Guest Ballroom Posted August 30, 2006 Report Share Posted August 30, 2006 I signed up for dance class at my school. The only requirements were to have some previous dance experience, no matter what type of dance. I do ballroom but my teacher has us doing ballet as of now. I am expected to do a double turn by this friday and can't even land my single. I was wondering if anyone had any tips on balance, landing. 1. She first told us to have our feet parallel. She had a word for it but she told us to point our right foot to the side while having a straight leg on our left. Our arms would be out and shoulders down. 2. Then to point backwards but still have feet parallel and to plie? Or bend our knees. And our left arm would be pointed left and my right pointed straight. 3. Then she told us to straighten our legs and have our right foot up and in front of us touching our left. Our arms would be like "holding a beach ball". Then she said just to turn and "spot". (we are turning to the right) I know what spotting is now but it was new to me then. Then she said to be on the ###### of my foot when I turn and leg straight. That was the advice she gave me when asked her why I lost balance. Many of the people in my class have taken her class before and can obviously turn better than me. Her expectations are high because most people know how to do this already. Being completely new to this ballet stuff what tips could you provide to help with my landing? I can somewhat spot and spin fast but I can't control to land. Is it necesary to turn fast? I'm not even sure how I'm supposed to land the turn. I tend to go right. My strengths as a ballroom dancer are to keep my shoulders down and to straighten and bend my knees, but have virtually no balance is this turn. I don't even want to get into my problem with the double turn but mainly losing balance and momentum needed to turn a 2nd time. Link to comment
Administrators Victoria Leigh Posted August 30, 2006 Administrators Report Share Posted August 30, 2006 Hello Balleroom, welcome to Ballet Talk for Dancers Unfortunately, there are no shortcuts to learning ballet technique. One cannot possibly expect to do a pirouette en dehors with enough training to even know how to align the body, find the balance point, relevé, rotate the legs, find the retiré position with a strong supporting leg and a rotated working leg with a beautifully shaped foot in the retiré position! Forget spot, or landing or anything else. You do not have the ballet technique to make a pirouette, and from the description you gave of some of the positions using parallel, the teacher does not have enough knowledge to be teaching it! Ballet is rotated, both legs, and all the time. Very rarely any parallel positions used, not even with one leg. The body has to be trained to do all these things. Ballet is not a natural art form. It takes years. If there are students in the class with a lot more training, they have probably been studying it in a studio somewhere, not in school. And the teacher cannot expect someone with zero ballet training to do the same work as students with much more training. Drop the course and complain to the administration! PS - If she is telling you to "point your arms", then get out of there even faster! Arms in ballet are not pointed, they are soft and fluid, with a touch of roundness in many positions, but even when straight they are not so straight that they look pointed! Link to comment
Guest Ballroom Posted August 30, 2006 Report Share Posted August 30, 2006 I wasn't too shy to ask around and most people said they learned these turns by the previous dance class she taught. Some of the new students with a different dance background like me are lost like me. I actually assumed it was ballet because of the plies and everything. Is this turn possibly from a different dance? The dance class I enrolled in was to make me more rounded as a dancer, we do jazz, hip hop, lyrical, ballet, ect. Link to comment
Mel Johnson Posted August 30, 2006 Report Share Posted August 30, 2006 Run, do not walk, out of there. You are being taught by Dolly Dinkle. Link to comment
Administrators Victoria Leigh Posted August 30, 2006 Administrators Report Share Posted August 30, 2006 Aha! Okay, that explains it. It's not ballet. Good, because if it was ballet, it would be very bad ballet! However, my guess is that it is not a very valuable class anyway Link to comment
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