Pirouette problem

[NHBnutcracker]

I learned pirrouettes about 3 years ago. We learned them with a certain preparation, bent front leg, straight back leg. (for endehors) During the turn, we had our arms in first position. I could do clean singles, and fairly clean doubles. Now along comes a totaly new teacher. She changed the entire preparation to 2 legs bent but leaning forward, and she positioned our arms in what she calls first position, but our hands are about 5 inches from our rib cages, and our elbows are almost folded over, instead of being at a 100 degree angle. She won't let us prepare any other way. Its almost as if we have to learn pirrouettes all over again! Many students feel this way. We ask her if we can do them the way we learned, but she says we are being rude to her. We ask nicely, don't demand anything, and say please. Now she yells at us for not having clean turns. What can we say to her to make her realize that if she let us do the turns the way we learned them, we would have clean turns?

[Mel Johnson]

You should learn this other way, too. And the ones from open fourth to a wrapped cou de pied position with bras bas, and the ones from second with arms in fifth, and anything else that a teacher gives you to do. There are plenty of ways to skin the pirouette cat. The way you described as having learned first was a modified Balanchine preparation, but there are many different preparations for pirouette, as well as positions IN pirouette, without even having the leg in an extended position. Once we start considering those, then there are hundreds of different kinds of pirouette!

[Victoria Leigh]

However, if people are teaching you different preparations, they also need to teach you the motivating action for this kind of pirouette, as they can be very different. A straight front arm in the preparation does not move to second before ending in first position, it comes straight into the first. A rounded front arm moves to second and the other one comes around to meet it in first. The theory of turning for these two different preparations is very different. Both work, but the dancer needs to understand HOW they work.