2 3 Technical Tuesday: One Step Ahead | Ballet Webb

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Technical Tuesday: One Step Ahead


Technical Tuesday:  One Step Ahead
In a previous blog about “a place to go before you go where you are going”, I mentioned the fact that dancers must always think one step ahead.  In a glissade, for example, the dancer is not thinking about the glissade.  Instead she is thinking about the assemblé or the jeté or whatever step is coming immediately after.
This is only possible because of muscle memory.  The steps have become so automatic that it is now possible to think ahead and use that instant to perfect each upcoming step.  Sound confusing?  It can be.  When a beginning dancer starts to move in the center, the steps usually appear stilted or robotic.  This is because the muscle memory for each step has yet to be established, and each step is being thought about as it is executed, instead of one step earlier.
This “thinking one step ahead” is, in part, what allows the movements to flow together, so an untrained audience member cannot tell where one step ends and another begins. 

From the Big Blue Book of Ballet Secrets:

Secret #7h:
“Always think one step ahead.”

 
                Link of the Day:  

  

Quote of the Day:

“Never look back unless you are planning to go that way.”
-Henry David Thoreau

 

                Help expand the knowledge base!

 Leave a comment about any instructions, ideas, or images that worked best for you!

No comments:

Post a Comment