The 12 Days of Recital- Day 4

 

Another day closer... Goodness! It's getting to close!

 

So yesterday, I had two little rehearsals, and one long rehearsal. It started with taking a visit to the Youth Acting class. They have a little scene where they are townspeople talking to Bert. They are around 6-10 and they have to use British accents when they talk. Very cute. During there scene, I have to run through and chase Jane and Michael around. So anyway, I got to come visit their class to practice with them.

 

After I went to acting, I went back to the waiting area to find out that one of the girls' mom had brought fruit and ice cream to celebrate the last week. Food is truly the love language of the dancers in our company.

 

After enjoying some ice cream, we went into Jazz 5 to practice our dance with them. We have the same song, but come in and dance on different parts. At the end we all come together and finish the dance. Pretty simple.

 

After Jazz was Modern rehearsal. We are combined with Modern 3 (I'm modern 4) for this dance, so a few weeks ago, we started only working on the dance in Modern 3. On Wednesdays for Modern 4, we have regular class.

 

Our dance for Modern is AMAZING. We are doing Temper Temper from the musical "Mary Poppins" and we are wearing our oh-so-fierce purple unitards that we wore for our ballet number in our dance concert.

 

Our teacher did such an amazing job with our choreography, and everyone loves the dance. When you love a dance, you put everything you have into it which makes it great. I'm pretty sure that this dance will be the highlight of the show.

 

Now for today's schedule. Today is a really easy day. The only thing I have is modern class this afternoon. That's it! Since today is so empty, I will do a lot of tacking and adjusting costumes, and maybe a little bit of extra stretching\conditioning. Like I said, pretty low key day today.

 

Be sure to check back tomorrow for Day 5!

The 12 Days of Recital- Day 3

 

Exactly one year ago today, one of the absolute most difficult situations I have ever been in happened. If you don't remember, you can go back and read days 3-5 of last year's "12 Days of Recital". I definitely left out some parts in that post, but it was for sure something that I took a really long time to get over. It was in tap class though, and my teacher just stuck me in a super difficult situation that wasn't necessary. This past year, things have gotten a lot better, and she has come to like me much more. Now I see her as a really great teacher and such a fun person. Last night, during our last tap class, she told us that she wasn't going to teach again next year. There wasn't a dry eye in the room. Even I cried. I was kind of confused though. This teacher hurt me so much yet I was still so sad to let her go.

 

And then it hit me. The end of this story, is that I had to go back for another rehearsal. That was the last thing I wanted to do. I considered taking myself out of that piece, and dropping out of tap altogether. But I didn't. I went back for the next rehearsal. I went back for the next year. I now know that day showed me that I have the perseverance and guts to do anything. Lately I have been doubting whether or not I have the skills, like dedication and perseverance to be a professional dancer someday. That class, though it was so tough, has tremendously impacted my life. I can now say I'm glad that it happened.

 

So on a completely different note, I had my last pointe class. This year for pointe, we changed teachers during the second semester. Well, I don't know where our normal teacher was last night, but my teacher from the first semester came and subbed! I was so excited to see her, because she was an incredible teacher. I learned so much from her. Last year, I got thrown into her advanced pointe class because they needed to fill the class. She got me from barely able to do a pique turn, to solid double pirouettes in 6 months. She really was a blessing, and I was so glad to have her come back and sub. It was a really great last class to look back and see how much progress I've made over the last year.

 

So that was my eventful night last night, today's schedule involves me going to the little kid's acting class to practice the part I do with them. And then my Jazz 6 class has to go to the Jazz 5 class to practice our dance together. Finally, we have our final rehearsal for our modern piece.

 

Be sure to check back for day 4 tomorrow!

 

The 12 Days of Recital- Day 2

 

Hey guys! Thanks for coming back another day! So we are down to 11 days left, and I'm super excited! Today's schedule is a pretty simple day. This morning I got up and went to the dance studio around 10:30  to practice my dances and some turns. Then at 11:30 I helped teach Creative Movement. I came home around 12:30 and I ate lunch and did some school. It is 1:20 right now, and after I finish this blog post, I will do stretching, and work on my feet. At 3:00 I have to go back to dance for pointe class at 3:30. When pointe class is done at 5:00 I have a 2 hour break to eat and hang out with friends. Then I have tap class at 7:00 and I will get home around 8:30.

 

So I had my last day with my little babies in Creative Movement today. They are all sweet kids, whom I will miss tremendously. Before class got done, I said something like "You know girls,  today is our last class", and one of the girls replied with "I'm going to miss you! I loved you as a teacher!" My heart melted... So in honor of these children, here is a word about them.

 

 

Lucy, I will miss your pretty pointed feet

 

Grace, I will miss hearing all of your stories

 

Chloe, I will miss your elaborate list of butterfly colors

 

Anna, I will miss your near-perfect leaps

 

Lilly, I will miss your random impulses to act like a frog.

 

Elizabeth, I will miss when you pronounce "trois" (the French word for three) "twelf"

 

Eva, I will miss your giggles every time we say "Bras Bas"

 

Katherine, I will miss when you yell "Sharp, Sharp, Melt"

 

 

Check back tomorrow for day 3!

The 12 Days of Recital- Day 1

Hello Everyone! Goodness, it has been a long time since I have posted! Life is very busy, and sometimes, you've got no time to post. But anyhow, I decided that I definitely wanted to come back and do "The 12 Days of Recital" again. I love going back and reading about last year's journey. Many great moments and one of the hardest moments in the years that I have danced happened during recital, and I love having the documentation of what was happening and how I felt about it all. I can also see all the ways I have grown and improved.

So here we go! The 12 Days of Recital: 2013. This year we are doing "Mary Poppins". Our show is put together from a combination of the movie and the Broadway musical. For my lead role I play Constable Jones. I don't really get to dance as the Constable, but I get lots of crossings and I get to run across the stage and chase Jane and Michael with a stick. For Jazz we are doing the overture like we did last year, but our dance is to a Jazzy version of the Chim Chimney song. For Modern we are the Temper Temper scene from the musical. For Ballet we are the Carousel. For Tap we are the horse race, and for Pointe we are nanny angels. You are probably wondering what "Nanny Angels" are, and honestly I'm not even sure.. I guess in the beginning of the movie where Mary Poppins starts out on a cloud, it is like Nanny Heaven, and there are other Nannies who live in Nanny Heaven. So at the end of the show, we are the other Nannies in Nanny Heaven who welcome Mary Poppins back. I don't really understand...

 

Anyway, yesterday was a very busy day. We had a normal ballet class in the morning from 9:00-11:00. After that we had auditions for our Companies. Everyone gets in, but we have to audition for placement. I'm already in the Senior Company, so even though I haven't gotten my letter yet, I already know that I'm in Senior company.

 

After auditions we got a little break, so I stayed at the studio and hung out with one of my friends while two of our other friends ran to get lunch for all of us. In the meantime, we got three of our little friends (who are around 8-9 years old) together and we had fun creating different shapes where me and my friend would be the base and create a pose, and then the three little ones would come climb on us and pose and create a really cool shape. It was quite fun.

 

Next we ate... my salad was really yummy.

 

Then we from 2:00-4:30 we had our third lead cast run through of year. That is when the lead cast basically performs the entire show straight through to practice our parts, work out kinks, and get and idea of how the show will flow. We did the entire show with costumes facing away from the mirror, so it was a little stressful, and definitely chaotic. The good new is that I think it went rather well.

 

After the run through I went home and immediately turned around for a babysitting job. 8 kids, 3 1\2 hours,  1 room. Hey, I gotta pay for the expenses somehow!

 

So that was my day yesterday, today I'm chilling at home, but I will stretch and condition for a little while after I finish this post, and then I might swim laps for an extra cardio workout with my dad. Be sure to come back tomorrow for Day 2!