adult dance troupe

[teknik5.5]

There must be others out there in the age range 35-60 who love ballet and love to dance, who are at least intermediate level, may dance on pointe and would love to perform with a group of the same age

I would like to start a dance troupe of adults. Any ideas how? Anybody interested?

[Chinafish]

Hi teknik5.5, welcome to BT4D!

 

Where are you located?

 

Fish

[Serendipity]

This would be great if we were all in the same area.... *sigh*

[LaFilleSylphide]

Unfortunately, I'm too young for your troupe, but deeply interested. 30 years old (give or take a few months) and no where near any of our fellow BT4D posters. Maybe if you ever start a company and decide to tour South East Asia, I can "guest artist" with you guys! Hahaha!

[MelissaGA]

This thread reminded me that I did once read about a company of all "older" adult dancers.

 

I did a google search and found it.

http://www.kathymataballet.com/

 

It's a company made up entirely of adults who work in other professions.

[olddude]

This thread reminded me that I did once read about a company of all "older" adult dancers.

 

I did a google search and found it.

http://www.kathymataballet.com/

 

It's a company made up entirely of adults who work in other professions.

A few years ago I was in San Francisco for a week, and managed to get four classes from Kathy Mata. I don't know anything about the company, but she's an incredibly good teacher! I was way over my head, but still learned a lot from her.

[Garyecht]

I’ve been lucky enough to have been in a few amateur dance companies. None has been a ballet company, however. That makes sense to me in that I think it is extremely difficult to produce reasonable performance quality ballet for adult amateurs. Much easier for other styles such as modern.

 

All of the little companies I have danced with have had a strong artistic director, someone who has had a professional life in dance and currently teaches somewhere. That person essentially does the choreography and worries about things like rehearsal space, costuming, programming. It is a really big job and these artistic directors were all superbly dedicated to the act of putting on dance for an audience. The companies last until the artistic director basically gets tired of doing all the work. Then the company dies.

 

If you take ballet classes and would like to dance in a performance, my best suggestion is to encourage your school to put on an adult show where classes present some things they have been working on (perhaps a 3-4 minute piece). This is not simple either. You have to convince enough teachers to put something together to make a performance. The school needs to know the finances, so it doesn’t wind up losing money. Get together a group of adults who are interested and create a proposal for the school. Then present your proposal to the director of the school. Be prepared to revise your proposal after that.

 

I once knew three women who wanted to put on a “show,” a mix of dance, music, and drama organized around a single theme. They worked like dogs putting it all together. Took a year to do so. But they did it and I think it was pretty good. They had a nice paying audience, more than I would have expected quite frankly. When all the bills were paid, their net loss was about $3,000.

[swantobe]

Can the age range be made a little wider please? For those of us too young to fit into the 35-60 category and for those who are still able to dance (especially in character roles) after age 60.

 

I would LOVE to be in such a dance troupe. I would love to learn classical ballet corps work (and solo work obviously, but I actually enjoy corps work). I know I'm not advanced enough to make it look nice (yet, hopefully!) but more than anything I'd love to learn...although possibly not perform until I am more advanced.

 

I am fortunate to be given the opportunity to perform in studio shows, but generally they are choreographed by the teachers and not classical repertoire. I am excluded from youth dance companies here because I am too old...and I am too old to work towards a professional ballet career (which would probably not have been accessible to me anyway for various reasons mostly related to technical ability/physical characteristics). I feel like I've fallen into a horrible hole where people look at me strangely and ask "but why would you want/need to learn repertoire?"...can one not just do it for the enjoyment and appreciation of it?

[swantobe]

Here's an opportunity for those in England:

www.balletomane.co.uk

[luceroblanco]

The biggest challenge (after money), would be scheduling for such a dance group.

 

I run an amateur theatre group and also another musician's group. These are very low key groups and we don't do public performances, although my theatre group did an outreach to a highschool last year. The work that went into planning that one afternoon was quite a bit--at least 2 months. Even if you have the money (and I have none yet) the biggest problem I have had is scheduling. Everyone says they want to do it, but getting working people to all have time enough and on the same days to schedule rehearsals for a performance (that doesn't pay) would be quite a challenge. As a professional singer I know from experience that if people are not getting paid it has to be relatively easy for them to participate otherwise they will not commit. I try to make anything I do as low stress as possible for the participants and so far it's worked out okay but have had my share of unreliable people and no-shows.

 

One thing those who want to perform or even just get together and dance, is maybe to just find one or two other dancers that you like and schedule studio time to just improvise or work together to learn a variation by scheduling a private group lesson with your instructor or watching a video and teaching yourselves. The smaller the group the less hassle it is trying to schedule and there is actually quite a lot you could do with a duet or a trio.

[Kini]

Don't I wish there was a such thing where I live (Denver Metro), only place on the west side of town then even accepted adults is closing its doors at the end of November.