MMM Colours for Adults
The training system developed by Margaret Morris covers eleven levels, called Colours, which contain a carefully built up series of exercises developing at the higher levels into short dance pieces.
The eleven Colour grades are called:
BASIC (Royal Blue); WHITE; YELLOW; ORANGE; RED; LIGHT PINK; DARK PINK; CRIMSON; MAUVE; BLUE; GREEN
In addition, Jim Hastie created a special advanced Colour for performance only, called MAGENTA.
Each section of the syllabus in each Colour is devoted to a particular aspect of training; these are called:
Free Movement, Walking & Posture, Breathing, Opposition, Balance, Mobility, Continuity
In each section there are a number of exercises progressing in difficulty throughout the Colours. All exercises have a set piece of music, though the teacher is encouraged to use alternative music as and when required; and a matching breathing pattern. At all levels the development of creative expression is encouraged in a variety of ways, including improvisation and choreography. An assessment can be taken to progress to the next Colour.
MMM Health Play
Health Play is for the very young child, and as the name suggests offers a playful introduction to movement, music and creative expression. Through chosen pieces of music combined with movement sequences, the child's early artistic development is encouraged, together with the health aspect of mobility and control.
MMM Children's Grades
There are five Children's Grades for children of school age, up to approximately 15 years.
They are also characterised by colours:
Grade 1 - White, Grade 2 - Rose, Grade 3 - Turquoise, Grade 4 - Primrose, Grade 5 - Lilac.
The exercises encourage movement control, spatial awareness, imagination and expression, as well as physical development of the child's range of movement, and form a foundation for the adult work. They are also accompanied by a set piece of music, chosen by Margaret Morris. There is an optional sixth grade called Elementary (Royal Blue), which aims to build a bridge into the adult colour grades. Children are assessed to progress on to the next Grade.
MMM Dance Technique
Dance Technique was developed later, as a separate syllabus alongside the colour work for adults. Margaret Morris recognised that her professional dancers needed further advanced technique to be able to obtain work in the theatre. The enhanced demands of the dance technique exercises, of which four Grades are still taught today, form together with the adult colours a foundation for choreography of all kinds.
MM Movement Therapy
Margaret Morris's early work in dance training soon convinced her of the beneficial aspects to health of exercise and movement. Encouraged by positive resonance from doctors in London in 1925, and in Paris a year later, she began to develop a system of exercises based on medical principles to be used for work with post-hospital patients, the disabled, the elderly and those in nursing homes. She qualified as a physiotherapist in 1930 (as a member of the Chartered Society of Massage and Medical Gymnastics). Movement Therapy is today more than ever relevant for our ever-aging society and for all kinds of post-operative and medical conditions, and is taught currently in homes and centres for the elderly, for chair-based and disabled persons and for patients with conditions such as Parkinson's and dementia.