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Ballet Practice Music?


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The ballet class CD's are sold in some dancewear stores, but not very many. Check Dance Magazine for ads on where to order them. Some of the online dancewear places may have some of them too. They are generally not sold in regular music stores. There is a series of French ones that I did find in Tower Records.

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I have an RAD one which is good. There are two of them, I have the first. There are several bits of music for each exercise, so 2 plies, 4 tendus etc with different time signatures and speeds. There are 61 tracks so plenty of choice (of course you don't have to do the exercise they suggest for the corresponding piece of music!) It is all piano music, adaptions from ballets and well known songs etc so you will find yourself humming along!

You can buy them from the RAD website, www.rad.org.uk

Click on "Online Shopping" then "videos and CDs", they are right at the bottom of the page, called Studio Series.:)

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Thanks for than information, Lolly! I have a question about the CD you have. (This is related to using the CD's for class, not for at home practice.) Is it the one with 2 CD's, and are the individual bands, especially the center work, long enough for several groups to do an exercise like pirouette combinations, petite allegro and grand allegro? My problem with so many recordings is that the music for these kinds of exercises is limited to the same 32 or 64 measures as the other combinations, which means you have to keep restarting for each group. Nuisance. :)

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Ms Leigh, this one is just one CD. One pirouette is over 3 mins, and one of the grand allegros is 2 1/2mins and another 3 mins - they seem pretty long to me but I don't know how long that is in terms of how many groups etc, I am not musical enough to count bars I'm sorry! The rest is mostly half to one and a half minute things. There are 28 tracks for barre (I was mistaken before - there are actually 3 plies and 5 tendus), 5 pirouettes, 4 petit allegro, 7 allegro, 4 grand allegro etc... The second volume (which I don't have) has music for pointe exercises on which this one doesn't, but I'm sure there is stuff suitable for pointe on this one anyway. And the list on the back tells you the time signature and whether it is slow, medium or fast.

I think it is a good CD - I know my teacher has it too (she used it once when one of our pianists was away)- and the speeds are generally good, that is the disadvantage to CDs as with a pianist the teacher can say "a bit slower please!" etc if she sees you struggling!:)

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Thanks, Lolly :) I work with pianists too, however once in a while there is a pianist out for some reason or other, and then I am the one who can work with CD's, so the pianists who are there get shifted around and I give mine up for a class or a day. :( I have a few CD's, but would like more, and I know the RAD classes have some very nice musical choices.

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Oh yes, the selections are lovely - bits from Nutcracker, Paquita, Giselle etc, it makes pleasant listening even if you aren't practising! I recently learned the entrance of Giselle in a class, and that bit of music is on the CD. Now I can't do anything but the Giselle steps to the music! Which might be inconvenient if my teacher uses it in class again!:( (I have another story like that actually, I was in a bookshop and some familiar music came on, I was trying to remember what it was, then my feet involuntarily did a coupe on the 4th count to start the Cygnets dance! It was funny - isn't some music just so inextricably linked to the choreography? Or maybe I was just so well drilled in counting 1, 2, 3, COUPE!;) )

Regarding the dancing in several groups thing, in RAD Grade 6 at least, a few of the exercises have "continuous" versions so a second group can start straight after the first, so I expect they will have thought of it for the Studio Series CD.

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Guest stpltly

You can also purchase CDs on Finis Jhung's website: http://www.finisjhung.com/music.htm My personal favorites are those by Scott Killian. I took a few classes from a teacher who used his music. It's not your traditional "ballet music", but it is so refreshingly different! You can listen to samples online if you have MusicMatch.

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Here is another one, which Juliet mentioned on another thread somewhere. I like it because you can listen to some of the selections, and I registered for the catalogue and it was sent very quickly! I just ordered a couple of their recordings today. They have orchestrated CD's for class. They are interesting, with very long bands, which is good, however one still need at least two or three of them to use different music for every exercise in a full upper level class. I ordered #7 class, orchestrated, which is in the catalogue but not online, and also the classes taken from Don Q and Paquita.

When you get the catalogue they also send a demo CD, however I found that to be relatively useless as there is very little on it for ballet. Most of the demo is for other forms of dance. I discussed that with him today when I ordered the albums.

www.christopherseminars.com

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Nice to see you back, Cygne! :)

Mozart's only ballet was "Les petits riens". I found the following CDs on amazon.com:

"Mozart: theatre and ballet music, Polygram Records #422525, conductor Neville Mariner,

2 CDs"

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00...9941076-1991109

There's also a CD called "Moizart: Les petits riens, K229b" (Cbc Enterprises #5095, conductor Georg Tintner) but it seems that only the first track is from "Les petits riens".

Hopes this helps.

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actually PMartins's PETITS RIENS was danced to Mozart's "Les Petits Riens" as follows:

mus: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Les petits riens); cos: Barbara Matera; lighting: Mark Stanley. First perf: New York, New York State Theater, Jan 15, 1987; New York City Ballet.

LES GENTILHOMMES is set to Handel. credits as follows:

G. F. Händel (Concerto grosso, op. 6, no. 9, in F major); cos: Alain Vaës; lighting: Mark Stanley. First perf: New York, New York State Theater, May 14, 1987; New York City Ballet

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