Technique

[Guest SaxonBiggy]

What do you personally think about the differences between the male technique and the female technique and why do you think they are there? Also, what do you think about males en pointe? I think men should go en pointe at least in classes for extra strength. I also think that male pointe should be encorporated into performances (not classics, but new classical ballets) to show strength and skill with more sautes en pointe than the girls do.

[Mel Johnson]

It depends on the ballet, and the dancers involved. There are women who can dance like men, and men who can dance like women. And not just the Trocks. There is a residual aftereffect of the Romantic era when many of the female parts were otherworldly beings, seeming to float above the stage en pointe, and the males being the mortals, weighed and earthbound.

 

There are male parts done on pointe, particularly in parts which are Georgian or Circassian from Greater Russia, where pointe is done by men to emphasize strength. There are also ballets where the men are on pointe to emphasize their androgynous or epicene characters, as the fop in Bronislava Nijinska's Les Facheux. So it's been done.

[Guest SaxonBiggy]

I know it's been done, such as in Frederick Ashton's Beatrix Potter but I want to know everyone's opinion on it.

[Dance_Scholar_London]

I am doing pointe work on a regular basis, initially I started off to understand more about pointe work for choreography but it is fun though the progress is very slow (for me).

[Mel Johnson]

If it's just a matter of an expression of preference, I like the things I've described above just fine, if they're well done.

[Hans]

Men jump more than women if they're being trained properly, so there is no need for extra strengthening with pointe shoes.