- Joined
- Jun 21, 2003
There are other judged sports where artistry is a factor: Diving, Gymnastics, Children's Pagaents.
I have been thinking some more about the music factor, and this is what I came up with. What every successful spectator sport needs is an emotional hook to draw in the attention of the audience. Baseball is a very exciting sport to watch because a baseball game is packed solid with little emotional peaks and valleys, with crescendos and diminuendos, and occasionally a cymbal-crashing climax.
The base-runner leans off first base. Is the hit-and-run on? Here comes the pitch. The catcher has called for a pitch-out! The runner is dead meat! Horray for the home team!
Without that emotional commitment, it is just some overgrown boys hitting a ball with a stick.
In figure skating, never mind "artistry," I think the role of the music is to provide the setting for that kind of emotional commitment on the part of the audience.
Hongbo Zhao flings Xue Shen halfway across the rink -- OK.
Hongbo Zhao flings Xue Shen halfway across the rink to the achingly beautiful strains of Nessun Dorma -- not a dry eye in the house!
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