Blog Archives
Ballet Squid Chronicles: Ballautopilot
Today, halfway through some barre combination or another, I suddenly found myself doing something completely different.
Why?
Because the beginning of the combo was exactly like one we often do in Claire’s class, but the last third or so was different. Apparently my ballet-autopilot — ballautopilot, if you will — had kicked on. (Please tell me I’m not the only person whose ballautopilot that sometimes goes awry!)
The same thing happened again, incomprehensibly, as we were going across the floor. This was Essentials, so the allegro combo was simple: glissade-pas de chat(1), glissade-pas de chat, tombé-pas de bourree-glissade assemblé.
For some reason, my ballautopilot decided it needed to end with “glissade-sisson,” even though nothing ends like that, ever. So there’s no rational explanation for that one, except that apparently my legs like to sisson, and I was thinking about something else (specifically, my arms).
In other news, I managed another of those lovely and enjoyable double-pirouettes that happen when you get most of the way through your first rotation and then go, “Hm, I think I’ll just go on around again.” And then you do, and then you close back and look like you’re an awesome dancer when, in fact, you’re much more half-baked than usual this week because you’ve been out of class so much lately.
In still other news, this week I decided to try a fouetté en tournant, just to see if I could do it, in my kitchen (because everyone knows that the kitchen is where you practice your turns).
You guys, it turns out my kitchen is not actually big enough for that. Whipped out the leg, and WHAM! Right into the stove(2).
So I guess I won’t be practicing fouettés en tournants in my kitchen anymore. I will have to add them to the (ahem) rotation (see what I did there?!) of turns I practice before class, like the stepover-stepover-pique-pique combination from Tawnee’s class that’s one and a half piques too long for my kitchen, no matter how diagonally I travel.
In different news entirely, my husband is incredibly sweet and, as a surprise, took me to see Big Hero 6 today. It was brilliant, and if you can, you should run out right now and see it before its theatrical run closes. And if you are feeling weepy this week (which some of us do sometimes, just sayin’), I recommend that you bring a packet of tissues and a friend.
Notes
- I would like to point out that my glissade-pas de chat sub-combo looked stellar today, unlike my grand battement, which involved high extensions and a jiggly, jiggly, jiggly core. Must be jelly, &c.
- Fortunately, this was loud, but not painful in the least. I specifically planned it so I wouldn’t crack my leg on the dishwasher door, which would probably have hurt, since said dishwasher door was propped open to let the dishes cool off, with its pointy edges out and ready to rip my legs off.
Ballet Squid Chronicles: In Which Your Humble Ballet Squid Puts On The Splotchy Purple Tights and Rocks Them
Denis has splotchy purple tights that he bought on clearance when one of our local K-Marts was closing. I think they’re Joe Boxer brand leggings, really.
I’ve never worn them before because, quite frankly, I figured they probably wouldn’t fit me. This morning, though, I didn’t feel like going down to the Costume Department (AKA the storage room in the basement) and digging out my foil leopard tights. I grabbed Denis’ purple splotchy tights instead.
Turns out that they fit rather beautifully. Better than my usual tights. So I wore them to class.
Denis, meanwhile, wore his sparkly, star-splashed multicolored tights — which, by the way, was why I didn’t want to wear plain old black tights. Denis (who usually does class in pre-pro regulation black tights and white t-shirt) wanted to kick it up a notch because it was Hallowe’en weekend, and I wasn’t about to miss out on an opportunity!
You might remember these from an earlier episode 😀
Claire was teaching Essentials today, and when she arrived she said, “Thank you for wearing those tights!”
Apparently, she really gets a kick out of people who bring a little color into the studio. Well, today, Denis and I brought the color (though I did wear my usual black t-shirt).
I was surprised to find that I really liked the way the purple tights looked. And I was also surprised how solidly everything came together at the barre and at center — including the chaines allllllllll the way across the studio, going both directions. I guess I don’t get to make excuses about sucking at chaines anymore.
Denis did some nice jumps today. Claire’s amazing corrections — which are forever making my life as a dancer easier — apparently work for Denis just as well as they work for me.
After, we did lunch at Whole Foods with B & N, and then sat and chatted for ever and ever and ever(1), which was great. Our plans to take over the world will soon be complete.
So there we go. It was an excellent day, all told.
Oh, and my strap updates seem to have sorted my Capezio Romeos well enough. They didn’t peel off in class even after I took my socks off.
Notes
- Among other things, B and I discussed body size diversity in ballet. The more I talk about it with other dancers, the more it seems like we all really like the idea of getting a more diverse array of bodies into the studio. Something to think about!
Ballet Squid Chronicles: Coming Together
Did both classes tonight. I felt good throughout, with the exception of totally not having a couple of barre combos sorted in Claire’s class.
Pirouettes are becoming reliable. I did one double, from fourth, semi-badly (it could have been worse, which represents progress).
My coupé- and passé relève balances are becoming like my track stands used to be: they work until I realize they’re working, Wyle E. Coyote style 😛 They’re improving, though, so no complaints.
Combinations came off well. I’m still going on the first group all the time, and it’s still working.
After class, Claire asked how it was feeling (the dancing, that is), then said, “It’s coming together!”
So that was an awesome end to a frank roller-coaster of a day.
So that’s it for now. Keep the sunny side up, and don’t forget to salt your eggs a little.
Ballet Squid Chronicles: Sisson Double
Tonight, among other things, we did sissons (on purpose, even!) and also the sisson doublé variant. It took me a zillion tries to get sisson doublé to make sense, and then it did. The change-o-leg in the air was what was getting me.
Like, sissons are basically jumps from two legs to one, but normally you sproing and land without changing legs or directions. Sisson doublé does both (the turn takes place in the air, which looks cool), but is still a jump form two legs to one. I like the way it lands in attitude. And how I don’t fall over*. Yay!
This was most gratifying, after doing renversé something remotely like right a few times and very, very wrong a whole bunch of times and not doing pirouttes-from-fourth-to-coupé right, like, ever at all. Frustrating. My pirouettes just sucked tonight (my sous-tenu turns were fine).
I wasn’t feeling too hot at the beginning of class (digestive issues, fleh) but actually felt better by the end of barre. Thus, the beginning of barre was uninspired, but the end was mostly okay.
Adagio was mostly pretty, except for the moments when I got distracted by the mirror. Um, yeah. Maybe I should wear a blindfold for adagio?
The little jumps were lovely and easy by the time we got to them. I even counted to four correctly. Huzzah! I am so ready for my maths exam next week! Bring on the Counting Numbers Less Than Or Equal To Four!
Across the floor, all my glissade-pas de chats looked pretty good (I’m, even the ones that were supposed to be glissade-saut de chats, because I can’t hear very well, because allergies). Apparently, according to the Powers That Be, pas de chat doesn’t really fly in men’s technique too often. Too bad, because I really kind of love pas we chat. It can look joyful, athletic, floaty – whatever. It’s a nice step, and I have always thought so, so there.
In other news, it’s been a while since I mucked around in MSpain and made a silly drawing, so here you go — from Act II of Zombie Giselle:
Your call as to whether the ninja is after GiZombie or Albrecht, here. Presumably, by this point, Hilarion’s braingz have already been eated. Also, needs moar scenery.
I feel like someday I should post a real drawing, and I’m sure I will have plenty of time, um, next year. After I graduate. Before grad school.
So, there you have it, folks. GiZombie: Scene from Act II.
Finally, I actually managed to complete everything on my to-do list today for the first time in Untold Days. So go me! (And, yes, I totally pad my to-do list by including things like ballet class, so I can feel like I’m accomplishing stuff.)
So that’s it. Good night, all!
Notes
*Today I did a tour en l’air to see if I still could. I didn’t fall over, but I did over-rotate and almost turned my ankle. So that was dumb.
Ballet Squid Chronicles: Advanced Topics in Counting to Four
Class was decent tonight. Or, rather, class was great, and I was decent. My balances and développés are coming along.
Sometimes my core fell apart at the barre (usually when I was really concentrating on using my feet). Sometimes my arms got confused doing pirouettes. Sometimes I did nice pirouettes. This is becoming a pattern.
My petit allegro is getting better, provided I count correctly (see below). Tawnee likes to give us combinations that end with assemblé, assemblé, assemblé, assemblé. Those can get interesting. I have to look at pictures in my mind what that should look like before we do it again.
I rather fell apart doing little jumps. I blame math class. Clearly, I used up all my numerical faculties this morning in precalc. I could do the jumps, obviously, but apparently I couldn’t count to four at the same time. This was worse than usual. Counting is hard for squids, you guys.
That said, going across the floor, I thought my big jumps looked pretty good. They get rather better when we’re instructed to travel – then I remember to use my plié and my working leg automagically kicks itself higher. Amazing.
I’m still all about saying “Damn the torpedoes!” and going in the first group. Sometimes I don’t have the combination down perfectly (“Oh! There’s another sauté arabesque! Who knew?!”), but I strap on my imaginary super-cape and go like I have it down cold.
In the process, I’ve found that if you don’t stop to look sheepish when you forget a step, you will generally remember the next step and you can just roll on. I should have already figured this out by now (it’s, like, the first rule of all performing arts: if you make a mistake, just keep going like nothing happened).
I guess the goal is to improve incrementally every day, and I think I might actually be succeeding. Taking class three days per week really helps. I am very much looking forward to next semester, when I hope to up the ante to five days per week (I’m guessing one will have to be a conditioning class or plays or something, since there are no ballet classes Tuesday, Thursday, or Sunday*).
So that’s all for tonight’s class. I have an ocean of homework and housework and finances for the next two days, so radio silence will likely follow until Saturday, when we will be doing class and then going to see Giselle. I’ve heard our new AD is pretty creative, so I’m looking forward to that.
Notes
*Except company class?
Ballet Squid Chronicles: A Mixed Bag of Combos?
Class was interesting today. Claire called in sick, so we had two teachers — Margie for the first half of barre, then Brienne for the rest of everything.
I employed Claire’s suggestion about keeping my fingers in my eyes (okay, maybe that’s not exactly how it goes!)…
So many fingers. So few eyes.
…which made my balances a bazillion times better and let me focus on today’s challenge — preventing the Fail Chain and keeping my turnout, well, turned out.
At the start of our fondus, Brienne handed us a deeply-useful bit of advice: if thinking of bringing the heel forward is making stuff not work, try imaginging that you’re bringing your calf forward (I assume this means the back of the calf).
It’s a brilliant trick. Simply put, you can’t bring the back of your calf forward without opening your hip (and, where appropriate, your knee). Somehow, this little mental-imagery thing makes it way easier to find and activate the muscles that wrap around the back of the thigh and make your turnout go — which, in turn, makes your extensions about a bazillion times easier.
Also makes your balance in passé much prettier — I actually got a “Nice, Asher!” on one of these today … a non-ironic one, even 😀
Other things I learned tonight: PDG’s name is, in fact, Brian. He wasn’t in class tonight, but PDG2 (whose name is Connor) was, and wow, was he lovely to watch.
I (stupidly?) decided to stand on the same end of the room as PDG2 during barre (and, frankly, just about everything else) in hopes, perhaps, that some of his loveliness would rub off on me. At times, it worked, or maybe I’m just improving. At other times, it was more like, “Yeah, here’s a foil for my badness.”
I also decided to go ahead with my bold, bad self in the first group on every freaking thing — in part because I realized that we comprised an odd number, so then I could run around, hit the end of the line again, and practice all the combos cross the floor twice! Bwahaha.
That said, my jumps kind of sucked. Which is weird, because usually I’m all about the jumping, and I didn’t feel like my legs were particularly cooked. In fact, I specifically chose not to go home between school and class in order to spare my legs. I think the problem was actually in my brain; today was one of those distracted days.
Anyway, some of today’s combinations were good (the adagio was pretty, even); some of them were, well, meh. There were good moments (Pirouettes from fourth! I love them!) and there were terrible moments (Recite this in waltz time: Sauté arabesque! Sauté passé! Crap, what comes next? I have no clue!)
The weird part about that last one — I actually did know the combination (the next part was tombe – pas de bourrée – glissade – assemblé), but as soon as I would light out on the first sauté, my mind would go completely blank. It so happens that I can Sauté arabesque! Sauté passé! all day on autopilot, so I kept getting that bit down, and then the rest … ehhhhhhhh.
So that was my class today. I decided that it’s better to screw up boldly and confidently at the head of the line than to screw up mousily and quietly in the back.
For what it’s worth, at some point, the secret to all forms of dance is being able to fake it when you totally forget what you’re doing. You put on your biggest, most confident face (I would say “smile,” but what if you’re Von Rothbart, and you’re supposed to be getting your butt kicked by angry swans?).
Then you do something, and you sell it so well that everyone in the audience believes that you’re doing it right, and everyone else in your line (or in the entire corps, or whatever, depending on the scale of the piece, eh?) is doing it wrong.
Oh, and you don’t stand next to someone who’s better at faking it than you, or it won’t work.
So that’s it for tonight.
Be good, and if you can’t be good, be bold!
Ballet Squid Chronicles: More Brilliant Thoughts from Claire
I get great corrections from all of the teachers at LBS, don’t get me wrong — but something about the specific corrections I get from Claire just works for me. It’s like she instinctively knows how I think or something.
Today’s highlights:
1. You should always be able to see your fingertips.
I put my arms in all kinds of interesting places. The idea that my fingertips should almost never leave my field of vision keeps them where they should be. Much of the time, they hang out in the periphery, but they should still be visible*.
Like many flexible people, I have less-than-perfect proprioception (the “Spidey sense” that lets you know where parts of your body are without looking), so using a visual cue makes a huge difference. Eventually, I won’t need the visual cue — through repetition, my body will train my brain to place its arms correctly without the visual reference.
Anyway, sighting the fingertips fixes your placement so you don’t throw your weight backwards (which is still a problem for me at times). This, in turn, improves balances, turns, and just about everything else. Some of my pirouettes from fourth were pretty nice today.
For what it’s worth, I think the arms look nicer this way as well. One suddenly looks less like a crash-landing stork and more like a gliding swan.
Don’t be this guy.
2. Don’t hop out of turns. Ever.
This correction was issued to the whole class, but I’m pretty sure I did this at least once today — you’re turning, and something in you panics, and instead of letting the momentum of your turn do its thang, you hop out (and then you curse yourself because Professional Dance Guy is doing a triple).
It looks awkward. More crash landing. It also pretty much eliminates any hope you have of gracefully moving into whatever the next step in the combination might be.
Worse, as Claire pointed out, every time you hop out of a turn, you’re training your brain and body that it’s okay to hop out of turns. So just don’t. Fall over instead, if you must.
But, in fact, once I relaxed and just let my turns go, I found I was suddenly landing them rather nicely.
In general, class was good. I felt a tad fumbly and awkward at times in Margie’s class (too much thinking, maybe?), but mostly felt good in Claire’s.
PDG (whose name I really seriously don’t know — like, maybe it’s Tommy? Maybe it’s Brian? Maybe I’m just guessing, and I should, you know, ask?**) shared a barre with me again. It was just the two of us, all by ourselves, on our own barre on the end. Apparently, nobody wanted boy cooties. I totally cribbed off his breathing, since this week has been all about everyone telling us to breathe into our pliés and stuff.
The cool part is that it’s really hard to overthink your dancing when you’re conscious about your breathing. I guess that makes sense, though — when you learn Zen meditation, you begin by following the breath.
Claire also sorted another problem specific to balances that’s been plaguing me at the barre but not at center: I kept losing turnout on my supporting leg, and couldn’t figure out why.
Turns out (no pun intended) that I was leaving the shoulder on the same side behind my center of balance, so then my hips would rotate in an effort to correct, and instead of bringing the shoulder forward and the hips back, I would attempt to do … who knows what? All I know is that the end result was a half-baked turnout and shoulders at an obtuse angle to the barre.
By bringing the shoulder into alignment, one prevents the whole chain of failure. The hips stay where they’re supposed to stay and everything else remains appropriately perpendicular to the barre.
Now if I can just get the whole chain to hang together when moving from attitude devant (which I do quite easily en relevé) to passé (wherein I fall apart again), I’ll be quite happy.
We did lovely little sous-sus turns across the floor in Margie’s class; in Claire’s, we did all kinds of stuff. Like glissade – jeté then two sautés on one foot, change direction, lather rinse repeat, followed by glissade – assemblé – soubresaut – soubresaut. I thought my soubresauts were rather nice today. My one-footed sautés started out high and pointed and all that good stuff, but around the fourth repetition or so I got tired and they stayed pointed but lost most of their height. Oh, well.
My favorite combination today was cabriole-sauté passé-cabriole-sauté passé-glissade-failli-pas de chat. But I think I’ve left out something in the middle, perhaps? It sounds like I’m missing a couple of beats in there somewhere. We couldn’t do anything much longer because we were in the small studio and there were something like thirteen or fourteen of us, all long-leggedy leapers.
Anyway. I enjoyed that one simply because it was pretty. We went in groups of three, in lines, and because we all had the combination cold Claire asked us to focus on staying together. The effect was quite nice.
After class, one of the newer students said to me, “You’re so good! I have to get like you!” So I was totally flattered (especially since I spent the whole class thinking the same thing about PDG and a fellow student who I’ll call Claire the Second).
Oh, and the Shoes
The new shoes worked nicely.
Perhaps because of the construction of the shoe or perhaps because I’ve placed the elastics correctly this time (maybe both?), I found the support through the arch quite nice. My ankles felt quite stable today (sometimes they want to supinate en relevé). Some of this is probably a question of improving technique and increasing strength, but I suspect the shoes do help.
The bottoms of the Pro1Cs feel seamless, which makes rather a difference. I’m not sure how exactly Sansha accomplishes this effect, since the sole pads are quite stiff — but one does not at any point feel as if one is standing on an earbud wire or something (which was definitely a problem with my other shoes at times — not the Romeos, but the little inexpensive eBay shoes).
A word of caution: if you do buy yourself a pair of Sansha Pro 1Cs, be aware that the sole pads (both fore and aft) will be slippery at first. Mine had mostly sorted themselves by the end of today’s second class; they’re still a little slick, but not too badly. At the beginning of the first class, I felt like I was trying to dance on ice. IIRC, this was also the case with Capezio’s Romeos.
So there you have it. Still no pictures, because I was starving by the time Claire’s class ended and didn’t think of it.
Here’s one of the Pro1cs, anyway. The little seam right under the arch seems to enhance the support of the shoe.
Soon! I look so different than I did six months ago. I am trending towards being rather lean and defined. That’s a surprise. Prior to gaining a bunch of weight, I was more or less skinny (except my legs, which have never been skinny). I had some definition because I had so little body fat, but now when I look at myself I get a sense of working musculature instead of just twink-tastic scrawniness. Not that I minded being scrawny, but, there you have it. I think I rather like being built like a dancer.
Anyway, homework beckons (though I think I’m going to take a bath first; my legs are seriously cooked), so I’ll close here.
It’s 4:00 — do you know where your fingertips are?
Notes
*The obvious exception is when you’re in allongée with your face turned towards the hand in front, and so forth. In that case, you probably won’t be able to see the fingers of hand that’s to the side.
**There’s a part of me which feels that sharing a barre with someone three or four times and still not knowing his name is kind of like waking up next to the dude you met at the bar last night and not knowing his name. Only, I’ve never done the latter. Still, it’s awkward. Like, “I should have asked this weeks and weeks ago, and now I’ve missed my chance” awkard.
Ballet Squid Chronicles: In Which My Ears Do Weird Things
Class today was like the weather – mostly sunny! I started off over-thinking and being tense and trying too hard, but by the end of my second class I had managed to relax enough to do some quite decent work going across the floor. I also totally hosed up the frappé combo in Class #2. Feh. On the other hand, during our adagio section, I did a couple of decent promenades. Also a couple of bad ones, but hey, that’s a better ratio than it has been!
Going across the floor, Jessica gave us a simple but rather lovely little combination: tombé-pas de bourré-fourth-pirouette, pause, repeat.
After the first run from the left corner I was convinced I was turning the wrong way (Oh noes!!!) so Jessica made me run the combo by myself. Evidently I was doing it right the whole time, so Yay! Pirouettes from fourth without all the confusion.
On the first repeat, however, I exhaled as I finished my pirouette and suddenly my left ear went all funny.
I spent the rest of class (fortunately, only about ten or fiften minutes) mostly deaf in one ear, but it didn’t really seem to affect my balance much *(I had noticed, earlier, that my promenades on the left leg were iffy). It was just really strange. Later I tried pinching my nose and exhaling to see if I could clear it out, but that just made the right ear go funny as well.
So, um, hooray for allergies, I guess? I think I’m going to take some allergy meds tonight. The time has come.
Both T and J were in class today. T is pretty darned good. If I can dance as well as he does when I’ve been back in it for a year, I’ll be pretty satisfied (I think I’ve probably said that before). J, meanwhile, is funny and lovely and humble and gives me really useful notes (for example, the one about watching my mouth, and another about being lazy with my turnout while practicing releve balances in coupé before class ;)).
After class, I took my time coming home. I was too tired to ride the whole way, so I waited for the bus, then ate lunch downtown, then slow-pedaled the remaining seven miles.
This evening, Jenna joined me for dinner at home (You guys! I made baked falafel and didn’t ruin it*!) and then we went to see University of Louisville Dance Theater at Iroquois Park Amphitheater.
Jenna is evidently my sister from another mister. I looked at this and went, “Huh, we could totally be siblings.”
The whole show was immensely enjoyable — UofL Dance Theater put together a program of varied choreography, including one very fun Bollywood-inspired pieces — but the two pieces at the end with Louisville Ballet’s Eduard Forehand were stunning. He is simply a gorgeous dancer, and the rest of the company raised their game to approach his level.
For what it’s worth, Forehand is totally the kind of guy you watch and think, “And that’s why he’s a professional.” He’s very fluid, expressive, and musical, and his technique is very good.
Also, his pas de deux work could be used to teach a partnering masterclass.
So that’s it for now. A lovely way to close out the summer, even though school has already resumed (and if it hadn’t, I’d be at Burning Man). We don’t have class on Monday, and I may or may not be going on an epic bicycle adventure instead. Depends on the likelihood of major thunderstorms. The weather has been iffy of late, and while none of us mind riding in the rain, we don’t want to get caught in a severe storm in the middle of nowhere.
Good-night, everybody. Don’t burn your falafels.
Notes
*So, the last time I made falafel, it was an unqualified disaster. I didn’t own a deep-fryer then and I don’t own one now, so baked falafel seemed like a good plan.
I have no idea what I did wrong the first time (I was still in high school, and I really had no idea how to cook anything but spaghetti, ramen noodles, hot dogs, and a really fine grilled cheese). Whatever it was, I didn’t repeat my mistake this time. I suspect that’s because in the intervening period I have learned to occasionally read all the directions. Both times, I used boxed falafel mix; this time, I got Ziyad’s mix, which has a short list of recognizable ingredients and easy-to-follow directions. I recommend it.
I’m posting this because Jenna pointed out that I’m always wearing my composed “portrait face” in photos. So there 🙂
Ballet Squid Chronicles: Just call me Vidal Sisson?
Tonight, I learned that when I’m tired, I sisson when I should sauté arabesque. My legs are all, “We are not getting off the ground on just one leg,” or something.
Also that when I think about getting my extensions higher, I return to Defective Construction Crane Mode.
When I’m just learning the combo, it’s all, “Ohai, well, there’s my leg way up there.” And then we run the combo and I’m all, “Dangit, it was up there before and it’s getting up there again!” :::gripgripgrip:::
But I can defective – crane higher than I used to, anyway. Is that a good thing? Beats me.
Meanwhile, I still can’t count and jump at the same time. D’oh. Will I ever learn*?
That said, I managed to glissade and assemble without dissembling or disassembling, so that’s something. I can also glissade – jete. Getting from sauté arabesque to glissade still looks a bit awkward. Have to work on that.
This was not a great day for Letting It Happen. I definitely suffered for missing class on Monday. All told, though, it’s coming along.
I also mostly remembered not to make faces. Mostly.
Edit: I forgot to mention the (rather depressing) highlight of last night’s class: left split all the way down, no sweat (well, actually, I was sweating buckets by then, but not because of the split). Yay! On the other hand, I would rather have done beautiful combos than a full split.
Notes
*Yes. In fact, I’ve made progress in this regard. Now I’m usually okay if the combination is fairly simple; in more complex combos, I count fine until suddenly I don’t.
danseur ignoble 