Dancer Sugar Plum

I like Pineapple in London, there's a wide range of class levels. However, if you (or your friend) is only coming along for one class in the evening, for example, you could be paying £15.00 for an hour's class because you need to pay a membership fee as well. To me, this is quite expense for just an hour's class, but I don't know how this compares with other class rates in London. Maybe other forum users/readers could help out and give out costs and length of classes? I would be interested to hear about what classes are available in Paris too!

If you have a re-read through your post #1010 I hope you can see/feel that you are belittling and putting down my attempt to share my experience and contribute to the discussion here. If you don't see it as bullying or not respecting someone else's opinion, I can only assume you would say this because you would like to find someone for a 'tussle'. However, I don't want to 'tussle' with anyone, which is why I am not keen to add further comments to this thread after this post. I am commenting on this forum because I want to share my experience and learn from other dancers and teachers. Also, it's nice to share a love of ballet with other people. I was uncomfortable with your phrase 'or do you need perhaps the borrow of my teachers blind dog', which you've used twice to address me now. I find this insulting and upsetting. What if I said someone close to me had visual problems? What if I said I had visual problems? I feel you're using blindness and visual problems as an insult and I don't find that acceptable. The lines quoted above imply that you feel bullied. If you believe people on this forum, such as myself, are bullying you by showing concern about doing work that could be too advanced for your current level, or showing concern for you when you had an injury, I'm afraid I don't understand your definition of 'bullying'. In a recent post, you claim that it is 'elitist' to not to want beginners doing elementary or intermediate classes. As some members have commented already, it is not elitist, it is about being worried for their safety and ensuring that those dancers get a good grasp of the basics before moving on to the next level. It's also about people doing the most appropriate class level so that everyone in class gets the most out of their class. This is what helps progress, be the dancer a child, teenager or adult.

I have long hamstrings so I have no trouble getting my hands flat on the floor and rising to demi-pointe - like that pose of a NYC Ballet dancer on the front cover of the NYC Ballet Workout book. Wish I could say I look as good as her though! I have also been told I am flat turned out in the hips but my feet don't match this unfortunately. Aparently it's a good thing to have slopping shoulders for female dancers. But then there are leotard types I have to avoid because the straps would slide off during class if they are not 'in' enough. I have sway-backed knees as well, which I don't find easy to work with. However, one day in class some years ago, 2 girls in their teens, who were aiming to have a career in ballet/dance asked the teacher what sway-backed knees were. The teacher asked me to stand up and turn sideways to the class. It just so happened I was the only one in that class with sway-backed knees so I got to be the exhibit! The teacher said that you never see ballerinas not having these knees. The 2 girls who asked the original question then asked how it was possible to learn this particular 'skill' ('skill was what they called it) to have sway-backed legs! To reassure everyone who reads this forum, I should mention that the teacher replied that it was something you are born with, and not something you can get or learn.

Michelle, Like I said in my last comment, 'You either see it, or you don't'. I am feeling very unwelcome by your comments. You seem to hint that other dancers, like myself, can only be called 'dedicated' if they do the hours of dancing that you do. But there is no point arguing this point here. Although I hope you realise you are putting down other dancers, not just myself, who do as much dancing as they can while fitting in other responsiblities. In my last post I was merely making a point about corrections meaning different things for different levels of dancers, and how difficult it is to describe progression in ballet. Therefore it is difficult for teachers to explain to beginner dancers how/when they will see progress, why professionals still do 'easy' things like tendus in class, the repetitive nature of ballet, etc, which is what this thread has been discussing recently. However, you appear insulted by my passing on of what I have learnt in ballet. Since I can feel the aggression in your last post and since my comments are so unwelcome, I am tempted not to comment on this thread again. I don't like feeling bullied, and you are making me feel this way. I hope no potential posters have been put off contributing on this forum, for fear of being shot down...

I have mentioned this before on this thread but I think it's worth repeating and explaining a bit further. I mentioned that no dancer becomes 'too good' to do tendus (or words to that effect) even if that dancer becomes a professional in a classical company. In other words, no professional dancer becomes 'too good' or 'too advanced' to do plies. Therefore, just because you (or any other amateur dancer) happens to get the same enchainment as a professional dancer, it doesn't mean that the amateur dancer has produced the same quality of work as the professional. In fact, I would say being able to see why the professionals are producing a higher quality of work (it's not just about leg height), is an indication that an adult dancer has progressed. This is very difficult to put into words, I think you either see it, or you don't. Also, teachers can give out praise such as 'nice' or 'good' but it may not mean your pirouette (for example) is of the same quality as a professional's. A teacher may say 'nice' to a beginner's pirouette, which might have a turned in working leg, but the 'nice' might be used to encourage the dancer to keep working. Or maybe the dancer tried his/her full turn for the first time and the teacher wanted to encourage the dancer to continue working. If the same teacher then gave a company class, and said 'nice' to a dancer there, you can't say the amateur dancer's work is of the same quality/level as the professional's because they both had the comment 'nice'...

If you tell (non-ballet) people you do 3+ classes a week in my experience, they will ask you, "Wow, are you not almost at professional level?!" Then if you try and explain how hard and long the training is to actually have a chance of getting into a classical company, how young you need to start, etc, they'll say, "Why are you talking down your abilities? Surely you're just as good as the professionals because you do so many classes?!" It's so hard to explain! How do you explain why you're not good enough to dance in a classical company?! (I mean this in a light-hearted way) So it can be just as hard to explain to adult beginners why they are not at intermediate level just because they've done class for, say, a year. Another difficulty is getting them to understand that, for example, being able to spin round is not a proper pirouette. They may be sickling the foot, not shaping/pointing the working foot properly, turning the leg in, etc, etc. Yet since they can 'do' a double turn, they believe they 'should be' in the intermediate class. There are lots of areas of technique like this where it's not enough just to know what the steps are. It's the detail of executing the steps that mark out an advanced dancer from a beginners+ dancer. I think this must be very difficult to explain to beginners, if teachers ever try to explain this to dancers.

I think there can be adults 'promoting' themselves too much maybe because of ignorance. There was one woman I started ballet with, who dropped out a year or 2 later. When I bumped into her again, she said she booked herself on the intermediate class after a few terms doing beginners but she could not see the difference between the classes because you do the same steps and she could not see an improvement. I think there are dancers, including children and teenagers, who decide to stop ballet because they don't understand that ballet is repetitive, ie you don't stop doing plies and tendus because you are beyond the beginners' stage or you are a professonal dancer now! I also think the very technical aspect of ballet just doesn't suit some people. Also, the set up of some dance studios don't suit ballet either. If there are different dancer genres happening at the studios/dance centre, there is probably an admin system where you book for a term in advance and there is a 'fight' for a place in that class. Some classes get booked up quickly, including ballet. Therefore, when term starts, the teacher has no 'power' to tell/suggest to a student that they should do a lower level class because all classes are full so the student wouldn't be able to move anyway. The teacher wouldn't be involved in the admin side of things, so he/she can't suggest swapping and changing people between classes. I think dance centres with this type of termly booking doesn't ballet for these reasons. I agree that it's dangerous to have students in a too-advanced level, but if that dance centre books students this way, it's unlikely they would change their booking system or give the teacher more 'power' just for ballet. From what I've seen of ballet schools that mainly cater for children and teenagers, this sort of thing wouldn't happen because you/your DC would be put on a waiting list. Or if you really needed classes, you would look elsewhere.

I agree that doing variations technically correctly 'just' on demi-pointe is still very difficult. You could argue that it's 'watered-down' just because it's not en pointe. But what about if it's in a professional context and choreography was amended in some way? I once went to a professional production of Swan Lake from a well-known company with other dancer-friends. We were looking out for the black swan's 32 fouettes. However, the black swan's variation went by and we noticed that she had missed out the fouettes. I don't the exact steps in the variation to know what adjustments were made. This is not a complaint against professional dancers, but just curious to know if this would then be considered a 'water-down' version of the Black Swan variation, since it did not contain the fouettes? I think some adult dancers continue doing a class if the atmosphere suits them. I have heard of (adult) dancers saying they would rather do a particular class than a more advanced class because the more basic class had a better atmosphere. Personally, I try to include a more basic class in my schedule because I like having the chance to work on my corrections in more basic enchainments. In the effort to make everything as 'perfect' as possible, I find it can be even more exhausting than my 'proper' level of class! I have come across one teacher who would have a quiet word with a dancer at the end of class if they felt he/she was not ready for that level. But I have also come across a teacher (who teaches different classes of different levels) who appears not to mind if people 'promote' themsevles too much. For example, if a beginning student placed him/herself to an intermediate/advanced level after a few terms in beginners, I don't think that teacher would say anything to that student. Personally, I think it's kinder and more beneficial if the teacher had a word with the student if they felt the class level was not suitable for them.

I agree videoing class can help all dancers, such as in the context Balleteacher has mentioned. The teacher may want to show a student(s) that they have a habit of not pointing their foot enough, for example, but the student doesn't notice it. The dancer may even notice things that need correcting that they didn't notice while dancing. However, I also agree that in learning choreography, whether it is original choreography or a variation from the classics, the dancer should be able to pick it up from the teacher's verbal instructions, or the teacher just 'marking' it. I accept that the student/dancer may need verbal prompting from the teacher or be given physical corrections such as, 'your arm should be up here and not down there at this part', etc. If a dancer is having to rely on recordings to remember the steps, then I would say that the choreography is beyond that dancer's level. Or the dancer should not be doing the variation because he/she is not ready for it yet. I would also suggest that it would be counter-productive for that dancer's development. In my opinion, it is better to perform something simple in ballet and do it very well, rather than attempt something that's way beyond your currently level and do it badly. I had one teacher, who was an ex-professional dancer in a classical company say that it takes years of training to be allowed to do a minute-and-a-half solo on stage. Another teacher, also an ex-professional, says that learning the steps of a dance/variation is only part 1 of the process because there is so much more to doing variations than just knowing which step follows what step. I agree with my teacher. This isn't about 'the old ways' vs 'new ways', just a fact of learning ballet.

I agree that it was kind of you to offer help to the girl with the mobile phone, Michelle. However, I am uncomfortable, maybe even slightly offended, that you would suggest that dancers in class are not 'serious performing dancers' just because they do not want to be filmed. As it has been mentioned, a lot of people would not wish footage of themselves to appear on YouTube. If the video was filmed on someone's mobile, how would people know whether it would appear on the internet or not? Personally, I would not be comfortable being filmed by someone in class because I feel there is too much I need to work on in ballet. What I would be worried about is, if a video of me appeared doing class/rehearsal, etc, it would invite 'anonymous' criticism from people claiming that I need to work on X,Y,Z even if they knew nothing about ballet. You can see this from non-professional ballet videos on YouTube. I've even seen people critcising a professional dancer's technique, only to be told by other users, 'She's a professional dancer, she doesn't need your help!' There was a set of summer classes I did last year, attended by a mix of non-professionals, those who had graduated and looking for work and some who were on a break from vocational school and some maybe going to audition for vocational school later on, etc. There was a girl in her mid teens whose parents filmed their daughter throughout the whole class. It wasn't pleasant because some people did not want to go down the diagonal with this girl because it meant they would be filmed as well. As a result, a notice appeared in reception from the following week onwards. To sum up, it said that if people came into the studio, they had to do class. If people were not doing class, they had to leave, so no filming or photography was allowed in class. These classes were linked to a professional company in the UK, so I don't think anyone could call any of those dancers in attendance 'not serious dancers'.

Unfotunately I have come across ballet teachers doing this, just teaching for the sake of exams. One reason I left one RAD school was because of how they dealt with exams. The students there all covered grade 6, 7 or 8 work and completed the exam in a year or less (when they got to higher grades). One girl said she 'was rubbish' (her exact words) because she had been in grade 7 for a year and still had not done the exam! At this school, the students just focused on learning the set work so they don't learn any new ballet steps outside what is in the syllabus. Another student, who had been through all the higher grades, said she did not realise she was rushed through the exams until she left to go to university. This school also published names and marks of students who got distinction in their exams on the noticeboard and then later on, the website. So it was great for the students who got high marks in the exam (I would imagine), but not so great if you got anything lower. So if you didn't get distinction, everyone knew. Personally, although I am not a teacher, I still don't get why there are teachers around who are only happy to enter students for exams if they look like they would get high 70s and above. It's a well-known fact that vocational schools don't take marks into account anyway, for who they accept onto upper schools. If we need proof, Darcey Bussell is a famous example. I think she has mentioned before that she did not get very high marks for Intermediate. It hasn't done her dancing career any harm!

Flit and float, I had the same problem with Grishko demi-pointes, I steamed them, shut them in the door, bent them in half, etc. I even got them so wet during steaming at one point, I thought I had really broken them in. However, as you said in your post, they just re-hardened when they dried! I really liked how the shoes looked on my feet and didn't want to give up on them so quickly. But the other problem I had with them was when I go on demi-pointe, the bit where you tie the drawstring dug into my feet. Steaming, bashing, etc, didn't help soften that bit permanently either. Apart from being sore whenever I rose on demi-pointe, I also felt they were holding back my demi-pointe too much. I didn't want to give up on the shoes, so I tried to lower the vamp so that the drawsting was lower down. It took a lot of work to lower the vamp on both shoes, and after I did it, the drawstring stopped digging into my feet but I still could not get the shoes to soften (where I wanted them to soften) permanently. As you said, they seem to be made with some 'magic' re-hardening glue! I've actually stopped wearing them because of the re-hardening problem. But if I wanted to give them another go, I'm definitely tempted to try the washing machine tip!

Thank you Anjuli, this makes a lot of sense. I'll be trying the quarter, half and single turns and paying particular attention where my arms finish after each turn. I like the idea of keeping the leading shoulder over the retire knee. I have a feeling you are right about me closing the leading shoulder. I had noticed that when I finish a turn in class the following arm and shoulder aren't square to my other shoulder and hips. So if I had done an en dehor turn from 5th to the right, my left arm and shoulder would finish slightly pulled to the left. Also, after finishing a turn I have noticed my elbows have dropped. It's not a huge amount so it's not that the elbows are facing the floor. But just slightly dropped is enough to affect the turn badly. The times when my elbows have stayed supported on landing a pirouette I have felt the turn was more secure and I have been in more control. I assume elbows dropping is about the back not being engaged during the turn? I am keen to fix these faults/habits on the flat because I have noticed they carry over onto pirouettes en pointe. And then with pirouettes en pointe, the fault/habits are magnified. Apart from the fact it feels even less secure en pointe from my point of view, I can guess that it doesn't look very nice either! I find it amazing that you are able to help my pirouettes so much (and other people's) simply by me describing my turns on an online forum. I've said it before but we are very lucky to have you on this forum.

Anjuli, I've really enjoyed your pirouette articles, they have been very helpful. I have a question about the part the back plays in a pirouette. I know I have a habit of 'leaving' my back behind when I intiate the turn and I have been trying hard to break this habit. It's really affecting my turns to the point I can feel it stopping the energy of the turn. If I was doing an en dehor turn to the right from 5th, I try to think about bringing my left shoulder with me as I turn, but somehow my back still gets 'left' behind more often than not. Should the back be 'doing' something as I releve? Or would you suggest this was to do with my centre, or something else? Any advice you could give would be much appreciated.

I have more thoughts about class levels... I think it's good that there are companies trying to make their classes more accessible to their audiences. However, I think it's not the actual ballet jargon/traditional level meanings that is the 'problem' sometimes. Sometimes it's how a dancer judges himself or herself when he/she tries a new class. For example, there could be a class labelled 'elementary' - a Pineapple class is a good example for what I mean. A dancer tries the class for the first time and notices that there are a lot of advanced dancers and dancers who are probably professionals. The problem is when the new dancer starts to doubt himself or herself, thinking, 'those dancers can lift their leg higher and do multiple pirouettes with ease. I can't do the same as them so I must be in the wrong class'. The dancer might then be put off coming back, thinking that class was 'too hard'. I don't mean that the advanced dancers shouldn't attend lower level classes. I actually think it's a good thing to have professionals show you how it should be done! But for some dancers they need to able to see what they could learn by watching the advanced dancers, rather than compare themselves negatively and be put off that there are higher level dancers in the same class. But I also know that this is easier said than done!

It's also difficult to know when you actually move from an advanced beginner level to elementary, or intermediate dancer to advanced. I don't mean exams of any syllabus here, more like a dancer's ability to cope with free classes in a particular level.

Hi Swanprincess, I am not a teacher or physio so I can't suggest exercises, but I like the advice given so far. However, in case it's useful, I did have this same problem and this was my experience. I used to be terrible at holding my turnout, it would just 'go' when I started moving in class (basically, anything in the centre!). Then I learned it was me being 'lazy'. I don't mean 'lazy' in the sense of 'can't be bothered', but just that holding turnout for me needed more thought and effort than I thought was required. Turnout for me is something I need to think about all the time, always thinking about heels forward, always thinking about the muscles working to maintain that turnout and never relaxing them. I still struggle to use my maximum turnout in everything I do, but I can see it's getting better just by aiming to keep it in everything I do. I know what you mean by the standing heel slipping when doing developes in the centre, especially in 2nd. I think it's about making the standing leg work just as hard to sustain turnout as the working leg, which is easier said than done. In fact, I had a teacher who says the supporting leg should be your main focus because that provides a base for your working leg to work against. I like this idea very much. Also, I find it harder to control my looser leg. The same teacher has told me I maintain turnout better on my 'stiffer' leg, so my turnout is more likely to 'go' with my looser leg. She said that the more range you have with your turnout, the harder it is to hold/maintain. Or in other words, you would need to work harder to get the strength to hold that turnout. She also says that it's normal to have one leg looser/stiffer than the other. I hope some of this helps.

I find the term 'Intermediate' confusing because it could mean class for someone who is working at, or who has gained their RAD Intermediate (previously called 'Elementary'), or it could mean an adult dancer who has done ballet for 2 or 3 years and it's a class that caters for people a bit beyond beginners level. So 'Intermediate' here actually could mean 'Improvers'. The 'problem' I have noticed with terms like 'Intermediate' is that I have seen the effect of this confusion for adult dancers, who started ballet as an adult. I have seen adult dancers who have done ballet for a couple of years and have placed themselves in an Intermediate adult class. They then decide to do RAD classes, and assume they 'must be' in at least Intermediate level because they are going to an adult intermediate class. I'm not saying they're defintely not suitable for doing an RAD Intermediate class, but I have noticed that some adults invite themselves onto classes that are too advanced for their current level, and then think they 'should be' at the same name level for a syllabus class, or open classes such as those in Pineapple. The term 'Beginners' is confusing as well. I have seen beginners' classes, which are so basic that they would explain the positions of the feet and arms in the first lesson, etc, for the first week of term. By the way I think this is a good thing. But there are other beginners' classes, which aren't for those who have never done ballet before; they would be better described as Improvers' level. 'Levels' can be confusing too. I've noticed that if classes use 'level 1', 'level 2', etc, and there are different teachers, the actual difficulty of classes would vary depending on who was teaching class. The levels could be interpreted differently by each teacher. I once went to a level 2 class, which expected dancers to do a fouette turn in arabeque during barre!

I read the advice about red leotards being off-putting in a ballet book aimed at adults. I don’t remember the name of it at the top of my head, but it must have been published at least 10 years ago. It's possible trends and opinions have changed since the book was published, and may just have been the writer's opinion. It’s the only place I’ve ever heard of this advice and I don’t mean to discredit it by asking the question about wearing red leotards. I was just curious that’s all in case it was a ballet tradition/etiquette I had missed. If there really was a colour (or leotard style) that teachers would find off-putting I probably wouldn’t realise it since I am not a teacher. The book overall was very useful. It’s aimed at adults who are new to ballet or who would like more advice about starting class and class etiquette. There’s also a chapter on starting pointe work as an adult as well. I’ve not seen anything ‘costumy’ in class before. In adult recreational class the only rules I have ever come across was for beginners’ classes. There was a teacher who did not like people wearing socks only in case they slipped. Another teacher didn’t like long loose trousers that hid your ankles because they hide your feet rolling in (if you were rolling in) or if you had to roll up your trousers your feet could get caught in the trousers and make you fall over.

There were things I liked about the programme and things I didn't like. I felt the good things about it were: The women enjoyed the experience of auditioning They loved dance when they were younger and wanted to give it another go The programme may encourage more people to try out ballet - always a good thing There was a sense some women may take up classes again, whether they were chosen for the final group or not Wayne Sleep appeared to have a lot of passion for his project, to prove some people wrong The things I did not like were: The woman who had an RAD examiner mother was not big at all and looked like she was quite petite in size. Even Wayne said she was not big, but when she left the studio Wayne said she was large for a professional company. I thought this was misleading because it sounded like she hadn't become a ballerina because she was 'big'. Instead they should have explained that it was to do with whether or not someone was born with Balanchine-ballerina type proportions. It may not have been deliberate, but I did not like the idea Wayne portrayed that one woman couldn't have been a ballerina because she enjoyed food. Surely this just promotes the idea, 'as long as you starve yourself you will become a ballerina'? Or, 'if you eat well you can't be a ballerina?' There was a woman who got into the Royal Ballet when she was younger but had to leave when she stopped eating. She had wonderful feet and perfect turnout (or close to it). She looked quite petite in size as well, but they never said that stopping eating is not the way to become a professional dancer. It felt like they were saying to some of the women, 'if you were lighter, you would have made it', which we all know there is no such guarantee Wayne's remarks about 'fat' people - it was unnecessary The thing that annoyed me the most was the fact that they did not explain that the Balanchine-ballerina look is a specific body type that people are born with, not gained by losing lots of weight or starving yourself. I found it disturbing that it sounded like 'as long as you starve yourself, you will make it in the ballet world'. They may not have deliberately promoted this idea, but this was what I felt.

I think it’s always a good idea to let your hairdresser know you do ballet so they understand why you want to keep your hair long and not try to persuade you to cut it short if that's not what you want to do. On the subject of leotard colours, I was wondering if it was true that you shouldn’t wear red to class? I have read in a ballet book that it is off-putting to wear red. I assume they mean actual red rather than burgundy. Perhaps it’s off-putting for the teacher? But another book said it does no harm to wear a red leotard on particular occaisons, such as auditions. I’m just curious to know if it’s actually a ‘bad’ thing to wear red to class, or if this is just a myth. Not that I have a red leotard, or was thinking of getting one, I am just curious! From a teacher’s point-of-view, is it (or would it be) off-putting to teach class if one or two dancers were wearing red? Or have people ever worn red to class and got into 'trouble' for it?

Maybe your hairdresser could give you suggestions on other ways to do your hair for ballet? She/he could maybe show you how to do different types of buns?

I agree with Sheila, that's a real compliment on your dancing, Fiz. You obviously really impressed the teacher. I'm so glad it went well tonight.

Thank you Anjuli, I will go armed with these thoughts in my head for pirouettes on pointe. It's a very good point about the difference in height between a pirouette on demi-pointe and one en pointe. For some reason I have never thought about this before. The height difference is not much at all and I feel a lot better about it already! Thank you for your advice.

Michelle, Going back to your comments about using the barre for barre work, Tulip is right in that professional dancers don't need to prove to anyone that they can balance. That is not why they do barre work. They 'need' the barre because it helps them with their weight placement and alignment. If you use the barre correctly it tells you about your turnout, strength and weight placement. By strength, I mean the strength in your centre and your strength in holding your turnout. For example, if you were aiming to balance in retire on demi-pointe, and your hips go back (even slightly) on taking your hand off the barre, you know your weight placement has gone off. Or maybe your upper back has gone back (even slightly) when taking your hand off the barre to balance in retire. This means you've lost the hold in your centre. This is why ballet dancers need the barre. It keeps your weight placement in the correct place to allow you to work on other things. It can also tell you when you've become 'off'. Professional dancers don't use the barre for barre work because they are 'a passive participant'. Barre work is not there just because of 'old ways' and 'tradition'. While learning ballet you work on your technique at the barre. Then in the centre you aim to reproduce the same quality of work without a barre to keep you in the right alignment. This, in my opinion, is the hardest thing about ballet. I hope this makes sense to you.