Winter term 2012
03 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
Today, January 2, 2012: New Beginnings, or building on progress.
Our intermediate Flamenco class resumes Tuesday at 7PM at Stage Door. We are continuing to work on a lovely Alegrias with tailed skirt (cola) and shawl. Shawls and skirt are both involved and exciting techniques. The music is sung by Miquel Poveda, a dynamic and popular young singer.
Level 5 ballet continues work on Coppelia’s Mazurka. We have been surprised what a challenge this Polish rooted dance has been. But the music is so lively and energetic, enthusiasm is high and with patient review, we’re getting it.
Our Pointe class is using music from Pride and Prejudice, music of sweeping emotion and delicacy. Choreography is coming along with more group participation. Wonderful input, revealing seeds of choreographers among the group.
Rest is nice, but the holiday break has been less of a rest and more of a break, successfully so because there is high desire to get back to the studio. January always brings thoughts of fresh interests to people, so there are always new students to integrate, which we will do with enthusiasm. Each new student brings a fresh dynamic to the group. When students, old and new, come through that studio door, I am enriched from the experience of being with them. And to think I could have been a bookkeeper. My first steps were dancing; may my last steps also be dancing.
Dealing with Advancement
26 Aug 2011 Leave a Comment
Achievement is good food for the soul, and progress is the excitement of movement. Being advanced from one dance class level to the next can stimulate interest, but it can also overwhelm. For a young girl, (or indeed a woman of any age) if the advancement also entails a different group of fellow students, there can be a real sense of loss, just as much as if all others were advanced and she were not. Classes aren’t just the skill being learned, it’s also the relationship with the teacher, and I think even more, the relationship with fellow students. There’s a group energy which changes subtly or dramatically with each member.
Too often, especially in a professionally competitive program, new members present a perceived threat that can translate into a less than inclusive environment. It’s a natural tendency for girls to form cliques, and education is required to redirect the group into more embracing interactions.
Advancement to higher dance class levels can also present another challenge; being overwhelmed. The dilemma for the teacher is to keep more experienced students stimulated while coaxing the newer student to lengthen their stride in increments that are doable. Combinations, especially, need to be two tiered, with reassurances that in due time, those needing simpler challenges will be ‘caught up’ to the rest of the group. With such reassurances, the teacher can ask for a good clean ‘glissade’ in ballet, for example, and a well done ‘pique arabesque’, and then when the student is confident, venture out into a less than perfect, but more advanced ’chasse, tourjete’. “Good, Mary. It will come from there.” as a reassurance that whatever those first attempts look like, continued effort and instruction will bring about a beautifully done movement.
Encouraging fellow classmates to not only be inclusive, but to celebrate each other’s progress, brings a bonding to the group where all can feel safe to venture imperfectly into new spaces without fear of being demeaned. In ballet Mary tried a fouette turn. The concept was there; the attempt showed both courage and a sense of adventure. She must have felt safe, though new to the group, to even try. I have confidence in these girls that they will love and respect her as much as I do. Well, almost as much.
Spanish Dance, (Flamenco) starts on the 5th of September, just over a week away. That class will include older women and younger girls. They mix well, the maturity adding an extra element of nurturing. I’m so fortunate to be able to enjoy the energy of grown women as well as young girls, and about every age in between.
Monday opening
13 Aug 2011 Leave a Comment
My summer is over. Many of my students are still in the thick of vacation time. Nevertheless Monday begins the first evening level 5 ballet class, classically thin in numbers to start out, while each week, with great relief, the barres fill up.
We won’t be starting up the Flamenco, Pointe or Adult ballet until after Labor Day, but enrollment has already begun.
Gears are beginning to shift inside me with choreography and class combinations; new approaches to old problems are becoming a part of my night and day dreams. Those are not empty stares or stupors you would see me in; those spells are a sudden vision playing across my mind’s visual stage, movements often answering a puzzle, a means to an accomplishment.
Ballet goals: strengthening the broader range of movement we acheived last year through more flexibility. Better body placement. Music: back to the impressionists, or should we go more classical? Last year was definitely 20th century, but the classics is a vital part of a healthy musical diet. And where else are you going to get that, if not ballet?
Flamenco: Getting stronger with the basics, especially while integrating new students. More time on technique, then choreography with a growing edge as well as reworking and improving repertoire. More performing? I hope so; keep our eyes and ears open.
Thinking about that great ‘mother’ of dance teachers in our area, Carol Kutlow, and her sage advice: “Teach the students, not the class”. In other words, no matter what the class is called, or the level it is rated, the collective needs of who ends up constituting that class is what must be met. Also, classes start at a reduced level to begin, and escalate throughout the school year; therefore September’s beginning ballet is a very different level and character by Spring, joyfully so. The human spirit needs to feel progress and accomplishment, so that together, we are going somewhere beautiful.
A NEW SEASON OF DANCE IS BEGINNING THIS AUGUST
31 Jul 2011 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: ballet, dance, dance instruction, spanish dance
July and early August is a time for reflection and goals as the studio is gone into down-time. It should be a time for rest, but in reality, it’s time for catch-up, family trips, updating the home, getting the garden in order. Plus there is the need for auditioning music, getting inspired for dance themes and evaluating the needs of my students.
Dance people tend to be perfectionists, so it takes a kind of discipline to stop mind chatter for times of good remembering, giving due credit for success and growth, what went so well, and who had a breakthrough into a whole new realm of accomplishment. In this mind-room of gratitude there is joy and satisfaction. Recital videos and photographs point out the strengths….. and (see how little time we can keep ourselves in that room?) where we need to strengthen, try something else. Actually, the years go by without boredom or burnout because no year is the same as the last. Here is the stimulation of newness, seeking answers, new techniques and policies. I’m a different teacher every year, with the chance for ‘reinventing’ myself and my program.
Thinking now of the great balance between patience and demand: When a student is giving maximum effort, then patience is needed to wait for brain and body to meet in readiness. Where teaching has become nagging, then the vision of a hen knocking on overdue, unopened eggs comes to mind. The line between these two polls needs the tread of wisdom, of timing (a personal goal still). Those feet will be stronger this year and get over that toe shoe box for she who worked so hard and consistently last year. For another, that mind muscle of movement memory was really beginning to percolate last spring; what treasures unfold for her this year!
