I think I did it!!!!

[Guest Until The End Of Time]

I got my friend Jeff to sign up for the Summer classes since its only 4 weeks. He has never done Ballet before, but he is willing to do it. Now we just got to get him a dance belt and slippers, I doubt he'll wear tights first time around but we'll get there. I just hope he likes it and keeps at it.

 

Has anyone else done the same with their friends?

[Mel Johnson]

Good going. I was the pioneer in my first school. First there was me, then another, then another, then five, then seven....

[Hans]

Congratulations I hope he enjoys the classes.

[Dick]

Not with friends, but with my wife. Reverse stereotype! I got her to enter Ballet and join my school. I was in a more advanced level than she was but I joined her group in quite a few occasions. My dream was to be able to perform some simple pas de deux with her but she accidentally broke her foot during a class and never came back to it. The pas de deux will be for our next life.

 

Dick

[vrsfanatic]

Dick I taught ballet to adults back in the late 1970s to mid-1980s, "the Baryshnikov years" in adult ballet, when it became quite common for people from all walks of life to study ballet. I had 9 corporate/municipal bond executives (all male) in one 4 week summer class of 35 females. Yes, do the math. It was a real hoot. We all had a blast. The comradery was great. I have very fond memories of that summer! Four even continued on for a few more years!

[Guest Until The End Of Time]

I just can't wait until my niece goes to her first ever dance class. I just hope she enjoys it because yesterday she was wearing her black tights for some reason and she saw that I had mine on when I came home from class she started dancing. It was so cute. I just hope she stays out there on the floor when her mother drops her off I am going to go with them. and if I can do this I will stay out there on the floor with her and do it with her, because she is super shy around people she doesn't know, seeing at least one familiar face will make her happy and allows her to be herself. I will do the same for my own children, I can't wait to have a sons/daughters, well I can in 5 years but to see their faces and have them share with me their ballet stories would be nice to hear.

 

My friend jeff is super nervous about the class I am telling him not to worry, everyone goes through this the first time. I told him not to feel wierd if the teacher corrects his mistakes or pulls him aside and shows him how to do it. I am so going to try not to laugh and make this fun for him. By laughing, we tend to laugh a lot when we try something new and we can't do it. It just encourages us to do it until we say WOW!

[Dick]

vrsfanatic, I am relatively new to ballet and dance in general (5 years since I have started taking classes) so I would never have suspected that Barishnikov had such an influence. I remember having seen him in a couple of good movies, The turning point amongst others. Was it where he drew his influence from?

 

As to the walks of life male adult beginners come from, they seem to be as diversified as society; and so seem to be their motivations. No clean stereotype. Personally, I'm a computer enginering professionnal; my main artistic hoby has been opera singing (8 years and some 25 different productions at it) and this is where dance crossed my life; with the end result that I still do ballet and no more sing at the opera. I have no aspiration of dancing in a opera thow...

 

Richard

[vrsfanatic]

Baryshnikov's defection in 1974 and arrival in the US was quite spectacular by today's standards. Not that he was the first nor the last to defect, but the ballet world, at that time was "ripe" for a new star. As today, he was handsome, athletic, intelligent, and eager to succeed in our country. Also he made some good business decisions and found very good business people to help him. Nureyev and Markarova had paved the way. He was not totally on his own trying to figure it all out.

 

Being so involved in the ballet world, it is hard to say when he had become a household name. But, he did. I think it was after Turning Point, 1977. Of course, there was a large scale opening of TP in Philadelphia (where I was living at the time), so there was a lot of press and ABT had been to the Mann or was going to the Mann the following summer (I loose track of time sorry) to perform. He was everywhere. TV, magazines, newspapers.

 

Registration for adult ballet picked up almost immediately after Turning Point. The following summer was extremely successful. Little boys came on a larger scale, at a younger age, to study ballet. Of course, so did the little girls and the young ladies for adult ballet. What we in Philadelphia called "the Baryshnikov years" lasted for about three years. Then he made White Nights, Dancer, as well as the TV special, Baryshnikov on Broadway and his line of dance clothing and perfume. There were/are a numerous books, either biographical or pictorial. No other ballet dancer, who was/is still performing, IMO, had/has been able to succeed, in a marketing sense, to such an extent.

 

Perhaps it was the image of the male ballet dancer, so athletic, mysteriously foreign, presented as only Hollywood can do, that made him appealing to, IMO, both the ladies and the men. It somehow became "OK" to study ballet. The generation of ballet dancer who began in those years, is getting ready to retire from performance and go on to other things (if they haven't already), be it in or out of ballet. I sometimes wonder how many of those adults are still hanging in there and studying? I know one of my "bond executives" from Philadelphia ended up on the Board of Pennsylvania Ballet (years later) and remains there today. His wife-to-be, became our director of development at PBC and his daugther is now a member of the company.

[Dick]

Tanks for the explanation vrsfanatic. Seems to have been a very stimulating period.

 

Dick

[vrsfanatic]

Just one person's view of that time, but I can tell you that in 1984 when I moved to Italy to work, my students (ranging in ages 8-19) certainly knew who Baryshnikov was, but not Balanchine.