endeavor

Today, Davit stops us and waits until we’ve gathered our breath, his eyes unblinking, focused somewhere else. When he begins to talk, he talks in almost a whisper, drawing our attention closer.

“There are two things that make our dances ours. The first is the spring in our steps. Every time we take a step, we need to make a spring with our knees, or else our dances become just a walking exercise.”

He demonstrates, dipping slightly his knee as he steps side by side. “Imagine there’s a string that pulls you down to the ground and then up to the sky every time you take a step. Show me.” We all step to our right, lightly bouncing our knees until Davit is satisfied. He motions us to stop.

“The second thing, and most important in our dances, is that we only ever dance in the vertical. In Armenian dances, we never sway our hips, or our bodies in such a way that suggests impropriety. Every culture has its expression, and within its culture, each expression has meaning.

In Arabic culture, belly-dancing was something reserved exclusively for the women: the bride-to-be would dance this dance for the groom’s mother as a way to show off her skills, her suitability for marriage; this was later taken by the British and transformed into burlesque. If you remove the expression from its culture, the dance from its community, it loses meaning.

In Latin culture, dance has a meaning and expression wholly different from ours. Not one single culture or dance is right, wrong, holy, or indecent as long as it is performed within its original meaning.

When we dance, we dance vertically and as a group; we only ever rise and fall, hand in hand. When we dance, we face the heavens; when we dance, it is a spiritual endeavor; when we dance, it is a communion with God.”