Mumofballetmaddaughter

My daughter buys her pins/grips from Sallys (hairdressing/beauty supplier) as she's found them to be very durable and better than any others she's tried. The last set she bought came in a plastic box/carry case with different compartments in for the various types of grips. She usually buys her bun/hair nets from Dance Direct or Boots.

From what I can remember, my daughter's CV consists of her name, address, date of birth, mobile no, email address, height, weight, vital statistics, shoe size, eye/hair colour, type of build, academic education/exam results, dance training/vocational exam results,performance experience, availability and USA visa details (the last 2 are only applicable when seeking employment) She has a clear headshot on the top right hand side of the page and a full length photo en pointe in arabesque at the bottom right of the page. I would check with the company as to whether they will accept an email application, some do, others want them posted. If they do accept email submissions and you are invited to audition, I would suggest taking along a hard copy of both CV and photograph. Good luck and hope this helps.

Enjoy the graduation Julie, a fantastic achievement. Well done to your son for having the determination to achieve his goal and good luck to him in his new career. Congrats also to hfbrew's son.

A very interesting article Tulte. Thanks for posting.

Lovely to read about all of the promotions and well done to them all. I remember watching Angela Paul at a RAD workshop my daughter attended approx 13 years ago, taking instruction from a former Russian ballerina as part of a demonstration. Angela was fairly new, I think, to the BRB at that time so it's great that she's made such good progress within the Company.

Hope you don't 'retire' totally from the forum as I've also enjoyed reading your well informed posts. Always great advice. You'll be missed.

My daughter found the teachers at vocational school (6th form), who were ex professionals, had more understanding of the emotions the students were experiencing during auditions than those who weren't. Up until she went away to 6th form though, she had 5 teachers at 4 different schools who were a mixture of both and all were very good.

taxi4ballet - it can be a bit of a challenge but thankfuly she got her sea legs quite quickly although jumps can be tricky as you don't always land where you expect to. If the seas are too rough though the shows are cancelled. The dancers become quite adept at quickly readjusting their spacing if someone moves out of position as a result of choppy seas.

That's encouraging to hear Nana Lily and Glowlight. Cruise ship dancers do become good all rounders as they have to be able to perform a wide variety of dance styles, some of which will only have been learnt during a relatively short rehearsal schedule. During my daughter's 8 week rehearsal period, she had to learn several ballroom dances and latin routines plus jump and jive, none of which she'd done before in addition to the ballet, jazz and modern routines.

My daughter found it nigh on impossible to access sufficient ballet training after graduation. She did do as many professional level classes as possible whenever in London but obviously this cost a great deal to do when you factor in rail fares and accommodation costs if you live outside a communtable distance. She auditioned from the January until the May of the year leading up to graduation and had seen first hand how difficult it was going to be to secure a contract. Despite only going to invited auditions, the sheer number of auditionees was extremely high especially when you consider a company may hold several audition dates/times. My daughter was always adamant that she didn't want to go down the cruise line route as she knew that it would mean an end to her dream of being in a ballet company. But she's always been very pragmatic and after discussing it with her Dad and me, she decided to audition for a cruise line. Thankfully she's never looked back and thoroughly enjoys life at sea. She is now on her 4th ship with her 2nd cruise line, Cunard, who employ classically trained dancers. As a bonus, she now does ballet/pas de deux and was chosen to do a couple of pointe solos. My daughter's experience of cruise ship work has been a positive one although she knows people who have done one contract and hated it. Salary wise, she is very well paid and as dance captain this has added another $1000 per month. As Glowlight points out though you have to allow for when you are in between contracts Apart from rehearsals and shows she doesn't have any other duties to do apart from the passenger safety drills. On her first cruise line however she had to do 16 - 21 hrs per week of passenger duties (library, socialising and internet help). The experiences she has had whilst travelling and the socialising and interaction with passengers has been invaluable.

Robin - Glad to hear that your daughter has made the decision to continue her training and wishing her the very best of luck for the future.

Well done to your daughter Fran. So pleased to read your good news.

Spanner - It might be worth shopping around for a chiropodist. I see a private one every couple of months as I have the same problem and the first appt cost £31 and subsequent ones £26.

Robin - my daughter is currently dancing with a girl who is just over 6' so her height hasn't prevented her from a career in dance, although not currently in ballet. My advice, for what it's worth, is for your daughter to continue training, hold onto her dreams, whilst always being realistic, as at 13 who knows what artistic directors and choreographers will be looking for in 5 - 6 years time. We all try to speculate as to what vocational schools and companies are looking for but in my experience it's impossible to second guess.

I'd like to think not tutoo2much but I don't know. In my experience, no matter how poorly a company treats its auditionees, there's never a shortage of hopefuls queuing at the doors.

Audition costs came as a shock to us. My daughter did several trips to Europe which were costly. She did her best to keep costs down by combining 2 or 3 where possible in a single trip and staying in youth hostels but there's no denying it is expensive when you factor in not only flights and accommodation but food and train fares to and from airports and companies. The annoying thing was that despite being offered auditions based on her CVs and photos, at times the criteria changed by the time she auditioned. One company in Madrid specified a classical look but they chose a girl in shorts with spikey hair and a lip piercing. Others kept the whole group until the end, thanked them for their interest and then said there were no current contracts. Another in London (this still incurred train travel and overnight costs) sent her an audition even though her CV stated she was 5'6, halfway through they dismissed the taller girls (of which a fair amount had travelled from Europe) saying 'sorry you are all too tall' Even though she didn't get a ballet contract and despite the frustrations of it all, she did enjoy the experience. Hubby and I try hard not to think of what we could have done with the money. We're just thankful that we've been fortunate enough to support her. Ironically daughter now does ballet including pas de deux and pointe work on a cruise ship where a floating stage is a whole new challenge. And we're still waiting for the payback!!!

IMO I see no harm in supporting a child who wants to keep auditioning, without success, if they are able to cope with the rejections as one learns valuable life skills as a result. From my own experience, if my daughter had been persuaded to give up after the first few rejections (and the many more that followed) she wouldn't be dancing professionally today. Strength of character and determination are great attributes to have regardless of what you do in life.

My younger daughter started ballet at 5 because she wanted a little pink dance bag. She didn't admit this until many years later and by then dance had become her passion. We lived around the corner from a dance school so she used to see the girls go to and from classes with their bags. Eldest daughter started dancing at 9 after watching her sister in a show and decided to take up ballet, tap, modern and jazz all at once. She gave up at 17 when classes started coinciding with other activities. Youngest is still going at age 23 but at least earns a living as a result of it.

A dancer's weight can be very deceptive though due to the amount of muscle they have. My daughter is 5' 6", weighs just over 8 stone but looks much smaller. If she wasn't so muscular, I think she would be considered underweight.

Having spent a small (who am I kidding) fortune on ballet, tap, modern, jazz, singing, drama, swimming, gymnastic and music lessons for 2 daughters and all the other costs associated with these hobbies, I can honestly say that we have no regrets. My husband and I took the view that as long as we could afford them without bankrupting ourselves then we would continue to support our children. We would never have sold or remortgaged the house however to fund vocational school for our daughter who wanted to make a career out of dance, as that would, in our opinion, have been a step too far and would have led to too much pressure on her to succeed in a very precarious profession. We were concerned that it would also cause resentment in our other daughter in later life. Although my husband and I could have done a great deal ourselves with the money that we spent over the years, we feel that both time and money have been well spent. Both daughters have a strong work ethic, self discipline and have matured into lovely young women. Eldest is a paediatric staff nurse so is a real contrast to her dancer sister. Neither of them had any time to 'fall off the rails' in their teenage years as they were too busy. I did ask my dancer daughter a couple of years ago if she'd regretted not having what I considered to be a 'normal' teenage life and her reply was that to her, her life had been normal and what she hadn't done, she'd didn't miss. Who knows, in years to come she may well have a different viewpoint but at the moment she has no regrets. While we will never be repaid in monetary terms, the value of what we have experienced throughout our daughters lives has been priceless. aileen - regarding your point about extended adolescence, as most who are currently in their early 20s will probably be working until at least 70, there isn't the rush to settle down so quickly. Gone are the days of jobs and security for life, so our youngsters have a very different mindset. Not saying that it's right or wrong but just how it seems to be.

Glad all went well Julie and lovely to read such a happy post. You must be so proud. It's times like this that make all the worry and stress of such a precarious profession worthwhile.

Congratulations Megan on your place at NBS. I'll do my best to answer your questions but my experience is from my daughter's time there back in 2006 - 2009 so things may have changed in the years since. The level of ballet abilities in the first year was varied as all students followed the same course regardless of whether they were intending to follow the classical or jazz focus courses in the 2nd and 3rd years. My daughter had already taken her Adv 1 RAD and ISTD ballet exams but there were other students who were at Intermediate level. Ballet lessons consisted of free work, syllabus, pointe work and pas de deux. RAD was a compulsory lesson in whichever grade you were working towards. ISTD ballet was an optional extra. I was impressed with the standard of teaching in all subjects, especially the ballet and my daughter had improved greatly when I saw her in the show at the end of the 1st term. The principal made the overall decision on who did what in the 2nd and 3rd years based on the 1st year assessments. My daughter was happy that she was able to do the classical course as ballet was her love. She did also get excellent tuition in tap, jazz, modern, contemporary and singing. My daughter enjoyed her 3 years at the school and found it to be a very warm and caring environment. The teaching staff were all very supportive and the principal had an open door policy to all the students. The school had a high graduate destination success rate but very few students managed to secure classical contracts so if you are hoping to be a classical dancer, this should be borne in mind. The majority of students secured contracts for cruise ships. My daughter rented a flat in New Medlock House and stayed there for the duration of the course. It is very secure there with key fob access to the main gate and to the individual blocks of flats. It wasn't luxurious but it was adequate. It's also only a few minutes walk from the school and across the road is the free bus which takes you into the city centre. It's about a 15 - 20 minute walk into the centre so the bus is handy when laden down with shopping bags! I'm not too sure about sponsors but would imagine that these are hard to come by especially in the current economic climate. It may be worth doing a google search for bursaries for dance/arts although in my experience there is a very strict criteria as to who can apply and the amounts, if successful, tend to be very small so it would be time consuming trying to cover the fees with this. I'm not sure whether child benefit and or housing benefit is still able to be claimed if you are between 16 - 19 but this would be worth looking in to. I would say though that whatever the fees are, you need to factor in more as there are always hidden fees for things which you don't necessarily think of at the outset. Eg, extra pointe shoes during classical shows/rehearsals, show tickets, hotel/travel costs at show times (2 or 3 each year) if home is a long way from school. I wish you well and please feel free to PM me if there's anything else you think of. I'll do my best to help.

I think it's important for children to have hobbies for enjoyment and not as the starting point of a future career which may or may not materialise. Even if a child ticks all the boxes for a future career in dance, they can lose their desire for it. If the heart's not in it, the perfect physique and technique are irrelevant.

I always used fray check on the ends of the ribbons (non slip from dance direct) which seemed to work well. I spent hours darning the ends but when my daughter took over the task, she used to cut the satin off the ends saying that it had the same effect!. I found the suede pads too fiddly and they never seemed to stay put but this was probably due to never mastering the art of attaching them properly. Daughter always used the Ouch Pouch Pro pads but cut the underneath part off leaving just the gel pad covering her toes. I used to machine wash the gel pads periodically and they lasted quite a few years.

A good question, albeit a difficult one to answer. My advice to my daughter was that if she hadn't been successful in getting a vocational place by the age of 18 then it probably wasn't going to happen. Then after graduation, I suggested she give it 18 months and if she hadn't secured a contract by then, it would be time to rethink and try something different. I've always believed in being realistic and objective about her ability. The concerns don't stop though when your child gets to a vocational school. The years from the start of 6th form to graduation fly by so quickly and the next hurdle looms. Will they get a contract. How long do they give themselves to get one. It's a never ending worry. If you are lucky to get a contract, the end date comes around very quickly. The next question, is your contract being renewed. If so, all well and good. If not, it's back to the audition rounds again with the hundreds of other hopefuls. Then there's the dilemma of how to support yourself in between contracts. A regular job is difficult because not many employers can let you have time off at very short notice to attend auditions. If you don't work though, any money you've saved is quickly eaten up travelling to and from auditions. Despite the bleak picture I've painted (apologies everyone) there are a great many success stories and grit and determination count for a lot. Seeing your child dance professionally for the first time makes everything worthwhile.