landing on my knee

[Guest dancer at heart]

in a dance we have to do, i have to do a tour jete onto my knee. whenever i do this, my knee hurts really badly and i always get huge brusies afterwards. i have very boney knees too so it makes it worse. 2 years ago when i had to do this for a show, a damaged my knee cap because it was rehersed so many times that my kneecap was permanantly injured. can anyone give me advice on how to maybe CORRECTLY land on knee? am i doing something wrong? maybe i shouldnt go through my knee and go more through my feet? please help me! and what can i do to take over my knees?

[Mel Johnson]

You must learn to land the grand jeté en tournant entrelacé squarely on an arabesque, then put the working leg down onto the ground with very little force at all. You're not ending the step in the arabesque, you're trying to use that raised leg as a shock absorber for landing. That's going to get you into big trouble one of these days.

[Victoria Leigh]

Right! You must never land on your knee! You land in the arabesque, and the the thigh and the instep take the brunt of the work in terms of going to the knee. If you don't land on the front leg, on balance in arabesque, as Mr. Johnson said, then you can't control the descent to the knee. You MUST land with your body weight forward on the landing leg.