Do you think the horse is really dancing to the beat, or just doing what he's been trained to do? (Video)?

My guess is that the horse has been doing that for so many times he can’t make any more mistake. Or he just has a talent.

The horse is just frantically trying to delay being turned into sausages.
And the electroshock pads in its hooves.

He is a highly trained Dressage horse and he is performing his intricate training routine. Dressage is the highest form of equestrian discipline, and to get to this level is years in coming.

www.usdf.org/about/about-dressage/

I know what it is @Coloma. They spend years training them, from the time they are very small. It takes about a decade of training before they’re ready for show. But what I’m asking is, just like some people have a special talent for, say, dancing, does this particular dressage horse have a special talent that most horses don’t have? Can he actually step to the beat? Does he know this is what they really want him to do?

@Dutchess_III No, they do not train the horse to a particular song they choreograph the music to compliment the routine.

Yes, they played a compilation of several different songs that compliment each “trick.” I heard that. When my daughter was in gymnastics, they did the same thing. But she worked and worked to perfect her movements (“tricks” in gymnastics) to a particular compilation of songs. Are you saying the horse goes in to the competition and has no idea when the music is going to change, and, in this particular case, just mindlessly and accidentally, did his steps in perfect time with the music?

@Dutchess_III Well, not mindlessly, he is reacting to subtle cues from the rider, there are no accidents in a routine, only prompts. The horse has no idea when the music is going to change, it is the rider that is cueing him to per4form a certain gait, maneuver, side pass, “dance” move at all times.

Magnificent. Even swings the tail to the beat. A real lesson in patience, persistence, and performance. Thanks for sharing. A real pleasure.

I’ll be glad for the day when government funds are used to promote this level of exquisite taste to underprivileged children rather than a poverty inducing war machine.

It’s not much of a reach to believe he’s listening for the beat. I mean, we know birds bob their heads in time with music, no prompting or prior training needed. It’s a very simple task. Personally, I believe most animals are capable of much more sophisticated thought processes than this.

I hope he was trained in a force-free way. Very cool, if that’s the case.

@Coloma So you think they didn’t practice this routine, with that compilation of music, over and over and over and over before the competition? The horse went in cold, no idea what to expect? Really?

I saw a documentary on them @longgone. The horses are the most pampered domesticated animals on earth. They are selected according to their ability and intelligence when they’re very young. Only a very few actually make the cut. The horse and rider are together for life. So to answer your question, no force was used, ever. Without being able to talk to the horse, I“m pretty sure they love doing it.

We had a budgie that would always bob its head to the beat whenever music was played or performed in its presence. And it’s pretty well-known in the rural west that cattlemen would sing to the livestock they were driving, as well as to their horses to keep them calm during a trail drive.

@Dutchess_III The choreography and edits make every freestyle dressage exhibition unique.
The rider may choose music ahead of time but the horse is not actually listening to the music and anticipating, thinking about his moves. He is simply responding to his training routine and the music only enhances his movements.

Well, I guess you answered the question as I asked it.

However, I disagree that he is behaving mindlessly and robotically. I think they’ve practiced that routine, with that music, hundreds of times. I think the horse could pretty much do it without a rider.

@Dutchess_III Dressage, is the horse is responding to the rider. It is all very practiced and rehearsed. And quite lovely.

I understand what you guys are saying. But I think that particular horse may have taken it to an all new level on his own. No way of knowing, though, of course.

@Dutchess_III The rider/competitor picks the music they wish to use for each routine, it can be different every time. It is not like there is only one song for every competition for ever after. Infact in the dressage circles people get razzed for picking repetitive tunes like the Pirates of The Caribbean. haha
The horse is not going to perform it’s routine without prompting from it’s rider.

When it is not under saddle displaying it’s training it is just going to do regular horse things like stand around, graze and be lazy. Horse don’t “work” on their own, a cutting horse might cut a cow for a minute or two, a racehorse might run across it’s pasture and a dressage horse might perform a step or two of it’s training regime but horses do not work by themselves any more than a dog is going to perform it’s obedience routine all by itself.

@Dutchess_III Here is a wonderful clip of a Friesian horse in dressage.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3dZEocHGZ0

Man, they’re beautiful! Thanks @si3tech.

who cares about horses

We have a new Spanish Mustang here, his name is ‘Profe”, The Professor.
He is stunning. A coppery chestnut, he shines like a new penny in the sunlighjt.

Well, they are very smart horses. And the riders take pains to sit absolutely still because it’s the horse’s show, not his. (Or hers: on one occasion, Queen Elizabeth visited an English riding school and rode a horse while it did its routine.)

The horses are very smart. That’s one of the reasons they’re chosen. However, the riders are giving subtle cues to the horse, ones that we can’t really see. I saw a fascinating documentary on it once.

I’m looking for an article to support what you said, though. Can you give me some more details?

@Dutchess_III, I was raised here except there were no buildings then. The predominant form of entertainment was stacks of magazines, some up to fifteen years old. When I read the article about show horses, Q.E. was maybe 30–35 years old. That was 30 years before the internet was invented.There are no links and I have no idea where you might search for archives.

Why do you challenge every remark I post?

Quite frankly, you’re all kinda off base here. I am lifelong horse person and the horses are not of some above average horse IQ and the riders are not sitting there inert. Dressage training is an art, and the rider cues the horse in many instances, they are not just sitting there. Subtle leg cues, reining cues, posture, balance, many, hidden to the novice eye, cues.
It is about training methodology, unison between horse and rider and it doesn’t take an Einstein Equine to learn dressage.

Any breed of horse can be trained in dressage schooling but some breeds are preferable. Obviously a Clydessdale or other draft breed is not going to have the agility of a Warmblood but they could still learn the basic maneuvers, they just wouldn’t excel any more than a heavy set marathon runner.

@Coloma At last! Somebody with an opinion instead of a challenge!

Actually, you have it back wards. I am of the opinion that if a horse is trained to do certain steps to a certain sound track, and the horse practices dozens of times, he can do the steps without the trainer’s prompting, if he knows that’s what he’s expected to do. Coloma asserts that this is not true.
If you could have provided me with some documentation that the Queen rode a dressage horse, as a neutral rider, providing no prompts, that would have bolstered my opinions.
Therefore, it wasn’t a challenge, it was a request. If anyone were to challange your claim, it would be @Coloma, not me.

@Dutchess_III The horse could do the steps but my point is that the horse is not going to just start practicing his routine all by himself in his stall. He considers it work not fun.

I never suggested that he would ”... just start practicing his routine all by himself in his stall.” This brings us full circle, where we land back on the same page.

So back to my question. If the horse knows the steps, has them, and the music, thoroughly memorized, could one part of his brain be freed up to take it to another level, to recognize that there is a beat involved, that it shares the steps that his rider / trainer has taught him, and can take it to a level where he responds to the beat deliberately and directly, something which we humans call “dancing”? Because that is what the trainers ultimately want, in this case, is it not? Do some horses have that little “something something” that separates the very good from the GREAT? Like the horse in the video? What could that “something something” be?

From what I understand, the horses enjoy the “work,” just like race horses enjoy racing. Just like human athletes enjoy the competition, even though it is a lot of work. I sure did. If the horses don’t, they are culled. None of them are forced to do anything they don’t want to do.

@Dutchess_III The horse is trained, and like any athlete some will excel more than others based on ability, but the horse does not have the cognitive ability to predict the beat of the music all on his own. He may respond to a familiar song and anticipate the next move but animals do not possess extreme critical thinking skills like humans do. The fire horses of days past may have run to their places to be harnessed at the sound of an alarm but that was all conditioning. They weren’t standing around planning what they would do the next time the fore bells sounded. haha

What some horses have is called heart or willingness. To say a horse is willing means he responds well to his training and is a fast learner. The horses that are not excelling in their fields of discipline are not culled, some racehorses are yes, sadly, but most of the time they are re-purposed in a discipline they naturally excel at. That could be basic equitation, jumping, eventing, cross country or as lesson mounts at a riding academy/school/ stable. SOME horses enjoy their work and others are lazy and just phone it in.

That is what separates the great from the mediocre, as always.
The Dressage moves are all forms of EXTREME discipline and not moves that a horse would normally make on his own. Many disciplines are disciplines used to train war horses back in the day. The Lipizzan of the Spanish Riding School in Vienna preserve the disciplines used to train war horses back in Napoleons time.

Their performances are based on extensive training and trust in their handlers to perform, many, unnatural moves. A well trained horse knows his work but it is all about the training and the animals willingness and ability not their love of the discipline.

You keep taking it to levels that I’ve never suggested, as in …“They weren’t standing around planning what they would do the next time the fore bells sounded. haha” I never suggested that the horses make up their own steps and own routines, or that they plan ahead or plan changes in the routine. I’m not saying they have the cognitive reasoning abilities of humans. However, they aren’t programmed robots, either. They have some sense of self, and some free will.

I’m saying that I believe the best athletes modify their routine in small ways, outside of what they’ve been strictly trained to do. I believe that goes for those professional horse athletes. The purpose of dressage routines is, ultimately, for it to appear that the horse is stepping in time to the music, is it not? Well, is a horse to dumb to figure that out at an instinctive level?

@Dutchess_III I think this is where we are getting our lines crossed.
Yes, human athletes may modify their routines but every-single-dressage-move is about training, so no, horses do not “modify” their own routines on their own.
Actually, many people feel dressage is abusive and passe and nothing more than a circus act. I tend to agree to a large degree. The original moves were designed to acclimate a horse to pain and to make it a more agile war horse.

All passe in modern times, and what appears to be a “dance” to human spectators is really nothing more than watching an animal trained to move in unnatural ways.
Read this.

www.horsemanpro.com/articles2/classical-dressage.htm

We’re still crossing lines. I am not suggesting it’s a conscious modification on the horses’ part. It’s not something he thinks, “Well, I’ll do this next time.”
I am saying that, at some point during one of the routines I believe he can make a connection between the beat of the music and his steps. Perhaps it’s something his rider is projecting subconsciously, himself.

Dang, I’ll just have to ask a question. I’m also trying to hunt down the documentary I saw. I think it’s a 60 minutes documentary. Those horses are anything but abused.

@Dutchess_III The point IS, all of the maneuvers the horse makes are unnatural moves, not moves they would make, on their own, in their natural state, moves, steps, maneuvers all contrived to build the perfect war horse. Secondly, the horse is not trained to a particular song, the rider picks music to compliment the routine and it can change with every exhibition. There are some popular musical scores that are used repeatedly in many cases but the horse is not specifically trained to any certain piece of music. It is the movements/routines that are synced with the music not the other way around.

No offense but you’re talking to a very horse savvy person that knows quite a bit about most riding disciplines and do not agree with the training methodology of many disciplines, including racing thoroughbreds which are being run before their skeletal maturity is complete at 5–6 years of age and over. Dressage also puts a lot of stress on a horses feet, ankles, legs and complicated dressage performances or running immature horses have abusive components. Just because a horse is well fed, well groomed and is housed in nice quarters doesn’t change the fact that their training is not always in their best interest either psychologically or physically.

Here is the documentary I was referring to.

I understand that there are assholes out there that think abuse is an effective way to change behaviors. But I’m pretty sure the best of the best dressage horses are not trained in that way.

What I’m saying is that the act of insisting on an animal performing unnatural movements can be and is considered abusive by many. Whips are used as training aides, as a guide, not to actually beat a horse with, though some do, but the very “art” of the Dressage routines are all unnatural moves, many uncomfortably so, and put a lot of strain on the horses. A good trainer will know his animal and be very aware of anything that might be causing discomfort to the animal but the motions themselves are unnatural movements that horses would not perform on their own in their natural state of being.
Impressive? Yes, natural and comfortable, no.

Well, if they have no aptitude or balk at doing it, they are culled, at least in the documentary I referenced.