Victoria Leigh

I don't know for sure, Scottie, but I would think it would be Drama.

My favorites are The Red Shoes and The Turning Pointe! They should be available at Blockbuster.

Barb, I'm pretty sure, from her original question, that Jasmine is thinking of some other kind of work with a ballet company, as she said she only started classes 2 years ago and knows she will not be a ballerina. Jasmine, I still think that you should get a copy of Dance Magazine's College Dance Guide. As to majoring in dance or not, I'm not sure if that would be the best way for you to get enough exposure to all the other areas available. I would think maybe majoring in theatre arts might be better, because then you could take dance classes but also get a lot of other courses that would be helpful in deciding which way you want to go towards a major. Barb, help us out here, please! Would NYU be good for her, and what would be your recommendation for her to start with?

Hi DanceFan, welcome to Ballet Alert Online! Interesting story about Makarova and the Kirov. Do you have any idea why there was a different ballerina for Act III? Was the Kirov doing this in other performances, or was it because Makarova was not at that time strong enough to do all three acts?

Hello Jasmine, and welcome to Ballet Alert Online! We have a lot of very knowledgeable posters here who will be happy to talk to you and give you some input on various courses of study for work with a ballet company! My suggestions would be: a)to definitely keep taking ballet classes because the more knowledge you have of the art, especially of what it takes to become a dancer, the more you will have to bring to whatever area you work in; B) look for a college program in the US which offers good ballet classes along with a program in dance history, criticism, arts management, or design; c) try to locate in a major city which would offer lots of performances to see, both by local companies and visiting companies; d)do some part time work, while you are in school, with a company, in any capacity that will help you learn about the workings of the company; e)get Dance Magazines College Guide, which will help you locate the programs. Hope this helps a bit!

What a delightful story Mel, true or not! Thank you for sharing that with us!

I think you are right on that, Ari!

Tancos, Robert Greskovic's "Ballet 101" has a very large videography section. You will find this book in your local Barnes & Noble or Border's, or on Amazon.com!

Hi Michael1, and welcome! I just bumped the Jan. 2000 "Please Introduce Yourself" thread up to the top under Anything Goes. Feel free to tell us about yourself, and especially about your involvement in ballet!

Unless it is a really bad performance, and you have no desire to applaud the dancers, then it is indeed extremely rude! Many times I have not liked the ballets, but the dancers have done their best and worked very hard, and I feel that they at least deserve to take their bows. When you are on stage, and see lots of people leaving while you are bowing, that is not a good feeling. Out of respect for the dancers, I just cannot do that.

Sorry, Dale and Manhattnik, but I don't think it would be interesting to see anyone is this production! While I have only seen the TV performance of this particular production of Swan Lake, I would hesitate to even hazard a guess as to anyone's true abilities in the roles, if only seen in this version. In fact, I find it hard to believe that anyone is actually attending performances of this ballet after having seen it once. I don't care who is dancing it, IMO it won't work and I doubt that anyone will look good. Sorry. I really hate being so negative, but I was really quite disgusted with this Swan Lake, and felt that it was a huge waste of time, talent, energy, and heaven knows, a lot of money. That people are paying money to go and see it time after time is beyond my comprehension.

Susan, the part I played was so very small, and I was completely shocked to be listed in the acknowledgements. However, it was indeed an honor! Thank you so much for your kind words about the board! I really enjoy doing this, and love meeting the students, teachers, writers, and ballet lovers who post here!

Susan, I do indeed know that Gretchen is a very nice woman, and also a wonderful teacher! We met many years ago, and I consider her a friend, although we very rarely see each other since I left Florida over 6 years ago. Actually I was one of the 50 or so people who were privileged enough to see the book before it was published, when she asked me to look at it in the proofing stages. I was most honored, and really did not have much time with it, but I was certainly impressed! (See the Acknowledgements )

Gretchen Ward Warren's book, Classical Ballet Technique, is definitely excellent! (But it is also definitely expensive )

What a wonderful article, Alexandra! Thank you for posting it here for us to read!

Pacquita, these are all wonderful and I thank you for taking the time to post them! I particularly like the Karen Kain quote, "I've learned that a number of choreographers get their best results by challenging dancers to give something they didn't even know they had". I had this experience in working with Tudor, and I learned more from him that made a difference in my career (and in my teaching career later) in a few rehearsals than from almost anyone else ever!

I'm afraid that the only thing good that I can think of to say about competitions is that maybe they can help a dancer get a contract. Perhaps they can also help a dancer who is already with a company to get a better contract or negotiate for better roles. But then, I don't think that a better contract or better roles should be based on one's ability to do tricks. I really find "ballet" and "competition" to be antithetical. They are just not what the art is about, in my opinion. The dancers perform selected solos and pas de deux in which they have been extremely well coached and rehearsed for a long time, probably at great expense and to the exclusion of almost everything else. These pieces include a great number of "tricks", and these seem to be the most important thing in the competition. If they pull off all the tricks and also dance with a huge amount of flare and confidence, not to mention "sell", they should have a good shot at a medal. So, they have spent all the money with the best coaches they can find, worked themselves to death for countless hours over many months, and what do they have? What have they learned about the art of ballet? What have they learned about doing a role? What have they learned about working in a company, especially working in a corps de ballet, which is where most of them should be starting out? Most of these dancers are very young, many not yet in a company, and here they are becoming "stars" before they have become dancers. I may be old fashioned, but I believe there is a great deal of validity in the process of moving up through the ranks. I have never believed that being a child prodigy is a particularly good thing, and I don't think becoming a medal-winning star has much to do with becoming an artist. I have less difficulty with already established dancers doing competitions, although I can't really figure out why they would want to do them, except perhaps for the prize money that some offer. I guess they could also get guest performing work from them, which also leads to more money, and since dancers don't make much money, this would be a valid reason Some competitions, like the Prix de Lausanne, for instance, do offer scholarships for young dancers to continue their training in the best schools. This would certainly be an advantage for many students. I just don't like to see ballet placed in the same kind of arena as skating or beauty pagaents. (I have nothing against either of the above, but they have their place and ballet is in a different place.) Sometimes I feel that the competitions are more about teachers/coaches/choreographers showing off their brillance with exceptionally talented dancers. Those of us who teach have probably all had at least one or two exceptional talents to work with in our careers, and it would be very tempting to take that child to a big competition and show them off. I suppose there are some circumstances where this is okay, and in the best interest of the child, but I know I would think a very long time about it before entering into it.

Anne Bancroft, Shirley MacClain, or Vanessa Redgrave of course

pdance, not boring at all, and quite delightful! Thank you for sharing with us!

Many excellent points have been made so far on this thread, and it is a most interesting one. I agree with Alexandra that choreographers don't "just happen", and that training and development are very important. Also opportunity. For reasons beyond my comprehension, it seems to me that opportunity seems to present itself to male dancers/potential choreographers more than it does to females. Or is it that females just do not seek out the opportunities? Is it, like Leigh said, that they are not socialized to take authority roles? I find that choreography is just not encouraged nor developed in the training of a dancer, and, as in training for teaching, it should and could be. When Jim Franklin and I had our Academy in Florida, we did 3 or 4 in-studio concerts each year where the students choreographed their own pieces. We started them with improv solos, about a minute or two, at the II or III level, and increased the time and number of dancers over the years until by their senior year they were choreographing group pieces of about 10 minutes. We had a number of students who showed fine potential in this direction, and a couple of them (female!) are now doing choreography in professional situations. One is a Carbonell award winner in Florida. She choreographs for musicals and has also done a lot of cruise ship work. The other is a principal dancer with Houston who is right now choreographing a 25 minute work for the Houston Academy Level 8 spring concert. This is a first "major" work for her, but if successful, I would not be surprised if she someday gets to set a work on the main company. Another student I had in West Palm Beach showed major choreographic talent at a very young age, and is now majoring in dance and doing lots of choreography at U. of So. FL. At Leigh-Franklin we also trained our top students as teachers. In order to do this they had to be on early release from school, and also they were hand-picked. Not everyone received this training, as it was given to them, and I would only do that with students who I felt had solid potential. In their junior year they took the teacher-training course with me, and in their senior year they were given a class of their own to teach, usually a ballet I or II level, twice a week. They were supervised and guided, but allowed to be on their own enough to develop their confidence in teaching. Not all will be brilliant teachers, but they will all know the vocabulary, the "why's and wherefore's", how to break it down, and when to present it. They will know how to align a student, and how to deal with structual differences. Hopefully, they will have learned a good deal more than that when combined with their own technical and artistic training! I'm not sure why we don't have any major female ballet choreographers right now, but I do think that we will have in the future - hopefully the near future! I think that women are stronger as far as seeking out authority now than they used to be, and also that the "good old boy network", which existed in the dance world as much as anywhere else, and especially in the University world, will be a thing of the past. Is this just wishful thinking?

Alexandra, just returned from a trip and much too tired tonight to think straight, but the first thing that came to mind on this is that I am very tired of unitard ballets, and one-act works that are all alike. I have seen so many "contemporary ballets" in recent years that are so much alike that I don't remember any of them. I know that there have to be some that are really good, but right now I can't think of any except some of the work I saw several years ago by Eddy Toussaint.

There is a young dancer in ABT, Elizabeth Gaither, who I have watched from childhood (no, she was not one of my students ), and have always thought she had enormous potential. She danced in Houston Ballet, then was out for a long time with a serious injury. Since joining ABT she has not had a lot of opportunity to be noticed, but I still think she is quite special. I'm also not convinced that she is in the right place to be developed, unfortunately, and so wish that were not the case. She danced principal roles in Memphis for one season after recovering from the injury, and perhaps she would be better off in a company with fewer dancers and more opportunities. I don't know, and this is, of course, a very personal decision. As a former ABT dancer, I know very well what it means to dance with that company!

Some thoughts off the top of my head on this matter: It seems to me that too many people are busy coaching young "super-stars" for competitions, instead of coaching young artists in roles within the companies. All the coaching seems to be technique and "trick" based, flashy pas de deux and variations, rather than developing Giselles and Odette/Odiles and Juliets. But this is not really a new thing in American companies. When I was dancing in ABT, a long time ago, there was no coaching going on there at that time, and I don't believe there is now. They have a staff of ballet masters and ballet mistresses, and they teach class and put the ballets together, but where is the coaching for the principals? I don't see it. Nor do I see evidence of it in other companies. It is indeed a very sad thing. ABT has Lupe Serrano right there in NY now, teaching some company and studio company classes, but is she coaching? I don't think so. They have some incredibly talented dancers in the soloist and even corps ranks who could be developed with coaching, but it is not done. And it was not done years ago. Why? Money? Time? Misplaced priorities? All of the above? Dancers learn roles from video tapes and go into rehearsal and do them. Very little, if any, coaching takes place. Sometimes it seems like the directors just wait for the artists to appear in front of them, instead of doing something to develop them. Sometimes when choreographers create or stage a work, they coach their dancers, but generally, the coaching for the classics does not seem to exist. Perhaps there are some directors out there who do, or who have people who do, but in my experience I have seen very little of it. Ben Stevenson in Houston seems to spend more time than most in coaching his principals, but even there it is not always the case. Too much time with videos and not enough one on one in the studio! And too much time on technique and not enough on artistry and musicality. Okay, I'm down off the soap box now ;-)

One of my favorites is a soloist in ABT who, IMHO, has not received the roles and recognition that she deserves, and that is Veronica Lynn. Veronica is a tall, long-legged beauty, with gorgeous feet, incredible line, and a face that belongs in the movies. And she has technique to spare. She is exquisite as Prayer in Coppelia. Would love to see her get a chance at some principal roles.

I have seen a number of performances of a beautiful married couple from Les Grands Ballets Canadiens, Anik Bissonette and Louis Robitalle. They used to dance with Eddy Toussaint's Ballet de Montreal, and during those years I watched them work together in choreography created for them by Toussaint . Although both are very fine dancers on their own, I always felt that they had something really special when working together. Has anyone else seen this lovely couple? Are they still with Les Grands Ballets?