need help with technique....battement jete and pique

[liad4]

hay everyone,

I need an advice....I got confused with it lately...

Does someone knows when we are doing battement jete or battement pique near the barre what is the hight for the leg?? 25?45?

is there a rule for those specific terms? because for example usually when I am doing battmenet pique I am rising my leg to 45 degree but when the teacher gives us a super quick exercise with quick battement jet plus pique for example you cannot rise your leg to that hight...

someone knows?

 

thanks...

[Mel Johnson]

As with much of ballet, nomenclature changes with the method being taught. Whatever you call the low one, just off the floor, that's construed by some methods as being 15° of extension. RAD distinguishes by calling the low one "battement glissé" and the one at 45° as being "battement dégagé". They both have their uses, and in RAD, they are widely separate in the barre sequence under the old rubric, "barre warms you from the ground up."

[liad4]

and what about the "pique" in a barre exrcise for example: if we have brush fornt brush back brush front and then pique front side back and close to 5th position. the pique need to be 25? like the battement glisse you mentioned before?

2) usually those pique goes only with battement glisse? or they can be on the same exercise with battement degage? or it doesnt matter?

Edited July 10, 2010 by Redbookish
to remove unnecessary quotation of previous post.

[swantobe]

Mr Johnson - according to what you describe above, what would the difference be, in RAD terms, between a battement jeté and a battement dégagé?

I'm only in Intermediate RAD (and I'm familiar with the "written" syllabus and have the syllabus book) and have only done a couple of classes of the Advanced Foundation and Advanced 1 syllabus (and I don't have those syllabus books), but at least in Intermediate, we only have a battement glissés (just off the floor) and battement jetés (45 degrees). When we are told to dégagé in class it normally means something similar to a tendu, but usually held in that position or used between changes of weight. E.g. In the Intermediate syllabus in the plié exercise, when we extend our leg, on the floor, to second position to move to that position for pliés there, the syllabus book says "dégagé to 2nd". Again, in the tendu exercise, we are told to do 2 tendus devant and then a dégagé devant to hold for 2 counts and then close into demi-plié in 5th. It is done this way on the Intermediate dvd and this is the way it was done at the pre-exam course.

 

(Sorry for stealing your post, Liad, just confused by Mr Johnson's description).

[swantobe]

Liad - we normally do battement piqués to glissé height in our classes.

[Mel Johnson]

Battement piqué can be used wherever the teacher thinks it's useful. Remember, there's a bouncy quality to it, and the top of the movement reaches about 25°, but that's kind of approximate.

[Mel Johnson]

Mr Johnson - according to what you describe above, what would the difference be, in RAD terms, between a battement jeté and a battement dégagé?

 

Look in Rhonda Ryman's RAD Dictionary for guidance on usage. "Dégagé" is also an adjectival use of a participle, grammatically speaking, and can describe any "disengaged" movement from a closed to an open position, although it usually involves a position low en l'air.

[swantobe]

Thanks, I think my teacher has that book and I'll ask at class next week. I think, in the sense we use in those exercises I described, it is the "adjectival use of a participle...and can describe any "disengaged" movement from a closed to an open position". However, I think that in the temps lié exercise in the centre, in the Advanced 1 syllabus, dégagé refers to the lifted movement you described above.

 

I think battement jeté has a specific accent to it. I'll check that in the book too.

[Mel Johnson]

Oh sure, there's lots of variety in ballet! It's almost a kind of language in itself. Ryman's book is very useful because it preserves many of the "borrow" terms from other methods, especially Cecchetti, which formed the basis for RAD back in the 1920s!

[swantobe]

Thank you. Another book to add to my wishlist

[liad4]

sorry for bothering but now I am confused....!!!!!!

can someone just tell me exactly what is the different between battmenet jet, degage and glisse (reagarding the momvent itself, the movement quality(dynamic) and high of the leg) pleasee.....it sometimes so confusing...

 

thanks every one and sorry for being annoying...

[Victoria Leigh]

Welcome to Ballet Talk for Dancers, liad4.

 

I understand your confusion, but the problem is that there are differences in every methodology. It is primarily a terminology thing, because the movements of battement jeté, battement glissé and battement dégagé are essentially the same thing. In some methods there is a difference in the height of the leg, but in other methods there is not.

 

For example, I use the term dégagé for the exercise which usually follows tendus. The leg is approximately 25 degrees, and the battement piqués would be the same height. In some methods they use one term for 25 degrees and a different term for 45 degrees. So, it is confusing. The best thing is to watch the teacher and do what is being shown, and accept what it is being called!

[swantobe]

I'm sorry that we confused you I just had to ask Mr Johnson about this because he referred to the RAD method (which is what I am learning) and I had been confused about some of this for a while and this reminded me.

[CDR]

I have my students do grand battement pique (with the pique returning to the height of the original grand battement) - maybe I'm just mean!!

[gav]

I have my students do grand battement pique (with the pique returning to the height of the original grand battement) - maybe I'm just mean!!

 

I've done that in class before -- both squarely (one direction at a time) and en croix (pique devant-grand battement devant-grand rond en l'air to second, pique second-grand battement second-grand rond en l'air to arabesque...) -- and I don't think you're mean! Yeah, it's tough, but I rather like them for working on placement, strength, release, rebound, rotation (en croix, especially) all at the same time at the very end of the exercises at the barre.