2 3 Fun Friday Circular Port de Bras | Ballet Webb

Friday, October 16, 2015

Fun Friday Circular Port de Bras


Fun Friday Circular Port de Bras
A circular port de bras can be confusing to a beginning dancer. Since it is a circle, it is continuous, so where to begin and where to end, can cause problems.
When standing with the left hand on the barre, imagine standing in the center of a large, circular clock face. Noon, or twelve o’clock is directly in front, and six o’clock is directly behind. All the other “numbers” go in their correct places. To begin, the torso rotates outward (toward two o’clock) and descends from there. At twelve o’clock the head is down (kiss the knees position); by nine o’clock the body is in a perfect side alignment (side stretch); and six o’clock is directly back. The torso then must “hit” four o’clock before returning to the beginning position of standing upright, before reversing the process.

When standing with the right hand on the barre, the numbers are different, so learn it first with the left hand on the barre. After that, it will become intuitive.
The places that dancers tend to miss are the corners: four o’clock, eight o’clock, etc. So imagining a clock face, and hitting all the numbers can help beginners understand the nature of circular port de bras.

From the Big Blue Book of Ballet Secrets:
Ballet Secret #22o 
For a circular port de bras, imagine a clock face. 

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