Chassés are in the Air

It's that time. Spring is finally starting to show it's buds. This is the time of the year when dancers start planning what they are going to do dance-wise for the summer.

Some decide not to do anything. They figure, "I've been dancing all year, so my body needs some sort of break!" Although this is partly true, a complete break will not help your body. Yes, it is alright to take small breaks from dancing, but you must still keep in shape. If you do not stay in shape through the summer season it will be that much harder to get back into it in the fall. So, resting your body from dancing can be helpful, but only in certain situations. Those such as an injury of any sort are all acceptable reasons to take a break for a couple of months. If you continue to work through your injuries, they will only get worse as time goes on.

It is safe to say that the best option for your body during the summer is to keep dancing. Maybe at a lower intensity level, but still make sure to be dancing. That way, your body is still comfortable with the movements and it will take less pain to get back into the techniques. If you plan to take on a lower intensity level of classes for the summer, make sure that your body still stays in shape. Meaning, make sure that your cardio endurance stays at the same level or even increases, and that your muscle tone still stays the same, or gets better. Again, this continuing of training throughout the summer will help your body out a lot more when it comes time for the next season of dance in schools. The less amount of time that you have to spend on getting yourself back into shape, the more time is able to be put into working on your technical ability throughout the year!

Tech Week!!

It's here! Tech week. This is the time when EVERYONE goes crazy. Whether you are a teacher, a choreographer, a dancer, or someone in the tech crew, this week always holds some sort of suprise that will change something about the impending show. The added stress of these changes such as a different costume or a new formation then results in the stress that turns everyone crazy throughout the course of the week.

So, I decided to give some pointers that might help those of you who are going though the same thing...
1) Sleep. If you do not schedule in time for yourself to sleep every night, then the week is going to be very hard on you. I mean, you are already asking your body to do a lot, and then not sleeping just becomes too much.
2) Make sure that you eat healthily. This will help give your body the energy it needs from the proper nutrition. That will then increase your overall energy level which will help your performance.
3) Try to do your work as early as possible. This will decrease the added stress of too much homework along with extended rehearsals. The sooner you get it done, the better!
4) Keep your life as stress free as possible. Meaning, if you have had an issue with your friend for the past month that you are dying to argue with her about, this is not the week. You should give all your extra energy into focussing on your tasks ahead in the week, not yelling about a missing hairbrush. ;)
5)Check your schedule. There is nothing worse than missing a tech for a dance because you didn't know that it was happening. That then causes an inconvience to everyone participating and will not start the week off well.

Well, those are just a few to get you started, but I hope that they help! Remember, although tech week can be a very crazy time, the more time that you spend thinking and really preparing for it the better you will be able to perform!

If you don't put gas in the car, you can't go to the mall.

You wanted it, so here it is Cate :P

My dance teacher here at college is quite a character. She has a few jokes that she tells very often in class to try and illustrate points that she is trying to make. One of them is "If you don't put gas in the car, then you can't go to the mall." What she means by that is you have to eat in order to perform at the best of your ability.

No matter how many times she says it, you have to admit that she has a point. Proper nutrition is an essential to daily life. If your body is not healthy, it restricts many areas of your life. Meaning, if you do not eat enough, or if you are eating unhealthily, then you are not treating your body with the respect that it deserves. The problem that occurs more often in dancers is that they do not eat enough, and this is the problem that my teacher is most concerned with. If you are not eating as much as your body needs then it is hard for the dancer to get the maximum energy that they need. Dancing takes a lot out of the dancer. So many muscles are used that without the proper nutrition to give them strength it can be near impossible.

These days, the image of a dancer is very thin, but still very strong. If the dancer decides to not eat in order to achieve this then it is pointless. Especially since muscles can not be built on a diet of nothing.

The point is, teachers can be right sometimes, no matter how much you might not like that to be true. And really, "If you don't put gas in the car, you can't go to the mall," so eat. Keeping a healthy body is one of the best things a dancer can do to to improve in your dancing.

Duende!!!

So, today I had modern class and some recurring themes came up that I thought I share with you!! The concept that we have been talking about throughout the semester is that of duende. According to dictionary.com, duende is "the ability to attract others through personal magnetism and charm," but it's SO much more than that.

Duende is a way of life. It's what they call it when you are so passionate about something that it just explodes into every other area of your life. It is so important that you have some area in your life that you feel this way about. Otherwise, you will have nothing else to drive you and keep you moving when life seems hard.

For me and all the other dancers that I know, dance is the activity where I find and pour all of my duende into. It even comes to a point where I feel like if I don't put any of my personality into the steps, then I am not really dancing at all. Sometimes in a class the teacher throws out extremely hard steps that are so fast that they seem insurmountable. However, I have found that as long as you throw a little duende into the movement, it immediately become easier.

A dancer without duende is like a car without an engine- it won't work. Sure, technique is important, but it's not the most important thing. If the dancer does not show any sort of passion while dancing it makes it really boring for anyone who is watching. The people who get the jobs are the ones who convince the judges through their passion that they need to dance. They put so much emotion into it that the audience will think that if they didn't have the ability to do the movement, then they might just die.

So, even if you are not a dancer, you should still be using duende in some area of your life. If you do not have something that you are so passionate about that helps you get away from the world, then you need to look into some new activites. We are all human, and sometimes the best way to get through our struggles is to use a little duende and get away from the world for awhile.

ACDFA= Awesome

So, I'm sorry that i haven't written a post in a long time... but i was at ACDFA, and it was awesome. For those of you who don't know, ACDFA is a college dance festival that took place in Penn State this year. We spent the entire last part of spring break performing and taking master classes with other college students!!

Each college that went to the festival was allowed to bring two dance pieces maximum. All of the dances were then judged by three professionals and feedback was given in a session to all of the participants and choreographers. Then the judges pick ten dances or so dances that they like the most to perform in the final gala performance. This is such an honor because out of all the schools almost fifty dances were taken, so if you get chosen to be in this final concert, it was certainly one of the best.

The pieces that Eastern brought to be judicated were called "No Pictures Please!!!" and "Full Woman." The first piece was a solo, performed by Evelyn, and it was really wonderful. She thought of the choreography by herself, and it was really strong and appropriate to the idea of her piece. She is such a strong dancer that the piece really represented Eastern well. The judges also really liked it and gave great feedback, but unfortunately, it was not chosen to be in the Gala. The other piece, "Full Woman," that I was in, also did very well. All of the judges loved it and gave great feedback for the choreographer. They loved it so much that they chose it to be one of the pieces in the Gala performance!! This was the first time that this has ever happened to Eastern University, so it was such an honor to be a part of the cast. Because we were chosen to perform, we were put in the same league as Point Park and other schools with pre-professional dance programs which is such a great honor. Eastern's dance program is still just getting started so this honor will make the dance program a lot more recognizable and appreciated as a dance school.

So having our school go to ACDFA was definitely a success. An epic win even!

Inspiring.

Sometimes, after a long day of rehearsal or a tough class, I loose my drive and desire to dance. I love it, but it gets kind of hard to stay in love with it when you are completely exhausted or in a lot of pain. That's when I usually watch an inspiring video or movie that reminds me of how much I really do love to dance. This video is at the top of my list for these kinds of moments...



Polina Seminova is such a beautiful dancer with so much spirit. Watching her dance makes me aspire to be just like her. She has a perfect body and is really thin, but is so strong at the same time. The growth of the music throughout the song and the intensifying of her movements make the video end on an encouraging note. After watching this it makes me compare my own abilities to hers, and then it gives me the drive to be better. So, if anyone else feels the same way that I do time and again, I would highly recommend watching this video; It creates all kinds of inspiration.

Senior Dance Show

So, last night I went to the Senior Dance Show.. and it was wonderful!!!

There are only three seniors this year so the show was very short- only three numbers long (it lasted about a half an hour). But, the quality of the dances made the effort of coming to the show well worth it. :)

The first collection of dances was choreographed by Amy and she did a really great job. There was a lot of symbolism in the dances and it was fun to try to figure out. She also put in a lot of really neat poses at the end of each section (there were three sections), so they were interesting to watch for. It was also really sweet because the whole thing was dedicated to her Grandma who passed away. The whole thing was just a very emotional ordeal, and it was really neat to see her growth as a dancer portrayed to the audience in such a beautiful dance.

Next, was a solo by Andrea. It was also very beautiful. First of all, her outfit was so adorable and really seemed to fit her personality and the dance at the same time. The song that she used was "Held" by Natalie Grant, which is a very graceful song that fit the movements perfectly. The whole dance was about how great it was to be held by God, and what that meant to her. I had never seen her do a solo before, so this was really nice. She is so lovely and graceful that it was wonderful to watch her dance by herself.

The final piece was called "Hail to the Chief," choreographed by Evelyn, and it was so powerful. It was all about racism and putting an end to it. The music was a compilation of Kelly Clarkson singing, and Martin Luther King Jr. and Barack Obama speaking about change. There were a great deal of people in it too- some of the girls from my college, along with the members of the Messiah Dance Company and they all looked so great dancing together. Parts of the dance were fast and chaotic, where others were slower and held, which provided a really nice contrast. The lighting of this dance was also very memorable and went with the idea of the dance very nicely. After watching this dance, it left my friend Sarah and I so empowered that we didn't know what to do with ourselves. We were ready to change the world, which is how I'm sure everyone else in the audience felt as well.

Going to this concert was definitely worth it. It was great to see some of the seniors' last dances. It was a little sad, but at least we still have another concert with them!! It made me realize how little time we really do have until we're seniors too... Time flies when you're having fun I guess!

Too skinny?

It's been a longstanding trend that dancers are really skinny. But when is it time to say, "That's enough"?

I say now. Dancers, ballerinas in particular, seem to be getting skinnier and skinnier. It seems like, the less amount of fat that you have on your body, the more successful you will be in the dance world. It's really sad. The more ribs you can see the prettier, and more graceful you are, according to societal standards, and then those girls are the ones that get the jobs.

I think that this is ridiculous. There should be more representation of normal, healthy girls in the world, especially in the dance world, so that girls do not have to starve themselves in order to fit in. Women these days need to know that they are beautiful, no matter what size they are, not pressured into becoming thinner and thinner. It's nice to be thin, but being healthy is even better.

So, what I'm getting at is that dancers should take a stand and not starve themselves for a change. I think that companies should make sure that their dancers are skinny only because they are really healthy before they hirer them. Our country is obviously in a great state of change, so why not change this while we're at it??

Sport or not?

Throughout all my years of dancing... this has always been a debate that I have gotten into...


Is dancing a sport or not?


First of all, lets define sport. According to dictionary.com, a sport is "an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature, as racing, baseball, tennis, golf, bowling, wrestling, boxing, hunting, fishing, etc."


My opinion is based on a certain kind of dancing. I am talking about Ballet, jazz, and modern. The kind of dancing that you have to do almost every day of the week to stay in shape. The kind of dancing that professionals do and are able to live off of. I think that this kind of dancing is a sport, not just an artistic activity. Now, before you freak out, listen to my reasons...


1. Dancing is one of the most hardcore activities out there. I saw this quote on a bumper sticker once, and it describes exactly what I mean, "If dancing were any easier, it would be called football." People always seem to underestimate how much work goes in to being a dancer and how admirable it really is. Dancers have to keep in shape all the time, and they work muscles that most of the other sports have never heard of. So, the "physical prowess," as it says in the definition is definitely there.


2. According to the definition, a sport also has to have a certain amount of skill. Dancing definitely requires that as well. In order to be successful, dancers must have a certain level of skill and they had to have gone through a certain level of training, so skill is a given for dancers.


3. The third qualification is that a sport is usually somewhat competitive. Dancing can be competitive in two ways. One being that there is a lot of competition inside of the companies between the dancers. Dancers can be ruthless when they want to. Also, there is competition dancing, where you can take dances and perform against others to try and win. So, it's not like there is no competition in dancing.


So, according to the definition on Dictionary.com, dancing is a sport. Most people just think of it as an art, but I think it can go in both categories. It is beautiful to watch and physically strenuous at the same time!!! But yeah, it's definitely a sport.

What's this all about?

Hi, I'm Kristen, and this blog is going to be about my experience as a dancer. I'm also going to look at movies and different dancing video's and evaluate them using my own knowledge and experience as a template. So... let's get started!!

First, I think I'll start with my own personal dancing story. I was born in the town of Lewisburg, Pennsylvania with no idea of how much I would love dancing. As I got older, I loved just putting music on and dancing around the living room. Finally when I reached the age of 4, my Mom took me to my first ballet class. And I LOVED it!!!

I was hooked. I loved being so graceful and how fun it was to jump through the air and not worry about anything. Since I loved ballet so much, I then started experimenting with other types of dance. I took Jazz for the first time at the age of 6, and couldn't wait to try more.

After awhile, I grew out of the studio that I first started with and I decided to take lessons at a more advanced place. I stayed at Enterline's Studio until my family moved to Lancaster, Pennsylvania before my eighth grade year. Enterline's dance studio was a really great opportunity for me because, the owner of the studio happened to be the daughter of the director of local company. So, my first experience in a company started in my fifth grade year. I loved being a part of a unit like that so I continued to be in a company the rest of my primary schooling experience.

When my family moved to Lancaster with my Dad's job, I immediately started being a part of the Ballet Theater of Lancaster. This set up was really nice because I got to take classes at the same place and with the same people where the company was. It was also at Lancaster School of Ballet where I got to increase my expertise in a variety of different types of dance styles. Some of them included learning how to belly-dance, tap dance, do modern, and learn all different aspects of lyrical dance.

Ballet Theater of Lancaster was also a really great experience because of all the roles that I got to play. Some of my favorites were included being Wendy in Peter Pan, the Cat in Peter and the Wolf, the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz, and the Lemon Princess in Chipolino. I also got a chance to learn all sorts of variations such as the silver fairy variation from Sleeping Beauty and one of the female variations from Don Quixote.

Now, I attend a University and am in my freshman year. I plan to major in dance and psychology with hopes of becoming a dance therapist... but who knows? I'll go wherever God takes me. So, now that you know my background in dance, you'll be better able to understand where I'm coming from in my evaluations of different aspects of dance and the stories that I tell!!!! Please Enjoy!!!