Blog Post #3

Hello everyone! I am very excited to be posting on my blog today because I have made so, so, so much progress since the last time I updated you.  I have been working in the studio every Saturday and Sunday morning and I have also been using the studio on Mondays and Wednesdays with the help of my dance friends.  Along with this studio time, I have been practicing at home too.  We are redecorating our living room, so the rug was taken out and now there is a tile floor in its place.  This is a great place to practice my turns because there is no furniture, and the hard floor is good for turning.  I am so pleased with how much I have improved and even though I have a lot to work on, I am confident that my end goal will be achieved in the next week or two. 

            The most help I have gotten on my turns was from my ballet teacher, Miss Kim.  After working with her for just a few minutes, she gave me the exact corrections I needed to improve the control of my turns.  Also, she gave me an explanation of the muscles that need to be engaged the most in the turns, and the ones I should be tightening the most when trying to rotate.  I have used her corrections in the studio this past week and I have noticed a lot of improvement.  I have gone from not being able to complete one without help of the ballet barre to support me, to being able to do three complete turns most of the time.  I only need to be able to complete one more with the addition of a double turn ending.  This goal should not be too far beyond my reach.  However, this is not all I have to work on.

            What I think my turns look like vs. what they actually look like when I watch a video of myself are two very different things.  Sometimes I feel like I executed a turn perfectly, but after watching the video, I see that I look like someone who has never danced a day in their life.  This scares me because as a dancer, it’s all about how I look when I’m dancing, that’s the whole point.  But in order to improve, I have to get over the embarrassment of looking like a flailing fish, and use it to help me improve.  I’ve found that using this technique of watching myself in a video, helps a lot with making corrections to make the turns look better.

            Another strategy I have used is watching other dancers complete the turns and sometimes listen to their explanation of what they focus on while executing the turns.  By watching them, I usually pick up on details of their leg placement, arm placement, and where they focus their eyes while turning.  Then, when I try the turn, I attempt to mirror their actions and see how these details help me. 

            Some things I know need work with my turn is the extension of my rotating leg and making sure that it is ALL THE WAY straight.  Otherwise, this turn will not look very graceful.  Also, I have to work on getting all the way up on releve, meaning I have to push harder off the floor to stand higher on my tippy toes.  Another thing I must work on is the rotation of my leg and making sure I rotate it all the way to the side rather than just leaving it out in front of me.  These are the three things I will be working on in the next few weeks to accomplish my goal.  

            A big part of doing these turns is having the right amount of resistance and rotation against the floor.  I’ve been asking around and researching which shoes are the best for fouetté turns.  I have concluded that either ballet shoes or half-soles are the best kinds of shoes to use for fouetté turns.  Here are these two shoes:

These are ballet shoes.  They are used in most ballet classes from beginner to advanced. 

These are half-soles.  These shoes are used in contemporary and lyrical and are made specifically for turning because of the padding under the toe area.  

            So after many takes, I decided to put a short video together of my progress with the turns so far.  In this video you will find some failures, and some ‘okay’ attempts to completing the turn.  The hard part of this project for me is putting myself out there and being okay with failing and sharing my failures with all of my blog readers.  However, to show my progress I have to show you all how it’s been going, even if I do look like a flailing fish.  Because of the perfectionist side of me, I would rather wait until I have completely and perfectly executed the turn before showing anyone at all, but hopefully this will open me up to a whole new world of embarrassing fails and room for improvement.  Embracing my failures may help me with improvement, so here goes nothing... Talk to you soon!

Blogs I’ve commented on:

Margo Kaplan

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