favorite steps?

[Boots]

(I'm not sure if this should go on the adult student board, or the adult buddy board, so if moderators want to move this, please do!)

 

I'm curious - what are everyone's favorite steps in ballet? My personal favorites are:

1) balancé / pas de valse (especially en tournant! ) Maybe this says something about being a hopeless romantic... I just love carving my arms through space and really moving across the floor.

2) one of my teachers sometimes uses a failli/assemblé combo at the beginning of grand allegro. I love it because, again, you're really moving across the floor.

3) I'm developing a definite like for sissone. When I first tried this step I HATED it. The first time I had to do it was when I first started taking advanced beginner and low-intermediate classes. It totally confounded me for some reason at first and I developed a sissone anxiety. But now I really like them.

4) glissade - simple, but fun. And you know something good is coming next!

4) The good 'ol tombe, pas de bourrée, glissade, grand jeté (or saut de chat/grand jeté developé). It's fun and it feels great when you do it right.

 

Anyone else??

[scoop]

Fun question!

 

I'm partial to promenades in arabesque -- they make me feel like a music-box dancer. I seem to be able to hold my arabesque better in a promenade than when I'm balancing in place, probably because you really have to have your weight forward on your toes to get around. There's something quite charming about coming around in a promenade and catching sight of yourself in the mirror looking not half-bad at all!:cool:

[mermaid7176]

I've always loved grande jete's. There's something wonderful about flying through the air. Tombe, pas de bourree, glissade, grande jete! You're right-that's one of the best.

 

Though it is so basic, I love changement (sp?) as well.

 

At the barre, I would have to say that frappe's are my fav! There's just something about flexing your foot so dramatically, then pointing it -very fun.

[Guest piccolo]

Most of the big jumps: saut de chat, saut de basque but most of all, tour jete. Love, love, love tour jete!

 

Tombe, pas de bourree, pirouette en dehors (on the right.)

[psavola]

I especially love watching myself do developpe escarte devant in the center. I get such a triumphant feeling about my turnout when the leg draws into a retire forming that triangle of air between the supporting and working leg and then opens - not towards the mirror, but to the "more open side". When I started, the knee would pretty much point straight to the mirror. I'm generally unsatisfied with my turnout, but escarte devant shows in a concrete way I have made progress.

 

I also enjoy jumping. Almost any kind, except maybe those combinations that turn direction in the air a lot.

 

In fact, now that I think of it, I generally like pretty much everything in class except maybe the warm-up combinations. We've also had some unpleasant (too fast) frappe combinations lately, but then we usually get to do battu and/or petit battement in there at some point, and those are great.

 

Päivi

[Kate B]

Funnily enough, because it took me so long to get them passable, I like pirouettes! I also like adage combinations and petit allegro with beats, although I am quite bad at keeping my concentration for that, I do enjoy it!

 

I also like everything at the barre because it's safe and I can do things there I can't in the centre!;)

[Guest beckster]

I love pose turns and grande jete's en tournant! But never get to do them any more in the run up to exam time . I also really like petit allegro, especially beats. I usually end up with my legs in a knot, so I feel very triumphant when I do get them right.

[balletowoman]

I thought I was the only one liking beats and petit allegro... Definitely!! Nothing else! Give me entrechats, brises and anything else battu any day!

[Guest Tibbit]

I love echappes on pointe in center (one of the few times I really get to watch myself in the mirror). I also like doing chasse to arabesque on pointe.

Pirrouetes are nice too (I can't do those on pointe yet).

[Guest mathiskewl]

I'm with Piccolo on the tour jete!!!

 

I started to list some of my other favorite moves, but it would be too long. I love all of the steps (jumps, turns, barre -- it doesn't matter). I love learning (or re-learning) new steps and working at making the moves I have better. But whenever I do tour jete I become the little girl I used to be discovering ballet for the first time.

[Guest tournout]

definitely tour jetes...

 

and pique turns on pointe...

[psavola]

I got to add a new step to my favourites in the monday's class.

 

We did those arabesques that travel across the floor. (Do they have a special name?) They are very hard to do prettily (the arabesque leg jumps up and down like crazy, and maintaining turnout in the supporting leg seems totally impossible!) but tremendously fun to do.

 

Päivi

[2 Left Feet]

I was thinking just yesterday how much I like doing tour jette's. Thanks to one teacher in Orange County last weekend I finally felt like I was floating for a moment at the top of the jump/start of the turn. Every tour I've done since that class has felt great and floaty. My regular teacher noticed the change right away. For the first time it really felt like I had some ballon going.

 

I also like developes on relevee.

[Guest luna]

waltz turns, arabesque turns, and leaps of all kinds. my newest challenge is russian pas de chats--I look awful doing them now, but I'm having great fun practicing them anyway!

[Guest girlintheworld]

Pirouettes, pique turns and and chaines. I like to turn.