More Information about and History of the Friday Night Workshop

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The Group Motion Workshop (GMW) originated in 1971 in a rehearsal session with the GM dance company led by the verbal instructions of Brigitta Herrmann and in interaction with live improvised acoustic and electronic music by Manfred Fischbeck and other musicians.  

 

A specific series of movement patterns and qualities emerged as blueprint to lead participants into a practice of  highly refined structures of improvisation, movement meditation, and contact dance, which offer a space for interactivity, play, and communication that is spontaneous, deep, and direct, allowing for new channels of creative potential to open.

 

Conducted regularly on Friday nights in Philadelphia for over 50 years the workshop has also toured to festivals, dance centers, colleges and schools in the US and abroad countries,  including Japan, Taiwan, Argentina, Germany, France, Poland, Lithuania, Cyprus, Bermuda, and Barbados. It has reached thousands of people: women, men and children from a spectrum of diverse ethnic and social backgrounds. A Teacher’s Training was initiated in 1998 and has led to the formation of Satellite Workshops and devoted facilitators including in Arden, Delaware; Wayne, Pennsylvania; Rennes, France; and Berlin, Germany. 

 

GMW serves as a resource for creative and authentic expression through movement and sound and can be utilized as a practice for all levels of experience, (dancers and non-dancers alike) embracing all backgrounds and all ages it creates a ritual space for building community. It offers a powerful dimension of mutual learning, exchange of movement information, and integration of body, mind, and spirit. Compositions and choreographic patterns can be spontaneously created and experienced in ways of playing, and discovering individually and collectively. 

 

Implying that dance is a language that anyone can speak and understand, over decades the GMW evolved and was modified and informed by Brigitta’s performance practice, her studies in holistic healing practices, Dance/Movement Therapy, and Somatic Psychology, and by Manfred’s contributions of company performances, touring work, and teaching at the University of the Arts and the University of Pennsylvania. More information about these additional locations here.

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