Eric Conrad

I don't know how I'm only just now coming across this, with all the YouTube ballet watching I do*, but wow! I'm actually in the middle of knitting (a cowl for Dexter), but I had to hop on here and make a quick post, for I am watching Eric Conrad's YouTube video, Ballet Conrad #52: Port de Bras Back. Casually watching the beginning, I felt kind of bad for the female in the video, LOL. He was allowing for NO mistakes- tough, but definitely something I can respect.

I fast-forwarded to around the 12:00 mark, where he has the same female doing a port de bras back. He reminds her to come from the upper ribs, not the lower back. I was sitting in bed and decided to give it a shot- and my whole upper back popped like it never has before! It felt great.

Obviously, popping one's back is not a goal of anything, but so far, I LIKE his take on things. I'm only a few minutes in, and I have heard that he totally believes (from my understanding) everything from turnout to arabesques to splits and so on has little to do with flexibility, but with strength. I like that a lot.

If you do a search for "Ballet Conrad", some other interesting titles come up: The Frog is the Antithesis of Turnout, Very Detailed Placement Demonstration: Tendu, Vaganova Academy's New Turn-Out Method, and 20th Century Stars Wouldn't Be Accepted by Today's Vaganova Academy.

I think I've got some interesting videos to watch and listen to! Hope you get something useful from them! Now back to my knitting/watching YouTube!

Edit: I've glanced at a few links with Conrad's name in it, and it seems his teachings may be a bit controversial. I like reading such things, but I make sure to not get totally caught up in the hype, and to take a modest approach to learning.

Update: On Class Hiatus

So, I missed a Thursday class a few weeks ago- I was tired, or had plans, or something. The following week, my car nearly broke down and needed transmission work. Just breaking down a transmission itself is quite a time-consuming process... then they had to figure out what was wrong with it... order the parts... fix something else that my car had been recalled for that I'd forgotten about... fix the transmission... put it all back together. There was a big week-long event in town the first week, so car rental prices were absurd. By the second, I'd gotten used to just getting a ride to/from work and saved car rental money. But I had to miss two weeks of classes, on top of the Thursday I'd missed.

Had I gone back to class, they were just working on the demo I wouldn't get to be in, and I'd be quite behind on learning the moves. And after the demo, class is pretty much over. I've also found a new hobby I'm adoring, so I've decided to just go on hiatus until the next ballet season starts in the fall. That doesn't mean I'm not working at home; I'm just not going to class.

There's another reason as well. Remember the injury my silly self got by overdoing splits? I'm still injured. It doesn't hurt to move or anything, but the slightest stretching and I can totally feel it. I've decided I want that to heal totally before doing anything major with it. (I'm reading Dancing Through It by former NYCB principal dancer Jenifer Ringer, and one of her teachers told her, when she was injured, "The slower the recovery, the faster you recover", or something very similar. The book is fantastic, BTW. I just covered many pages while at the doctor's office today. I highly recommend it!)

And honestly, I haven't done a ton of ballet lately besides tendus, rond de jambes, other barre work- with a big exception: I've been going plie crazy! I noticed the slightest hint of extra muscle definition in my legs recently, and it has spurred me to do at least a little exercise every day. I like doing my plies in fifth, so I will usually do 15 on one leg here and then a little later do the other side, and keep doing that throughout the evening, or during the day if it's the weekend.

I also do a lot of leg lifts towards the back (ballet term not coming to me) to work on my butt, focusing on keeping my legs turned out. I do tendus and rond de jambes. I do a lot of ankle rolls and foot doming (many times throughout the day, every day) to work on my ankle strength. I do releves, including releves with either leg in passe (working on turnout!) I do this exercise every night on my problematic, non-turning-out, tibial torsioned leg. I do arabesques and other things. Occasionally, I do an online class. Non-ballet-style: all four on the floor, left leg up behind me then bring back down, also to work on my rear.

And I finally got nearly everything I need to make my rotation disks! I may have mentioned this before, but at my job, they install speakers. To install speakers in a box, they have to cut out circles. (The circles aren't perfect- it's difficult to cut a perfect circle with the tools they use... I mean it's perfectly circular but there's an extra cut in them that makes them kinda unsellable... maybe... hmmm....) They were going to throw away quite a few, so I grabbed them and came home and was able to nearly finish one. I can use it now, just the top is not attached. Getting the other screws and washers I need will be one of this weekend's projects!

One other thing: I realized last night that even though I don't really want to stretch my injured leg much at all, I can still stretch the rest of my body, even my other leg (duh!). So I am going to start stretching again, possibly yoga. (It's too bad I wasn't injured on my right leg. That one's naturally more flexible, and I could have worked on the left one catching up, but oh well!)

So that's where I'm at these days. Still loving ballet. Kinda regretting already not getting right back into class- I don't know where I will be placed when I go back (the girls should all be moving up a level), but either way is okay with me.

I might not be posting as often as I was, but I'm still "into" ballet and haven't lost my motivation as I'd feared I would. (Well, a touch, but not to where I am going to stop.) I'm still finding gorgeous photos online and will still be sharing those!

Update: Sick, Pas de Bourres, Adding a Bra to a Leotard

As luck would have it, just as I was getting over my not feeling so well from the car wreck I was in, I caught a cold earlier this week. It got bad on Tuesday, when I left work early, and I stayed at home in bed Wednesday and Thursday as well. I'm feeling much better. I pondered going to ballet both of those days (though I felt really bad, especially Tuesday), but decided that not only would it probably make me not feel better, I would likely spread it to all of my classmates, who would then spread it to their respective school classrooms and I would just be responsible for this huge catastrophe of sickness. So, I stayed home.

I'm definitely getting back into it today. Nothing too hardcore as I'm not at 100% but I can't not do anything today. I'm already worried my teacher is thinking I'm not taking ballet seriously- and I am! I'll explain to her what happened, of course. And today, I think I am going to work on some of the slower online classes that I know well, the ones by Tamra Chace, and do some stretching. At the end, if I feel like it, I will work on my pas de bourre. I'm really getting the hang of them, and want to really have them nailed the next time I go to class... or at least to where I'm not totally tangled up doing them in class.

I've been working on visualizing those pas de bourres a lot, since I haven't been able to do them. I've been watching two videos over and over to see how gracefully the dancers do them, and then try to imagine myself doing the movements as gracefully. Hopefully that's helping. One is from the Royal Opera House. We don't move front to back, only to the sides, but even so, I'm watching those movements too to help figure out how to gracefully do the sides. This is the other one and I don't even know who these people are, but I like that I can watch several people to see how each of them do the movements.

The other thing I am planning on starting today is this: I've been lamenting about my lack of leotard options as a woman with a D cup/fuller breasts. Basically, I have been confined to plain, basic tank leotards; plain, basic short-sleeve and long-sleeve leotards, and, well, that's just about it. (Although I have recently purchased one with lace at the shoulders, and can wear a bra with clear straps for that one.) But I still have my pretty leotards that I can't wear to class!

So I've decided to recycle an old bra to use with a leotard, probably my older white one (it's seen better days, so I will use it first. Also, it flattens me out a bit instead of pushing me up, which is better for ballet!). My goal is to cut the back off starting from an inch or two past the cups on the side, and cut everything from there back out. Then I am going to fold the edges I cut, and maybe add something else in for reinforcement there. (Excuse me, I don't know sewing terms.) And then I am going to add black elastic strips. With this one, it will probably be three horizontal straps, so that when the bra is on (which will hopefully just slip over my head? Or I may need to add hooks), the front will be supported and in the back you will just see three horizontal black stripes, which will hopefully blend in and look like it's part of my leotard.

I've been looking at a ton of ideas for doing this. I've got some ideas for straps as well. Here are some of the photos that have been inspiring me:

This is how the first one I plan to do will hopefully look, only under a camisole leotard with a very low back. I'm just not sure if strapless will be enough support. If not, I will add straps in somewhere...

Basically what mine will look like, hopefully, only the front won't match and won't be so pretty on my first try!

This was my original idea, for the really pretty black leotard I still have the tags on, because I just don't have a bra to match the straps and without a bra, it just looks awkward. It looks like with this one, you could actually sew in the bra straps inside the leotard straps, though I'm not sure how that will work with the one I have in mind.

I wouldn't put the adjustments there at the top like that, but I plan to use mine for low-back leotards. I'd love to make something where the straps could be worn or not... but if worn, they would match my leotards shape. So, not like the traditional multi-way bras that VS has and such.

Ballet Ad

There aren't many times I enjoy the YouTube ads that hop on in front of the ballet videos I watch. But this one caught my eye a few weeks ago, holiday-time. I stopped and watched the whole thing instead of skipping over it at five seconds, because it's actually cute (and ballet-related).

6-Year Old en Pointe...

Not sure what to make of the six-year-old little girl en pointe! The choreography looks fun though.

Real Ballet!

I've been putting something off partially because I'm a bit scared. Today, I finally went through with it. I went to the nicest ballet school we have in town and spoke to the director herself about taking classes. And guess what... starting the week of January 5th, I can start taking Level II classes twice a week!!

There was a real sense of finality to going in today. I've been avoiding it for quite awhile. I knew the adult class I took before would be more laid-back than regular ballet classes, so it wasn't that intimidating (other than getting over my fear of new social happenings). But this school, this is the real deal.

The director told me I could probably keep up with the Grade II girls. (The info sheet says they are around 9 years old.) She said that although they have had ballet for a year and a half now, as an adult, I should be able to keep up. (Note: This is a class I was debating on whether or not I would be put into it. The classes start at 5 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which is the time I normally get off of work. So I am going to have to work on my schedule, and get off earlier than I am supposed to. Considering I have doctor appointments very often, my bosses have gotten used to my leaving early, so I hope to just slide this on in there. Plus, I will work lunch on those days... and I'm going to try to start going in earlier after the new year anyway.)

The director was very nice (though she and the other lady in the office kinda scoffed when I mentioned I'd been watching YouTube videos. I knew that would happen, but I do think there is a difference in watching some YouTube videos and actually studying the moves the videos are doing, getting other input to make sure they're being done correctly. I guess I'll see how much they've actually taught me soon). Short lady, short hair, small frame, quite ballet-like. She's got some experience at the Joffrey School and another one or two I recognize. I told her about the adult ballet class I took, and how it was more of a social event. She said that this wasn't like that: the girls behaved well, and she teaches everyone as though they are working towards being professional, even though most won't actually go that way. So everyone likely dances with more of a professional attitude, and I'm sure she works them pretty hard. This is exactly what I was wanting/hoping for/scared of! :)

The classes are going to be kinda expensive for me, especially since it's not a drop in thing but a monthly deal... and I will be taking two classes a week instead of one. But it's not too bad, considering. Only $90 for two hours a week. The Tuesday class also ends early enough for me to head on over to the class I've already tried (once the real instructor gets off maternity leave so the class is under control!), should I decide twice a week just isn't enough. (I also have a few classes in the other town about an hour away I can take, even one on Saturday, which is a good day for me to get out of town. I'll start with these two a week, and if I love it, I am going to add more. The more I can do, the closer I am to [hopefullymaybeoneday] going en pointe!)

So, she was very welcoming, and even sounded a little excited about me coming to class (unlike some of my other experiences *looking down their nose* "We only allow 14 and under", as if that's a real school!). She told me she would put me in between two of the girls who have been there longer and are more experienced so that I can follow them on both sides when we do barre.

I've been working on center exercises with Finis Jhung. These are almost certainly going to be more difficult for me than barre. I mostly get the hang of barre now (as best as I can not really having had any actual classes). The only center exposure I have right now is about three minutes in the class I took (where I did terribly), a few steps at a time with Finis, and very basic center with Tamra Chace.

But this is it! This is what I've been wanting! I can come up with the money (by buying fewer ballet outfits, haha). I can work it out with my work schedule. I can get the nerve to actually go. And, provided I really do love it as much as I am truly hoping, I'm on my way to being... a late ballerina! (Okay, well "ballerina" in my head, anyway.)

Oh, one more thing. The director is the founder of the primary ballet company in town. If I do well, one day, I just might be able to join! She seems like she wouldn't discriminate based on my age (the other schools I've called wouldn't let me take classes with younger people, but she didn't think twice). That's way down the road, if ever, but so are pointe shoes (worn with permission!) and I'm aiming for those! Shoot for the moon!

WOOOHOOOOOO!

(And now, time for ballet. This week I have not done nearly as much as I've wanted to! My mountain trip went marvelously, by the way. I did get some hiking in, but other than that and about an hour or so of ballet, I was just too damn relaxed to do much of anything else... and it was great!)

Lifting Hips in Développé?

I've been struggling with not lifting my hips when doing développés. It seems like it CAN possibly be done, because it seems I am able to do it while on the floor, without gravity to bring me down. This article is interesting because it says that the hips are supposed to be lifted using the iliopsaos, not the quads. (It also has videos to go along with all of the seven exercises for leg extensions.)

I tried the "Thigh lift" last night and my iliopsaos was very elusive.

Then I came across this link while researching how to get my leg up higher. It's a video, inviting comments, of a ballet class DVD preview taught by Dmitri Roudnev (he's the one posting). He states it might be controversial, so of course I have to watch it:

The comments to his post bring up the fact that he teaches his students to lift the hips when performing extensions, instead of telling them to keep their hips straight like I've been hearing and reading. The first comment I see sums up the argument against what he is doing:

I just cannot fathom how it is beneficial; surely by teaching it in this way (referring to the developpe at 90) you are teaching the movement pattern of lifting the hip of the gesture/working leg to initiate the extension rather than developing strength and control in the legs, postural muscles and rotators etc?

 Here's Dmitri's explanation:

I believe the alignment should be the first priority in ballet training. Turn out is second priority. 

I believe for progressive training that 180 turn-out in all five positions are a must ( my school, the Bolshoi, believes the same, as well as many professionally oriented schools in the world ) At the same time, in order to keep the alignment correct, I believe the turn-out of the working leg should not be forced. 

The student in the video is a beginner ( 2 classes per week ). The video shows how much this beginner student is able to rotate the leg in a la second. It is a temporary look and it will change and improve as soon as she gets stronger.

So basically, he's saying it's okay to lift the hip as a beginner, that the beginner needs to develop the strength first, before working on keeping the hips lower and more turned out. To me, this makes sense (not just because I want it to!). For instance, I am working on my turnout, still. But just because I don't have perfect turnout doesn't mean I can't practice ballet. I work with the turnout I have, and also work on strengthening my hip rotators so I can increase my turnout. Likewise, he is saying nothing should be forced; build strength first and then the improvements in turnout, extension, will necessarily be improved so long as one is working on strengthening those areas.

I also came across this link, basically sayings screw all that, lift your hips for extension! And it posts quite a few photos of professional ballerinas doing leg extensions with their hips lifted. Such as these two:

Sylvie Guillem, former top-ranking dancer with Paris Opera Ballet, principal guest artist with the Royal Ballet in London

Students at Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis school, ABT's pre-professional division

 I just found a bunch more here:

So, I'm going to stop stressing so much over my lifted hips when I'm doing leg extensions. Honestly, they're hard enough as it is without my beating myself up over it. (They're one of those things that if I were to get focused on, I'd slide down into not wanting to continue ballet.) So, yes, I recognize that my ilipsaos needs to be a helluva lot stronger. I can't even isolate it at the moment. And I do think continuing to do floor barre may help me learn to isolate the right muscles. But when it comes to following along with the videos I watch, eh, I'm just going to do the best I can and that's going to have to be that. I can't control it right now, so, like I said, I'm not going to beat myself up over it.

I do find it interesting all the different ways I'm learning that ballet instructors can teach things. I didn't understand how there could be all sorts of different techniques when I started. I'm starting to get it now though ;)

Later today, I am off to the mountains with my dog, my friend, and his two dogs! I'm bringing all my ballet gear (well, I can't take my barre unfortunately!) and plan to hike, relax, read, and of course, do ballet. That's my next four days summed up (I hope!)

Intrinsic Foot Muscles

A great video for improving the point of the feet (via the intrinsic foot muscles):

(At first, I was like, "ah, I got this". Then it came to doing more intricate things with my left foot and... nope. I don't "got" it. I've been working on it about two days, though, and can somewhat squish my left toes together, which I couldn't do at all when I first tried. But really, from my understanding, being able to even come close to balancing on pointe, and to just have a nicely pointed foot at all, takes ability of detailed movement along with strength of those inner foot muscles, some of which some of us had never felt work before!)

And I get my Perfect Pointe book this weekend, yay!

It's a Yoga Day

I woke up today not really feeling the ballet vibe. It's Saturday, one of my two days off, and I really like to squeeze in as much ballet on the weekends as I can. So when I realized that vibe was going on, I was kinda disappointed but got through some chores and got on my leotard and got going. Made it through the warmup, but what next?

Nothing was sounding appealing. One of Kathryn Morgan skips the intros to the barre movements and just goes through the exercises- and there's music that's kinda nice. I put that on and started doing my own routine- plies, tendus, ronde de jambes. But by the time I got to the latter, I knew ballet just wasn't happening. But I'm still all dressed and want to do SOMETHING...

I found this, and it's great. In only a small number of poses, my back popped so many times (I love that feeling!) and I got SUCH a good stretch! I love it, and it's going on my flexibility playlist (along with the splits routines by the same group, PsycheTruth. I'm finding their videos are to my liking: no long intro, tough enough but not too difficult, and fairly brief, but not too brief.)

This one is another good one for the neck, shoulders, and upper back (the last exercise is the same as one in the video above).

I've really been slacking some lately on stretching. When I first started, I was doing it nightly, but I really haven't done it much at all in a few weeks. When I did, I was pretty much focusing solely on my lower body, since flexibility is great for extensions and such (and I will do splits one day!). But since starting the Conditioning for Dance book, I've been realizing how intertwined everything is- like the simple jump exercise I mentioned. So while getting more strength and flexibility is definitely going to help my cambre (ah, if cambre was done from the lower back, I'd be a pro at it), it's also going to help pretty much everything else in my body, including my leg extensions.

It's really neat not only learning how fascinating the body is, but to actually be able to experience it- the inter-connectivity- as well.

Inspiration

This is one of my favorite videos right now for inspiration:

And look, just LOOK at this amazing set:

Bolshoi Theater's set and costumes for Pyotr Tchaikovsky's "Sleeping Beauty"

I adore the movie Marie Antoinette because not only does it star one of my favorite actresses, Kirsten Dunst, but the costumes and the set and everything is just so colorful and opulent and breathtaking. The above photo nails it. Love it, and I so wish I could see this in person.

Ballet with Kathryn Morgan, Online Ballet Classes

I'm really taking my time going through Tamra Chace's online ballet classes. She doesn't have many, and those were put out a couple of years ago, with no more new ones since then. I have one or two that I haven't done or haven't done all the way through. I really like what she has out- it's taught me so much, and I repeat classes over and over.

I'm starting to need a little more difficulty, though, so I decided to start trying Kathryn Morgan's online ballet classes. She used to dance for the NYCB, so that's pretty cool. I tried half of the easy ballet barre class a couple of evenings ago, but wasn't into it. After a warmup and about 3/4 a class with Chace, I picked up where I'd left off on Morgan's easy ballet barre class.

I have to say, my first impression of the class included a bit of... irritation! Not because she isn't a good instructor, but because of the way she speeds through what we will be doing! It reminds me of watching the Royal City Ballet's class, where their teacher calls out what sounds like a few hundred ballet movements and everyone incredibly remembers every single thing that he said and the order it was said (and he doesn't even really do movements as an example). Ballerinas are inhuman!

So Morgan goes through at least one or two of the movements (that are repeated front, side, back, side, usually) completely (as in all of the front and second) then quickly through the rest (back, side, etc). But then she repeats what the movements are without moving, rattling them off like the RCB's instructor! My first thought was, "OMG, how am I going to DO this?????!!" "OMG, how do you expect me to DO this?????!!"

But once I got past my initial rebellion of doing something new, and I did some rounds along with Morgan, I started getting into it. It's definitely more difficult than Chace's- Chace is more of a very beginner's/basic technique style, while Morgan expects you to already know the movements... Guess what?! I DO know the movements now! I haven't honed in very well on my technique, of course, but I know what to do when she says relevé, battement dégagé, sur le cou-de-pied, or rond de jambe en l'air! (I haven't gotten to jumps and turns yet, besides a hint of piroutte attempts, so I don't know those other terms, and I'm also just now learning movement and that terminology, such as de côté.)

My timing on moving along to her class is perfect- I'd watched it briefly when I first started and there was no way I was going to be able to keep up. But now I more or less am able. I have trouble with the faster movements, like a fast battement dégagé or a one-beat rond de jambe, but that's good! It gives me something to work on and work towards, changing things up some.

Today, I discovered a website where you can actually take live ballet classes online! Kathryn Morgan actually offers some of these, and I think I am going to sign up for a class soon! I LOVE this idea! (It looks like you use your webcam so she can see what you're doing and give feedback!) There are some other ballet-oriented type classes, like yoga-ballet, but I haven't seen any other pure-ballet instructors. (A lot of the ballet-type classes are held during the day, no good if you work normal business hours.)

I also came across this subscription-based online class site (multiple dance forms, not sure if there are enough videos to justify several month's worth of subscriptions, but possibly a month or two, especially if you're interested in like lyrical or contemporary) and Mary Helen/Ballet Beautiful has live classes you can take (lots of classes scheduled, at various times (great even if you work 9-5), but they are expensive ($35/class or $280/month unlimited) and more importantly (to me, anyway), I'm not sure if it's actual ballet she is teaching or if it's more of a ballet-style workout (like her Ballet Beautiful DVD is, I think).

I may do some of Mary Helen's free videos on YouTube, and once I feel like I can keep up (I don't do much aerobic activity), I will probably try a class. I would love for it to be strictly ballet, and not a "ballet workout". Swinging $35/class is a bit much for now, but if her classes are exactly what I want, there are enough classes that would fit into my schedule (judging by what she has posted now) that would justify spending $280/month... not now but in the future.

I shall post if and when I try anything else new! More to come on what I'm working on with Finis!

(P.S. I actually found another subscription-based site. They have a free plan, so I signed up to see what it was about.  I got absolutely nothing with my free subscription and I see complaints on their Facebook page, so I won't be giving them any money!)

Conditioning for Dance

Yay! Today's mail brought "Basic Ballet Movement Skills" with Finis Jhung and "Conditioning for Dance: Training for Peak Performance in All Dance Forms" by Eric Franklin.

I'm actually going out tonight and I need to get some ballet in, otherwise I would spend the whole evening reading through that book. It looks awesome. I think it's precisely what I need. The drawings in it are just fantastic, and even a single exercise I did that took about three seconds shows that he's got some great (and new to me) material in there.

I don't think it would be a spoiler to tell you the exercise, in my own words: 1) Stand on both feet and jump in the air. Yes, just jump. 2) Stand on both feet, clench your teeth together and jump. That's it, but can you see the difference it makes on your jump when you clench your teeth? If your jaw can affect a movement that seemingly comes from the waist and below, what other tension is in the body that can be affecting movements in ways you'd never dreamed of?

I can't wait to start working on it! It looks like I am going to need to get some longer Therabands, though. Most of the exercises seem to use the really long ones, like more than twice the body's height. Definitely on my list now.

I'll check out the new Jhung DVD tomorrow- time for barre!

Tonight II

This evening's ballet went so much better than it has for a few days (which seems like weeks)! I was just totally into it. I could tell I'm making definite improvements: in posture, flexibility, and technique. When you're going every day it's a bit harder to tell the differences, but I feel like I kinda bummed out the last 3, maybe 4, days and just hadn't been into it.

I started with the usual Lisa Maree warm up. As I mentioned, I learned the basics of doing glissades. (I did a few more after that post, and those went well.) Then I did Tamra Chace's Lesson 4 Barre and half of the center. (I did quite a few exercises multiple times.) With both of them, especially the latter, I was doing so much better with balancing while shifting my weight. That's really tough, and I've definitely been struggling with it. But tonight I was even able to do rond de jambes almost without losing my balance.

I just felt the placement of my body better. When I was on one leg, I was able to center myself better. I was frequently able to remind myself of the little details besides just doing the exercises, especially regarding my posture. And yet, I was also able to let go of the posture issue a little. I think that's one of the things that's been bumming me out- all the things I see wrong with my body. But tonight it was more of "yes, pull up in the spine, working on pulling the bottom of the ribs back, but just notice it, shift if needed, and let go." When I'm not so focused on everything that's wrong with me, I can actually notice the things that are right! I even felt "ballerina-like", especially doing derriere developpes en releve! I think that was the highlight.

This video caught my attention while I was browsing through videos: How to Do Développé à la Seconde. I briefly looked at their website and they seem to have quite a few videos like this that are ballet-oriented. The preview looks pretty good. I like seeing the muscles that are working, where they are and what they are doing. When I am able to visualize something in my head, I'm better able to do it when it makes sense what I'm doing.

Anyway, I worked a lot longer than I expected and it's almost my bedtime! So I'm going to cut this short. But I do want to say I am SO glad I had a good session tonight! It's very inspiring; I was getting worried I was just going to give up. But the obsession remains strong!

Keeping up with the 9-year olds...

It's difficult to determine which children's class would be best for an adult beginner to take. At the school I mentioned I may be able to take lessons from, they have a "Grade 2" that's supposed to be for 9-year olds. (It's not RAD. There's the preschool levels, then grades 1-5 with an "advanced" third along with non-advanced third, and the most advanced divisions are 4 & 5 with the last being company/advanced.) I looked up 9-year old ballet on YouTube and came up with this:

Damn! If that's what's expected of the 9-year olds, I'm going to need to be in class with the 3-year olds! Haha! (From all I've read, 9 is usually the youngest age I've seen recommended for pointe except in cases where the child's bones have matured quickly. The 10-year old class would fit so much better in my schedule. Any lower and I'll have to leave work early... a possibility, especially if I work lunch. But I don't really have any clue where I need to be in regards to the grades.)

Loosen Tight Hamstrings

Believe it or not, this really works! Basically all you do is step on a tennis ball! Try with your tighter leg first then compare that leg to the one you haven't tried this on.

I'd love to know your results! Leave a comment!

Swayback/Lordosis

I have been using the terms "swayback" and "lumbar hyperlordosis" interchangeably. The terms may mean different things (IANAD- I am not a doctor!). But they are very similar and I don't know which one I have, but once I figure it out I will use the correct term.

And today's the day of my first ballet class! This evening will very possibly have a big impact on my life: if I love the class, ballet is possibly going to become even more important in my life. I will likely be spending even more time actually doing ballet- and more time and money getting to ballet class. (I'm already considering driving an hour or so to next Monday's ballet class in the other town that's nearby. It's an hour and a half long class- definitely more worth the two hour round-trip drive than just a one-hour class. It's also at that really awesome-sounding place that lets adults try out for the pre-professional level classes, the only one of the sort I have seen anywhere close by!)

Now, if I don't like it... I don't know. I don't know what will happen. Maybe I will see if I like the class out of town more, and just try to get there as much as I can. Maybe... if... what if I don't like ballet at all???

Ha, yeah, I worry too much. I'm sure it will go fine tonight. I hope so! (Maybe I will be able to move on to better posts as well... since I've already got nearly 50 posts on my ballet blog and yet I have never even taken a single ballet class! I may actually hate ballet! LOL)

I did all of Finis Jhung's DVD exercises at least once. (I like his rond de jambes too!) I watched the previews for a bunch of his videos and decided to just go ahead and exchange the beginner barrework for beginner center work. It seems to be "dancier". So that will be in soon. I should probably write a review here for the first one. I'll try to get to that.

Tibial torsion... taping?

I've been really focused on this tibial torsion, if you can't tell. What's interesting to me is that I can actually twist my knee around to the place it should be at. I was looking up more videos on it and came across this one. Judging by his uploads, he seems to be a massage therapist. No, I don't believe a random massage therapist on the internet is an expert on anatomy, but he is doing something that actually occurred to me to do: taping the knee and surrounding area to it's ideal position on someone with T.T. He says that T.T. occurs because the sartoris, gracilis, and semitendinosus (hamstring) muscles are weak, and not pulling the knee where it is supposed to be. (I've heard the hamstring mentioned regarding this a lot- no clue about the other muscles.)

Lately, when I've been stretching my left leg, I've been focusing on using my leg muscles to turn my tibia externally. I am able to do this; I don't need to use my hands, so this tells me it IS possible to get the knee back in place. It seems like, well, just what he's said and others have said- certain muscles are weak and certain muscles are too tight.

In the video, traylbodywork shows himself taping a patient's knee into the right position. I recently considered doing something like this myself, but wasn't sure if it was a good or at least decent idea, or a terrible one. But apparently, "Kineseo Taping" is a thing. I'm intrigued.

I was about to whip out some duct tape this evening, but I don't want to mess with my class tomorrow. This could be a very bad idea. It could mess up my knee even worse. But my intuition tells me there is something to it. After class tomorrow (or the next evening), I am going to be my own guinea pig. I'm going to try this taping business out. While continuing to focus on it the way I have been. I'm really convinced this is fixable. We're going to find out! (I am going to try to take some decent photos before I try this so I can have something for comparison in the future.)

A better day...

I think my theory was pretty dead-on: I took last night off from ballet, and just did a lot of body rolling. (Funnily, I think I am just going to roll for a few minutes and then those minutes turn into an hour or more! I love my foam roller!) Today, it took me awhile but I finally got SO into the ballet I was doing, and I was enjoying it so much. I was totally into it, totally focused, loving it, and refining my technique. Especially the ronde de jambs (en terre). Usually, I'm so focused on just getting my leg around that I neglect making sure I'm staying turned out, but today, I stayed very well turned out, and it seemed a lot easier today.

Speaking of turnout, my turnout this afternoon was way better than it has been. And I am almost certain it's from the rolling I've been doing. (Posted the previous yesterday 11/15. The rest today 11/16. So I'll be speaking about that day as "yesterday" from now on.) I did the thing where you hold your feet in 6th, go back on your heels, and turnout from there, supposedly a rough way of finding your real turnout. Well, yesterday when I did it, I went a noticeable difference outwards than usual, and I wasn't forcing it. It just happened!

Yesterday, I ended up doing The Ballet Workout (Lisa Maree), what I think is now my favorite class out of all of the online classes: Year One, Lesson 5 Barre (Tamra Chace) -only 25 minutes, but I always do both sides, making for at least 40 minutes plus I did several of my favorites twice or more on each side; some hip abduction exercises, Lisa Maree's Back Stretches, Follow Along Abs Workout (LM), and the 12-minute Splits Stretch by Psyche Truth. Plus some rolling. All in all, about 4 solid hours of ballet!

Maya Plisetskaya: Bolero

I really do not know ballerinas. My interest/obsession with ballet has come extremely fast. I believe I mentioned I never really got into ballet, preferring to go to theater or such instead. I think my tastes must be refining now, and/or I am gaining a new-found appreciation for ballet, because I am liking watching it much more (if only on YouTube for now). I have never seen this, and at first was totally unimpressed, but the longer I watched it, the more enchanted I became:

Back in the day, when I was 16 or so, I could dance. Really well. And it lasted from around the age of 16-20. I danced a lot. I wasn't allowed out much when I was younger, so I taught myself how to dance in my room when I was younger, stereo cranked up as loud as my parents allowed, watching myself in the mirror. I was young. I was active. I was in touch with my body. I could move. I wasn't as graceful and beautiful as Plisetskaya, and I certainly wasn't anything close to flexible, but had I had interest and seen this, I think I could have done my arms in a vague semblance of what she was doing. It wouldn't have been her, but my own take. It's kind of how I used to move, in touch with my body, in tune with the music.

Now, however, I am so out of touch with my body! I've always been a "thinker" rather than a "feeler", which ha always kept me in my head more than in the world around me. But at some point I got disconnected from my body. I've forgotten how to move it. I'm twisted up, cranked up tight like a coil, in some areas- muscles here taut from holding them in stress and anxiety, muscles there limp, lax, from underusing them. I don't know this body I'm in anymore, and it's kinda sad, but time to change it!!

Today's ballet...

I found myself cutting things a little short last night. I expect perfection from myself, and the ability to do things days after learning, and that lack of patience is just not going to cut it. As an example, yesterday evening, I was working on doing some things on demi-pointe. Really basic stuff- tendus, plies, frappes. And it's HARD to balance on demi. I was at my barre, and I was getting frustrated at my lack of ability to let go without falling sideways.

I've also been working on Finis Jhung's first beginner DVD, and (too cool! I am sitting outside on my laptop, it's fall, and there's a huge flock of sparrows, the seem to be. They all got in two of the trees, and suddenly, they all TOOK OFF in two separate groups, one one way and the other the other, meeting up on another tree. The WHOOSH of their wings was absolutely incredible. My dog, an 8-month-old pit bull pup, is in awe!) he gets to doing some pretty complicated (for a beginner) moves. While doing the moves, he asks us to see if we can lift up just a bit on our heels- while already standing on one foot, and moving the other leg around. It's very difficult, though it LOOKS quite simple, and as I said, I expect way too much from myself and got frustrated when I wasn't able to do what he was asking.

I DID manage to do pretty well on the eight lesson on the DVD, which was the first time I really felt like I was "doing ballet". That one is complicated, too, and I only got it really well once, so I plan to go back soon and work on that until I really have it down.

I always start with Ballet Barre Workout by Lisa Maree on YouTube. As of right now, today's workout, I am on a quick break from Beginner Ballet Year One Lesson 3 (Center) with Tamra Chase. I like the center work because it is still difficult but not impossible for me to do. Even some of her barre work I still do not have the strength to do. But I'm really working on my form today and some of the lesson I skipped over before I am now working on really getting down (like the epaulments and port de bra en face and en croix).

This is supposed to be fun for me, and I need to get over the fact that it can be monotonous. This has always been my problem before: I learn some to be able to say I've done it, but when it comes to perfecting, refining the technique, I get bored and move onto something else. (This is a theme in my life.) But I still REALLY want to get more flexible and graceful, I really want to eventually get on pointe (yes, I know there are no promises and maybe I shouldn't make that a goal- especially considering I've never even had an actual live class, but it is), I really want to be able to hold beautiful poses, and I'd really love to perform even something small one day. I've always lacked self-discipline in my life, and through ballet, I hope to gain that.