by Amy Brandt | May 10, 2024 | Pointe+, Technique, Training
There is nothing quite as beautiful as a smooth and perfectly cantilevered penché. “I love the idea of what penché represents,” says Alicia Graf Mack, dean and director of the dance division at The Juilliard School. “It is one of the largest iterations of a simple...
by Gavin Larsen | Dec 5, 2023 | Pointe+, Technique, Training
When Carolina Ballet Theatre dancer Marja’ Miller was 13, she hit a plateau. Although she’d always been super-motivated in class, she suddenly didn’t seem to be progressing as fast as she used to. Looking around, she saw her classmates advancing and getting more...
by Katie Slattery | Sep 27, 2022 | Technique
Gen Horiuchi, Saint Louis Ballet’s executive and artistic director, achieved the type of storied career many dancers dream of: After growing up in a ballet family in Japan (both of his parents were professional dancers), he won the Prix de Lausanne and was offered a...
by Katie Slattery | Dec 1, 2021 | Technique
As a dancer, former Orlando Ballet principal Katia Garza was a remarkable talent when it came to turning and jumping in a manège. She could make the Sugarplum Fairy’s piqué turns look effortless, and she was equally impressive when performing a circle of double sauts...
by Katie Slattery | Sep 2, 2021 | Technique
Some dancers may seem born to turn, but most of us spend years in the studio working to improve our pirouettes and fouettés. Is there a secret to turning well? Magaly Suárez, founder and artistic director of The Art of Classical Ballet in Pompano Beach, Florida, has...
by Katie Slattery | Mar 9, 2021 | Instagram, Technique, Training
What is it that makes walking in ballet so difficult to perform well? And why does a movement that seems so simple cause many dancers to feel uncomfortable and awkward? Raymond Lukens, associate emeritus and former artistic director of the ABT National Training...
by Julie Diana Hench For Dance Spirit | Aug 5, 2019 | Training
Updated 9/26/22. In theory, partnered pirouettes should be easier than regular pirouettes, right? After all, there are not one, but two of you there to make lots of smooth, glorious rotations happen. But in practice, they can be…complicated. (Just ask Kristi Capps,...
by Chava Pearl Lansky | Jan 2, 2018 | Uncategorized
Though self-described “ballerina artist” Grace Earp, 17, has been drawing her whole life, she only started ballet three years ago. Earp, an Irvine, CA native, had been selling her art—mostly of cartoon princesses and animals—at conventions like...