Ballet Dancing - Add a Touch of History to your Dancing

Ballet dancing history is interesting and probably different to what you are taught in schools.  I love exploring different aspects of ballet dancing history and writing about them to share with other ballet dancing lovers.

Anna Pavlova started off as a young dancer in Russia and she faced stiff competition from a large bevy of imported hotshot Italian Ballerinas.  They had fancy tricked out shoes and formidable technique, with brilliant pirouettes and even an unheard of thirty two fouettes.  Pavlova worked hard to try and mould herself to be like them.

Fortunately her wise teacher, Pavel Gerdt, advised her to leave off the tricks and rather develop her own unique qualities of lyricism, expressivity and delicacy.  In the end Pavlova won out as the Romantic Dancer of the time, and she went on to become world famous.

Of course she never stopped working on her technique and used her point work to convey achingly beautiful vulnerability.  She became a legend of her time by using her self-expression rather than showing off fantastic technique.

Ballet dancing joy lies not just in doing steps, but in the way that you dance them and show the pleasure of expression through movement.

Ballet history is interesting and can be a lot of fun.  It’s rich and glamorous, and also important in your education if you are taking dancing in a serious way.  You can develop informed artistry when you understand the difference between the ways a sylph holds her arms as opposed to the sugar plum fairy.  History has a way of contributing to your own dancing personality.