Contemporary and the future of ballet

[jdancer13]

Hi everyone, Im a 15yr old ballet boy who has been dancing for almost 2years now.

 

I want to hear some peoples thoughts and opinions on the future of ballet. It seems to me that more and more ballet companies like SFB are becoming fond of contemporary and contemporary ballet seems to be getting quite popular. Maybe its just me but, everywhere I go a dance teachers always tell me that in order to make it in the dance world today you need contemporary just as much as ballet. Thoughts?

 

I ask this because I am currently stuck between two studios. One studio is more contemporary ballet based but heavily pushes contemporary more than ballet (which is where I currently am) and the other is strictly ballet. Both are great, but I feel that in order to make it in the pro ballet world (which is what I want) I need to strengthen my ballet because although contemporary is nice to have, ballet is more important. Do you think I should switch or stay at my current studio?

 

Note: I am in no way trying to talk bad about contemporary, I think its great

[Victoria Leigh]

Joey, we cannot tell you which school to attend, however, you pretty much answered your own question by stating that you want to enter the ballet world. I would think that even the more focused ballet school would have some contemporary training, though. Have you checked that out? If not, would it be possible to study at the ballet school and take a couple of contemporary classes at your current school?