I’m truly a technical writer when it comes to ballet. I have been on a team that trained world class ballet dancers, even some famous dancers. Now I appreciate the situation of the recreational dancer, one who may never be a prima ballerina. But who shouldn’t love dance?For example, can ballet pictures of one of […]

Any artistic director of ballet dancers, sports coaches, and recreational dance teachers want to help professionals and students alike to exercise prevention for overuse injuries and repetitive stress injuries that lead to chronic injury. A ballet dancer, dance student or professional sports trainee expects chronic pain. Chronic muscle pain is caused by excessive muscle tension. […]

The psoas muscle, or hip flexor, plays a huge part in a ballet workout. The psoas muscle runs from the thigh to the anterior or front of the spine. As a hip flexor, or a muscle that bends the hip joint, lifting the thigh, this muscle is responsible for your higher leg extensions to devant, […]

A martial artist dance fan asked me recently this question: a ballet dancer looks extremely flexible, and she has the strength to hold her legs up and use them at these extreme angles. And this fan was wondering if it is core strength ballet dancers use in order to be able to support their legs […]

Dirty Dancing, the most romantic movie of the last 25 years. Do you still remember Frances “Baby” Houseman and Johnny Castle? You might hear their names more often these days, as it is 25 years ago that there love story hit the cinemas and touched all our hearts. It is the story of the 17 […]

Strength training for getting into pointe shoes. Every foot movement you do at the ballet barre in class, will build strong enough foot muscles for pointe work, if you learn to push down into the floor, creating resistance in the motion. At the same time, you pull up away from the leg movement with your […]

Flexibility Exercises For Dancers – Muscles That Get Left Out Dancers want to get higher leg extensions and fluid movements. Usually when they think about flexibility exercises they want to focus on the obvious muscles like: the hamstrings, and hamstring stretches for higher leg extensions to the front the adductors, for higher leg extensions to […]

I am enthused after seeing a trailer about a new television series about classical ballet. “Breaking Pointe”, premiering on the CW May 31st, looked promising to me until I found out it is a new reality show. Uh oh! I am wondering how the subcultural world of classical ballet will be spun for tv viewers. […]

Many who danced in childhood think about getting back into adult ballet. And why not? Even if you feel old and stiff, all you have to do is learn a set of flexibility exercises you can do daily, and perhaps some extra foot exercises to work on strengthening those foot muscles faster. There’s nothing better […]

Pink satin pointe shoes are every ballet student’s dream. Whether you are a child starting ballet, or an adult ballet classes beginner, I know you want to get ahead and try to be among the best in your class.  If  for some reason you think this is not an outcome that you can achieve, I […]

Taking ballet classes, or adult ballet class, in dance pointe shoes, particularly if you have started before you are strong enough to dance in pointe shoes, will reveal  weaknesses in your foot structure that probably you were never aware of. In this case, and under any circumstances,  if you experience top of foot pain, please […]

Stretching exercises for ballet require a comprehension of typical warm up exercises done in classical dance classes, and of course, some basic ballet positions. A beginner in ballet learns the five foot positions  early in training, even if if they can not immediately do the more difficult fifth position and fourth crossed position. These two […]

To prepare your ballet footwork for pointe shoes, concentrate on the single factor which will make up for perhaps not getting exactly the right fit with your first pair of toe shoes. It is not the ballet shoe ribbons or the toe padding that you use. It is not your teacher, or the type of […]

Dancers aspiring to get into adult ballet class like to plan for some extra training in between classes, to build those ballet muscles. You can use your ballet barre exercises to build muscle power, perhaps choosing different ones each day so that you can recover properly. Your large thigh muscles, your quads, can tolerate some extra […]

Maybe you are still just thinking about whether to start an adult ballet class. And you wonder about stretching exercises – where do you begin. Probably you are a little more limber than the “average” adult who would like to dance, maybe in adult ballet. You have a feel for movement and love music and […]

Foot pain, particularly foot arch pain, can cripple cheer leaders and students in ballet dancing. Athletes of all kinds, and runners specifically, also experience foot pain if they do not wear adequate sports shoes. Well before ballet dancers go to buy pointe shoes, before cheer leaders get into dance competitions and athletes run marathons, the […]

Of all the Romeo And Juliet ballet movies I have seen, This Opera National De Lyon production filmed in 1992 was a surprise for me. I could see from the DVD cover image that it is a modern ballet, easy to spot since Juliet is not wearing pointe shoes, and Romeo is wearing a suit. […]

When I was young and taking ballet classes I used to pour over ballet pictures for hours. Ballet movies were not yet generally available and they showed up few and far between in the movie theaters. Without knowing it, I was engaging in what would be called brain games, or creative visualization. After I got […]

Many people would like to take adult ballet. And even dream about achieving the ballet technique to get into ballet pointe shoes. And why not. Is this you? Traditionally, this idea has seemed to be something strictly off limits. Yet, if an adult was to gain the ballet technique, starting at just once a week, […]

Ballet turnout is important. But not in the way you think. First of all, many people have turnout from their hip joint, and some do not. This depends on the way your hip joint is shaped. (One of a few factors). Some people have hips that hold the top of the thigh bone in a […]