[originaltext] By the late 1800’s, ballet had lost a lot of its popularity.

By the late 1800’s, ballet had lost a lot of its popularity. Most of the ballet dancers who performed in the United States were brought over from Europe. (26) They performed using the rigid techniques that had been passed down through the centuries. Audiences and dancers in the United States were eager for their own contemporary form and so around 1900 dancers created one. So how was this modern dance so different from classical ballet? (27)Most notably, it wasn’t carefully designed. Instead the dance depended on free personal expression of the dancers. Music and theory were of little importance to the modern dance. And lightness of movement wasn’t important either. Even the modern ballet appeals to audiences; many dance critics were less enthusiastic about the performances: (28) They questioned the artistic value of works that had no formal structure. Loi Fore, after performing fire dance, was described as doing little more than turning around and around. Yet the free personal expression of the pioneer dancers is the basis of the controlled freedom of modern dance today.