rowan

I don't think this has been shown on UK television but there's this lovely advert for Levi's stretch jeans danced by members of the National Ballet of Korea - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iP98UCelGY And on a less lyrical tack, there's a recent one for baby milk in which baby girl grows up to be a ballet dancer, baby boy grows up to be an architect or a mountaineer... And I seem to remember an ad for one of the financial companies last year about planning for unexpected expenses with children - such as dental braces, or becoming a cellist, or a ballet dancer...

On the TV listings, it should be listed as SL, as opposed to S or Sub for the subtitled versions. But very easy to miss!

This programme will have carried subtitles as well as sign language - the two aren't interchangeable. And there will have been another (standard) version of the programme without the in-vision interpreter (signer). There are strict regulations on the percentage of programmes that need to be signed or subtitled. Only 5% of programmes are signed, so it actually can be quite difficult to hit upon the signed version! For many Deaf people, British Sign Language is their first language - it is an official independent language in its own right - and subtitles can sometimes alienate those with poor literacy skills.

I'm 'fessing up and admitting that I have worked on some of these programmes as part of my job - post-production, so the content is nothing to do with me! I thought Darcey Bussell's Ballerina Heroines was a pretty good overview of the different ballet styles for the general viewer, and very accessible. I'm sure that Darcey's slightly awkward twirls on various sets of stairs would be down to a director saying, "Just do a twirl, or whatever they're called, there." In the Red Button programme where she gives an overview of her dancing life, she comes over very well indeed. Even DD, who is not a Darcey fan, had to admit that, which is something indeed! As for archive footage appearing online, as discussed in the BBC archive thead, it seems to me that these have been chosen by a celeb with a special interest. For example, there is a very interesting set of archive programmes that I've worked on about post-war architecture that have been chosen by Janet Street-Porter. Perhaps it needs a celeb to lobby for the release of archive footage about ballet...

The film definitely exists in the BFI archive. If you search in its archive collections online it's quite easy to find. Alison is right - it was shown last year there, but if you want to view it now, it's more difficult. From the BFI website: Once you’ve found out we hold a copy of a film or television programme using the collections search, you may be able to view the film on BFI premises. Unfortunately we are unable to respond to requests for bespoke DVD copies and copyright restrictions prevent us from selling copies. Not so easy for you, I guess, in Northern Ireland! Jane Pritchard of the V&A was the curator of the Pavlova film season; you could possibly ask them if they know of any accessible copies of the film.

However, I remember reading this http://www.theguardian.com/education/2012/jan/10/how-cambridge-admissions-really-work article last year about would-be students of natural sciences, and being struck by this line: There is far less interest than is popularly thought in extra-curricular activity. An academic remarks with bafflement that a candidate has "got his violin grades on there".

The Victor Ullate school in Madrid is where Tamara Rojo trained, and then went on to dance with the company, if that helps! http://www.victorullateballet.com/index5fbd.html?ids=290

I can't recommend the Contigo brand too highly. I have one of their flasks for my morning commute, and it's fantastic - indestructible and completely leak-proof. You can also get them from Amazon. http://www.mycontigo.com/

13 hours a week will be far, far more than the vast majority of applicants do - in the UK at least! It's still really about potential and natural talent at this age. Good luck.

The RB doesn't run Chance to Dance, Aileen. It's run by the ROH education department. The RB has its own scheme, called Primary Steps, which was set up only a few years ago, and operates in different locations not in central London. The scheme is about exposing children and families to ballet who would not have previously considered it, not just those who couldn't afford it. That's why it's limited to children who don't already do ballet. I think the proportion of parents who would have even considered ballet for their child would be extremely small. To add to my comments above, some parents found it difficult for their children to attend the lessons because of the difficulty of getting to lessons after school when the parents had jobs (often low-paid and lacking flexibility). If children were going to a childminder or after-school club they would need someone who could take them to the centre and bring them back. I don't know how the ROH would assess the scheme itself. But it turned my child into a dancer and my family into ballet goers.

My child also started ballet through Chance to Dance and attended the Coldharbour Lane ("Murder Mile") centre. The majority of children on the scheme were from ethnic minorities, and, as Aileen says, this is owing to the intake of the primary schools which the programme visits. From my child's primary school year group of 60, four were chosen to do the initial audition. Neither of the two boys, both from African backgrounds, even attended the audition. One mixed-race girl attended, but did not get through. My child, who is white, did get in. Household income is not assessed, so there were children from very deprived backgrounds there, and those who were relatively wealthy - again, a feature of some inner-city London schools. While most parents were supportive of their children taking part in the scheme, which was entirely free and offered some amazing experiences, one thing that did shock me in my years of visiting that centre was the limited horizons of some parents/carers. The parent of one child (white) who was selected for additional lessons at the ROH, was worried about how to get there because she had never even been into the centre of London.

Good luck to your DD, too, Spanner! Not to divert from the topic, but... I've got no idea why exam boards, associates or whatever actually want ribbons in hair. I really think they look silly. Boys don't put ribbons in their hair and I don't see why the girls should either. They have no purpose, are purely decorative and just add grist to the mill for people who have the general impression that ballet is either something for tiny tots who like dressing up or something out of a previous century... which it is, of course! Is it just tradition that demands ribbons? Does anyone know?

I think we should be careful not to think that just because the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris doesn't exactly trip off the tongue - literally and metaphorically - in the UK, it is some undiscovered gem. It is very much a discovered gem and, as Afab has mentioned, extremely hard to get into. DD knows someone who has a place here, but this young person was previously at POB school. If children are assessed out of POB school, the conservatoire will often be their next port of call.

If you're referring to Eric Conrad's Secrets of Russian Ballet, this is not considered a valid method of training. If you look on the Ballet Talk website (hope that's OK, moderators!) you will find a hardly glowing discussion of his teaching method.

Afab is the expert on this topic but it looks to me that if you're a minor at the boarding house, you will be expected to go home at the weekends. If you're from abroad, I suspect that means you will need to have a guardian or someone in France who can take you in. I'd bet that there won't be that many students from abroad because of the language requirements, unless they are already bilingual, and those students probably have relatives/friends in the country anyway.

Maybe it's worth checking if they actually need a practice skirt, even if it's on the list, especially if your daughter's not likely to wear it any other time - anything to avoid extra expense, I'd have thought!

Hmm, not so sure about this. I'm afraid I think that the general population makes no distinction between the English National Ballet and the Royal Ballet,and think they are one and the same company. I've even heard reference to that oh, so famous company, the Royal English National Ballet! I have to say, (whispering it very quietly), that I have never seen Swan Lake, and I didn't want the Albert Hall production to be the first one I saw. I've seen other things there, like Cirque du Soleil, and you would have to go for the sheer spectacle of it, because if you're very high up, you're not likely to see much. But it's all kudos to ENB, which can stage very different shows in different venues that will appeal to different people.

I've often wondered if the reality of a dancer's life doesn't live up to the expectations that a student has while training and learning to become a dancer. It must be harder, of course, if a dancer is not in a large established company like BRB, and spends their life auditioning for one short-term contract after another, and living out of a suitcase. This dancer is lucky in succeeding in their dream of being a ballet dancer. If that dream has now changed, that's fine. As has been talked about before on this forum, it's all about the journey and no-one knows what the outcome will be. And I suppose, too, that any emotional investment involved should really only be that of the dancer. I'm not sure that the emotional investment in ballet should be the parents' at all, unless it is through their own interest. I realise that if a parent has spent years being involved in the ballet world through their child, when that ballet world stops, it is perhaps like a bit of their world that is being closed off to them, but really it's the parents' job to raise a happy, healthy human being, not raise a dancer, and they can consider their job well done if the dancer has the desire, courage and willpower to change direction in life.

I believe Isabella McGuire Mayes (now with the Mikhailovsky) turned down an upper school place for the Vaganova school in St Petersburg. But Tulip's point is well made - very few will have the luxury of that choice!

Thanks for providing this detailed account, Sim! It's much appreciated.

I'm not sure a nine-year-old necessarily knows why others might be better than her at ballet - and they might not be anyway - and she may just put it down to a perception that it must be because "they are more the right size." Some thinner children might be rubbish at ballet and some plumper children might be the best at ballet in a class because they've got all, or some, of those other things that make them good at ballet - including other physical things like great turnout or feet, and also artistic things like sensitivity to music. I knew a girl who had one of the more "solid" builds at age 10, but won a dance place at a vocational school.

Just Ballet, your post made me laugh! This happened to us, but we were the victims of the theft. My youngest daughter kept losing all her soft toys, and some we found at the bottom of the garden and even over the fence at the back. We thought she had been throwing things out of her window. Once we found her large velour unicorn halfway down the garden. We then blamed our own cat, but it seemed unlikely, as she was only a kitten at the time, and some of the toys were decidedly bigger than she was. Then we found my daughter's coat, the type that has a fluffy hood, stuffed halfway through the cat flap of our house - it was clearly too big for the culprit too drag out. The culprit - our neighbour's cat. We then installed a microchip cat flap that only opens for our cat - and the thefts suddenly all stopped!

Offer in today's Metro: Raven Girl/ Symphony in C Tickets for Saturday 8 June 1:30pm £33 in orchestra stalls (usually £63) £100 Donald Gordon Grand Tier Boxes (four seats usually £252) Use promo code: metrorg Boxes booked by phoning and quoting "metro box offer"

25th for us!

And both those A weeks are in term time!