“Ballet is a dance executed by the human soul.” –Alexander Pushkin
Like I talked
about in a previous blog, ballet is the base and foundation of dance. Ballet
classes are very calm and focused but take a lot of work physically and
mentally.
It is
expected of you in ballet class that you treat your teacher with the highest
amount of respect. At the start you are supposed to greet your teacher and at
the end you are supposed to go up and personally thank them. Not only do you
need to welcome and thank them you also must be very focused and attentive the
whole time.
In
ballet class it is required that you wear a leotard, tights, and your hair in a
bun, with the proper ballet shoes or pointe shoes. Some may think it’s silly
that it is such a strict dress code but there is a reason for it. The form
fitting leotard and tights allow yourself and the teacher to be able to see
your alignment and pick up on little flaws. Pointing out the flaws in your
alignment help you fix them faster and this will translate into all of your
other styles and improve things you didn’t even know were wrong. Also it helps
for injury prevention.
In professional
ballet schools the highest level students generally already know their class’s
combinations before it starts; and the combinations and exercises change every
day. Also in professional schools along with colleges there is often and accompanist
who will play the music to go along with the combinations on a piano. There are
many different time signatures for different combinations so the accompanist has
to be very attentive to make sure they don’t play something that doesn’t fit
with the combination. In average studio ballet classes the music is played from
a cd or iPod but the music still has to be selected carefully to make sure the
phrasing of the music fits with the phrasing of the combination. In average
studios they also learn their combinations for the class while they are in the
class. For more advanced classes it’s usually learned verbally and the dancers
have to translate it into their body.
Many
young mediocre dancers or even a lot of audiences don’t realize how intricate
ballet is especially combinations. The dancers don’t just have to worry about
feet positions but also arm positions and head positions and they have make
sure they are also relaxed and only engaging the necessary muscles for that specific
move. Ballet is a lot more structured and difficult than most realize.
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