Amateur Ballet Company Audition

[Chinafish]

Balletomane, an amateur ballet company in London, will be holding auditions on Sunday, February 3rd in North London in UK.

 

We are seeking adult male and female dancers of an Intermediate to Professional level to join our company. Female dancers must be competent en pointe.

 

Balletomane is a voluntary ballet company and all work is unpaid. Professional dancers therefore need not apply.

 

Rehearsals and performances take place on weekends.

 

For more info or to register for auditions please e-mail Natalie Krapf at info@balletomane.co.uk no later than January 25th.

 

To learn more about our company see our website !

 

** Mods please feel free to move this to another forum if you think it could reach a wider audience! **

[Christina]

What a nice opportunity!

Looks like a nice group to dance with.

Does anyone know if we have any such companies like this in the states?

[citibob]

http://commonwealthballet.org/

[Chinafish]

Hm.... not quite, citibob!

 

Although we are looking to performing at theatres, we are primarily visiting the venues we perform to -- e.g. disabled group meetings, libraries etc. (Yes we move their shelves to clear some space to dance!)

 

I've had a read at the company member bios of The Commonwealth Ballet, and quite a few of them started very young and were / are trained professionally. Although there are a few members who were trained professionally at Balletomane, they are very much in the minority (but anyone with professional level training are very welcome!). Most Balletomane members are adult starters / re-starters. Our company member age ranges from early 20s to 40s! (and I won't name names!)

 

(Just thought I'd point out the differences in case anyone is comparing.)

[Christina]

Thanks for pointing that out, I did notice they were very different.

I really wish we had a group of dancers like that here. I go in nursing homes from time to time but how I'd love to do more with a group. There are endless possibilities. You are very fortunate to be part of such a company! Your costumes are really beautiful too- do you each buy your own?

I found it really inspiring- maybe we can start something similar here.......

Best wishes to you!

[Chinafish]

 

Re Costumes: We chip in some money every week to contribute to rehearsals, and we keep the "surplus" in the kitty, if there's any. Sometimes when we perform people would make donations.

 

Then the company would buy costumes / buy materials to make costumes depending on what we are performing in the season.

 

But if some of us want to own the costumes, we might decide to pay for the costume and wear it on company performances - kind of like an "on loan" thing.

[Agnes1022]

I would love to have an opportunity to be part of an amateur ballet company such as the one Chinafish described website .

 

If anyone in CALIFORNIA knows of an amateur company like this, please let us know!

[citibob]

Sorry, I did not realize which aspects of the company were important in this thread. I gave a link to another amateur ballet company that features amateur adults. I would imagine that an adult student looking for a performance opportunity and living near Acton, MA would be interested, regardless of the performance model.

 

I also think the distinction between professional and non-professional training does us a dis-service. I believe all training should be professional, in the sense of setting the same high standards and making the best use of students' time to improve. Studying ballet any other way is a waste of time (IMHO). It does not matter to me what the declared goal of the student is. Ballet is one of the few educational settings in which it's customary that we treat people who do or do not want to make it a profession differently, from a very young age.

 

Imagine a Freshman Philosophy professor who separated out those freshman philosophy students who say they want to be philosophy profs from those who are just taking it as a part of their college education... and set lower standards for those who don't want to become philosophy profs.

[Chinafish]

I believe all training should be professional

 

Oh yes I agree absolutely.

 

In this context the "professional" training I was referring to was the type of training geared towards producing dancers fit for major companies (Royal Ballet / ABT / Bolshoi etc etc)

 

Part of the objectives of Balletomane is about providing opportunities for adult dancers, in addition to providing performances to people who can't go to theatres. Just want to make sure that nobody would refrain from applying if they wanted to (for fear that the level might be different from where they are at at the moment), that's all

[lampwick]

I remember visiting retirement homes as a child and young teen, through the Girl Scouts and National Honor Society, but never with my ballet school. That's a really nice idea.

 

I especially like that you're a group of adults. The folks at the home probably appreciate conversing with you afterwards. I remember being a bit awkward as a kid around "old people".

 

For those of you interested in a group like this in the states, you could start your own with some friends from class. You only need a group of four women for Pas de Quatre . It's a nice opportunity to ballet students to familiarize themselves with some actual choreography, which adults don't often have the opportunity to do.

[Chinafish]

Bump.

 

Audition date fast approaching. Please do get in touch if you are interested!

 

Fish