All Nutcrackers Out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Keshet- Nutcracker on the rockse:  Already talked about it

Popejoy Hall Nutcracker:  Well of course it was good. It was professional dancers. the main character, Clara, was 17, and she was and amazing dancer. Everything was perfect. Their was more ballet in this one then the other two (Starlet and Keshet, Nutcracker on the rocks). All of the dancers were on pointe. They also had very exquisite costumes. This one is my favorite so far.

Starlet:I want to talk about Meghan’s and china’s nutcracker. It was less dancing then I thought. Well to my standards, it followed the line of the nutcracker pretty well.  There was less dancing, which I thought was weird. And there was more acting, but it was a good show. They also had little children like 2 and 3 years old that were mice and sheep, which added a little less professional style to the performance, but they were really cute. They were so little!!!!!!!!!! That is what I thought of the performance. Only the main characters were on pointe.

BRT Nutcracker: I still need to see it so get back to you on that!!!

Nutcracker on the Rocks

Last night i saw Nutcracker on the rocks. It was really good.  To my surprise Vladimir, the guy I shadowed, was the nutcracker. He is such a good dancers. I was very impressed. None of them wore shoes, and then they were spinning, jumping, and doing developes, which for me I need shoes for. Also, for the snowflakes they had some disable children come and do some stuff, while the others danced around. Vladimir danced with a wheelchairs girl. And then there was the rat queen. She was the best dancer out of all of them. She was strong and limber, but Vladimir is just strong, which there is slight difference.  She really could show emotion with her face, and she really acted her part. Where Marie, the main character, shows emotion through her face, but if felt like she was just going through the movements.

(I was very sad becuase i wanted someone to wear the red pointe shoes.)

Do you get different tutus when at different stages, or different dances?

Do you get different tutus when at different stages, or different dances?

This is a question I has when I was learning about tutus. I think that it is with diffrent stages, but i'm not sure. The book i read it seemed like the diffrent stages.

Bodies Exibit

Today, November 8^th, I will be writing about the Bodies exhibit I went to yesterday. It was amazing. It talked about the temprial bone (the bone that is your temple bone). It talked about how male and female hips are different. It talked about how smoking is back for your lungs. It talked about the heart and the nerves. Also, it talked about MRIs, and how they work. It talked about fatty foods, and where all the fat goes in our body. It also talked about why we love fatty foods so much. It talked about the bone growth of babies. A lot of this stuff doesn’t have much to do with dancing, but some of it does.

                Like the heart and nerves. Your need your heart when dancing, so that all of your muscles get oxygen. So they can move the way you want it to. You need nerves to that you can feel when  your legs are doing without having to look at them constantly.

                Also, you can’t eat very fatty foods either. It doesn’t matter as much if you eat fatty foods, but in the end it does affect your body, which could affect your dancing. Fatty foods make your plack build up, and then after a while you have a blood clot.

                You need your lungs to supply your body with nutritious oxygen. It you have a black lung how can you get your muscles their oxygen to move. You can’t. So smoking can affect the way you dance because it will make you out of breath easier. It also will make your  muscles ache and hurt from oxygen cut-off. 

Tutus

A tutu is a symbol of a ballerina just like Pointe shoes.
        The first kind of tutu is the bell shaped skirt in various sizes and shapes, which timeframe was from the seventeenth century to 1832. Until 1832, ballet dance steps were simple, bu when they started to get more complicated the tutus got shorter to reveal the intricate foot work. Then came the classical tutu, which was a projection shirt attached to ruffed underpants. This freed and exposed the whole leg, while concealing, for modesty, the ballerinas bottom. A piece was placed in the tutu to separate the waistband from the skirt,called a yoke, which helped the ballerina look taller by showing their waist and hips.
        A Classical tutu is traditionaly made with seven ruffled layers of either soft mesh or a very stiff net. The soft mesh makes the tutu look gentle, and the stiff net makes the tutu stick straight out. The seamstresses sews the longest mesh on top and workes her way down to the shortest. The top of the tutu, which is the longest, is called the tutu plate. The tutus decorations are sewn on there.
    While tutus are beautiful, they usually take 40 hours to make.
                 Bell-shaped Tutu

 Soft mesh tutu
 Very stiff net Tutu

Drumline

On Sunday, i went to see a production of Drumline, at Popyjoy. Drumline is the best marchin band people from all over,  put on one stage. It blew me away. But that is not what i'm here to talk about. I'm here to talk about the dancers. There were five dancers, and all girls.They did all kinds of dances, mostly modern. But they also did different decades, and the woman dances like they were from that decade.  To name some they did, jitterbug, modern, and waltz. It was really fascinating to see their foot works, how they dressed, facial expressions, and much more. I will be holding on to the tickets and the postcard for Drumline because  the next tangent I’m going to be moving into soon is the history of dance, so I will need to be thinking about the Drumline’s dancers costumes, and their dances.

Going to See Vladimir

Last Monday, i went to see Vladimir. I saw him teach a two hour ballet and a rehearsal to a dance he was creating, which i will see sometime in march. It was AMASING!!!!!!!!!! He is such a good teacher. His philosophy is, since their college students, bad habits are like ingrained since they started dancing. So Vladimir tells them their correction, and makes them do it until they get it right. He corrects them every time the do it wrong. He thinks of it as planting a seed in their brain, when he tells them what they need to correct. Then each time he tells them their doing it wrong he is watering the seed, until it blossom or the bad habit goes away.
    He is so creative!! For the rehearsal he did this really modern crazy dance. The moves were really different. But in he end when they did it wit music. It looked good.

Enrico Ceccheti

           Enrico Ceccheti was born in rome. He was an Italian ballet dancer, mime, and founder of the Ceccheti method. He was born in a costume room of Tearto Tordinona in rome. Also, he was born into a family of dancers. Both of his parents were dancers. After a while of danceing, he went to dance for the Imperial Ballet. Later in life, he further tweaked his dancing in Russia. He was complimented for his agility, strength, and his ability to dance. Soon, he turned to teaching. Some of his students include other notable dancers of the Imperial Ballet. He taugt mostly modern.

Anna Pavlova

She was widely known for her performances. She was said to be the finest ballerina in history, and was the best at Imperial Russian Ballet. Also, she was the first ballerina to tour the world with her own company.
       Anna's love for ballet started when her mother took her to a performance of The Sleeping Beauty. The wondrous performance imprinted Anna. After seeing that, Anna, eight years old, had her mom take her to auditioned for Imperial Ballet School, which she didn't get in because she was eight. But at ten, Anna auditioned again, and with success. This is when Anna appeared on stage for the first time, in the production of Un conte do fees(a fairy tale).
                Anna's training was difficult, because classical ballet didn't come easily to her. She had severely arched feet, thin ankles, and long limbs. All of those kept clashing when she tried to dance. Since she was so bad, the other kids nicknamed her "The Broom" or " La petite sauvage." Although she was horrible, Anna trained to improve her dancing. Also, she took extra classes from teachers too. Soon enough she had it down, and she was moved up into Prima ballerina, which means almost ballerina.

Fitting Pointe Shoes

When you get your first Pointe shoes, you should really try to get your teacher to come with you because they know much more about Pointe shoes them you do at the begining. Make sure that in Pointe shoes you can go to demi- pointe. Also, the Pointe shoe should be three sized smaller from normal shoe size, and one width wider.

How a Pointe Shoe is Made

The block that your toes stand on is made from layers and layers of fabric then dipped in glue. The glue hardens. The fabric cushions and supports your toes. I thought it was a wooden block that was wrapped with one layer of fabric. The heel of the Pointe shoe is made the same, except thinner. Then the block and heel i covered by leather, and there is your Pointe she These are some of my questions about Pointe shoes:

If we change the block in the Pointe shoe, What effects would it have on the dancer, feet, and the movements? If you put more fabric in the heel/ sole, what would it effect, when dancer is dancing?

UNM Dancers

I have got two UNM dancers, who are willing to let me shadow them. One is names Vladimir Conde Reche, and he teachers modern, ballet, and choreographs some dances that are shown at Popyjoy. He agreed to let me shadow him, and he is amazing at dancing!!! The  other is named Stacia Smith, and she makes all the costumes for the performance at Popyjoy. I can't shadow her until next  ssemester, but i'm still excited. Vladimir on left, and Stacia on right
                                     

Two Famous People

There are two people who during this dance study i will b researching. One is Anna Pavlova, who is a russian ballet dancer. She is so beautiful on pointe. It is amazing how a person can be beautiful on pointe. Also, i am going to be researching Enrico Cecchetti who was  a italian ballet dancer. He loved dancing!! He helped Russia evolve better pointe shoes. Afterward, he went on to teach where he taught Anna Pavlova the Russian ballet and the Italian ballet. Here are some pictures of them Anna on left and Enrico on right:

                                                       

Have You Been Stretching?

I have been stretching out my gracilis because i have been trying to get my splits down. I have been stretching over 12 muscles just in my thigh when i do my split.  It is amazing how many muscles in our body we have. Also, i have been reading this book about the muscles in the body, and how to stretch all of  them. For stretching the thigh there are more then 36 stretches. It just blows me away.

Here is the thigh, and most of its components.

Starting Up!!

I have wanted to have a dance blog for a while, and now i get to have my very own. I'm so excited!!!  I hope you are as excited as i am. Also, here is a video to get you started, and excited. a very pretty dance.