Dance*is*life

There's a special edible modelling material that you can buy. Don't know where you would buy it in the UK - possibly supemarket. My daughter-in-law makes wonderful figures from it for decorating my grandkids' birthday cakes. I imagine it would be fairly easy to model pink ballet shoes and perhaps red tap shoes out of it.

I haven't taught this year's graduates for a couple of years now, but I do like the idea of the photo. I will make a point of taking a photo with my most senior group when they finish with me this year and keep it for the future!

I struggle every year to find little goodbye presents for our graduates and this year there are about 7 17/18 year old school leavers, none of whom are continuing on to dance professionally - well not at the moment anyway. Still I want to give them a ballet memento because it's from me - they invariably give all the teachers toiletries. I often give a miniature satin ballet shoe keyring, but that's getting boring, so I too would be grateful for ideas.

I just had to add on this little story that my middle son sent to our family WhatsApp! He was sitting in the car with his 3 children in the back - 2 boys age 7 and 5 and a little girl 2 and 8 months. He was fiddling with the radio to find them music. He tried all kinds of music channels and after every one it was - No Daddy, not that one. Suddenly he found a classical music channel with Tchaikovsky on it and there was silence in the back. The 5 year old said - "That's ballet music!" (I have no idea how he knew! Unless it was Nutcracker which he has seen) and his little sister said "Yeh - ballet music" (she hasn't yet been taken to see ballet ). Okay said my son - Shall I change channels? Noooooo!!!!!!!!! they all screamed! Definitely my grandchildren!

I remember doing this in the days of yore when you had no idea if the photos were good enough until you printed out the negatives. The money I wasted!

Non EU dancers also have to get special visas. I had to write a letter of recommendation for a dancer who wanted to join the Trocaderos. The only reason they granted him the visa was because he was one of the very few males who are experts in pointe work. America is a huge country with many. many companies, but there are still hundreds of thousands of talented US dancers there who can't get jobs, so they are miserly with their visas. They make it tough to get a tourist visa too! We've had students who have nearly missed summer school because they couldn't get a visa interview in time.

My Mum was an absolutely brilliant dressmaker - sadly I didn't inherit her skills, although I am a whizz hand at sewing on ballet shoe ribbons and elastics! And at one stage my Dad had a factory for ladies' suits - so he was a ladies' tailor!

Before the EU existed, the Royal Ballet was exclusively for British dancers and was still considered a world class company and anyone who couldn't get in to a British company went to Europe, mainly Germany and France, where there were loads of companies. Having said that, I should note that I was accepted for Zurich, with the promise that a contract or two were due to become available at Christmas, but was then told that they had had to take 2 Swiss girls first. So I guess it's as broad as it's long. Incidentally, a former student of mine was given a contract for Estonia (he has dual French/Israeli citizenship) but his then fiancee (now his wife) only had Israeli citizenship and she was still accepted without any hassle. They stayed for two years.

There's a wonderful old fashioned word that you never hear nowadays - seamstress. I suppose because they sew seams! There isn't a male equivalent as far as I know - I believe men were called tailors! I note this because I thought you were talking about drains too!

What pointe shoes video Lisa? Do give us a link please! I think older children prefer slightly more realistic stories. My nephew really doesn't want his sons going to watch ballet (afraid it will "corrupt" them?) but he agreed to let the eldest see Romeo and Juliet, when I was performing in it as the Nurse. It was his first ballet and he knew nothing about it, but it was dramatic and funny, there were sword fights which entertained him and he got caught up in the story. When he was brought backstage, he wanted to see how the lighting worked and the scenery. In short he loved it. Unfortunately, he'll probably never be taken to see another one.............

I actually have the same problem in our own school! From Grade 7 I am not their only ballet teacher - they have a third class with a Russian teacher. I have learnt to be very diplomatic and calm them down all the time, explaining that it is okay that he calls things different names and that he expects them to do certain exercises differently from me. I just tell them we're both right and to go with the flow! It is difficult, but it's good for them to be able to adapt and be able to respond to different demands. Of course first they need to establish their basic technique, which is why we stick to RAD only until Grade 7. They do however add on flamenco in Grade 3, modern in Grade 4 and jazz in Grade 5. They start pointe in IF and add on Russian ballet in Grade 7. It all expands their horizons and makes them versatile. Very useful in today's eclectic dance world.

If they don't offer modern, then I don't see why you shouldn't send her to another school for that, but I do think you should tell her current school. We have girls who do all sorts of extracurricular activities, but we know about most of them and everyone tries to work their way round it. We also have girls who learn dance at their regular schools and we have to take second place when they have rehearsals and performances there. As long as we see an improvement in their work we're fine with it!

I think competitions and festivals are great for getting stage experience as long as they don't impinge on the technical training. Learning group dances is wonderful training for corps de ballet work and having to dance a solo builds confidence. Perhaps a few words with the teacher just sounding her out about how much the school is involved in competitions would be useful. if you want your daughter to do things for fun at this stage that's fine, but my feeling is that as long as a thing's worth doing it is worth doing well! Proper training is important even at an early stage.

If I am not mistaken the pirouette enchainement with the fouettes is a solo and should be practised as such, which means that if it is indeed candidates choice of side, it would not be a problem if someone chose to do it to the left. Having said that we were always made to do everything to both sides - I could do 32 fouettes right and left in my day (they looked nicer to the right though) and I get very miffed at students who ask me to choreograph the dances for the end of year show to include grand jetes and turns to their better side. I always tell them and what if a professional choreographer in a company asks you to do something to your less favourite side - are you going to anounce that you can only do it to the other side? If you do someone else will get the part!

Just wanted to say that although it's only a small part of the exam the free enchainement does stand on its own and is worth 10 points. So important to spend time on it.

Which exam is she doing IF or Intermediate? There are different focal steps for both levels. What she needs to learn off by heart are the names and meanings of all the focal steps and linking steps. I quiz my students on these before actually working on an enchainement. They are printed in the teacher's syllabus book, so you could take a photo of that or try and find it on the RAD website. In IF the focal steps are jetes ordinaires, sissones sideways (de cote) and assembles and each focal step will have different linking steps (glissades with assembles and pas de bourees with sissone for example). Intermediate has pas de basque saute, sissone forwards and back (en avant/en arriere) and assemble battu and porte, again each one with different linking steps. They are kept quite simple, but you have to do them four times over without stopping and that is hard even when it's simple! They get several chances to learn the enchainement and practise it and most of my kids were surprised that after all the hassle they found it quite easy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpmvMolT8tQ For those like me who can't see it live! Beautiful! I liked the touch of the sheet at the end like the Romeo and Juliet cloak hugging in the bedroom scene.

I took my oldest grandson (he's 7) to see Cinderella a few months ago and when I asked him what part he liked best he answered excitedly "All of it" , which I thought was rather nice coming from an absolute mad football fanatic............

As far as I'm concerned,however violent or nasty a scene may be on stage, I find it less disturbing than watching a film version. I adored Les Mis in the theatre and it moved me every time I saw it. I did not enjoy the film, because they really made it graphic in parts, with very nasty closeups and gory details. At least on stage it's distant from us. I saw Mayerling many years ago, but I don't remember being disturbed by it, somehow a part of my senses accepted that it was make-believe!

After all that!!!! The moral of the story is let them have a go - if it's right for them, it is and if it isn't, que sera sera!!!

You probably know this already, but at that age the important thing is to keep it simple and not too long. I remember that I choreographed a far too complicated solo for my Primaries (in the days when it was teacher's choreography) and I was very lucky, because the examiner was really kind. She saw I was new to it and she told me that they all got muddled with directions and steps and that though it was a lovely dance, that age needed a simpler one. I did one with a teddy bear for the next lot and it was most successful!

Yes, I would do a lot of investigation into the commitment expectations of this other school. Our 9 year olds are doing about 5 hours a week, which includes 2 x 75 minute ballet classes, modern and flamenco. I agree with the other posters, good ballet classes are more important than travelling around the country doing competitions. I did comps as a child and loved them - they gave me a familiarity and confidence with performing on stage that has remained with me to this day. However, they were only a part of my training and were never the whole emphasis of it. Without serious technique training you can't progress properly.

My sister lives near Chelmsford and went to see their last production. She thought it was very good for an amateur company.

Quite incredible! I could hardly believe that he did all that with tulle. Those aged hands were amazing!

I honestly don't see any reason for all these multiple pirouettes - apart from the "wow" factor, I don't think that they add to the performance in any way. Ballet should be so much more than technical "tricks"...........