Happy Monday!

Know that feeling? 😉 Hope your summer is filled with many ballet victories! 🙂

Finally Clara's Coffee Break Meme 1 png — Created with Wikimedia Commons Public Domain Image.

7 Stages of a Bunhead Summer…

Pointe shoe flower orange — Photo by Rachel Hellwig.

How is your summer going? What stage are you experiencing? 😉

1. Post-Recital Blues

How is ballet season over yet?!

(Via Giphy)

2. Summer Intensive Prep

Just focus on summer intensive, focus on summer intensive…

(Via Giphy)

3. Summer Intensive

Ahh, finally…

(Via Giphy)

4. Intensive Performance

THIS. IS. WHAT. SUMMER. IS. ABOUT.

(Via Giphy)

5. Post-Intensive Slump

Can this please be over yet?

(Via Giphy)

6. Beginning of Nutcracker Season

Time to start thinking about auditions! September is just around the corner!

(Via Giphy)

7. First-Day-of-Fall-Classes Countdown

And 5,6,7,8 – can’t wait!

(Via Giphy)

Happy Saturday!

Clara's Coffee Break Princess Leia Buns2 — Created with Wikimedia Commons Public Domain Image.

Fun Fact: Ballet Class Isn’t What it Used to Be…Thank Goodness!

Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. I need an ice pack just thinking about this…

A ballet barre from the 1820s:

“48 pliés followed by 128 grand battement, 96 petit battement glissé, 128 ronds de jambes sur terre and 128 en l’air, and ending finally with 128 petit battement sur le cou-de-pied. One inevitable consequence of this extreme training was a sharp rise in injuries.”

– Jennifer Homans, Apollo’s Angels, 2010, p. 129-130

Oh, and all of this was repeated in center. Yikes. Do not try at home.

Extreme Ballet Training Image Clara's Coffee Break — Created with Wikimedia Commons Public Domain Image – Not a Painting of an 1820s Ballet Class, in Case You’re Wondering 😉

Know that feeling?

Certainly not unique to dance critics… 😉

Dance Critics Hard Deadline Edward Hopper Clara's Coffee Break 11 — Created with Wikimedia Commons Public Domain Image.

Ballerinas with Wings: Swan Roles

Anna Pavlova Edit 1 — Created with Wikimedia Commons Pubic Domain Image of Anna Pavlova in “The Dying Swan.”

From the irresistible pull of swan arms to the allure of feathered tutus, swan-inspired characters outrank other bird roles in the realm of ballet. Here’s a throwback to three of the most famous swan roles as interpreted by past generations…

White Swan

Distilled through black and white, foregoing scenery, and emphasizing movement as the medium of storytelling, this 1970s Kirov film brings the emotional core of Swan Lake‘s pas de deux into focus with sophisticated simplicity. Odette’s enigmatic, love-him-or-love-him-not relationship with Siegfried is told through the power of musical motion with little aid or accent of acting–flowing through reserve, release, tension, ease, energy projecting outward, and drawing inward…

Black Swan

Odile actually didn’t acquire her avian identity until the 1940s…Before then she was simply a femme fatale who could be costumed in a variety of colors including red and green. But, safe to say, the little black dress makeover certainly stuck. It’s hard not to imagine that this was her signature look all along. Here’s a clip, also from the 70s, of Kirov soloist Elena Yeteyeva performing the variation and coda fouettés.

Dying Swan

“Often imitated, never duplicated”… For something seemingly simple in design–mostly bourrées and upper body movements–Mikhail Fokine’s The Dying Swan, created for Anna Pavlova, has eluded so many of its subsequent performers. Pavlova’s watermark on the work, as seen in this 1925 film, is the translucent abandon and leaf-in-the-wind quality of her arms and upper body: ballerina grace, but with a sense of unsettled drifting.

Can you relate?

Off Day Clara's Coffee Break. Smaller — Created with Wikimedia Commons Public Domain Image.

Flower Power: 6 Famous Flower Scenes in Ballet

April showers bring May flowers…What’s your favorite ballet flower scene? Here are some memorable ones:

Rose Adagio—The Sleeping Beauty

Are flowers the way the to the heart? Not in this case. Princess Aurora doesn’t find true love with any of her rose-bearing suitors, but her dance with them is one of the most famous in all of ballet.

Garland Waltz—The Sleeping Beauty

Flowers, flowers everywhere! Presumably the village people didn’t suffer from allergies. Or perhaps some good fairy freed them from that curse… (This clip doesn’t show the entire stage, but I do like the close-up view of the Mariinsky’s version.)

Lilac Fairy’s Variation—The Sleeping Beauty

What floral-inspired magical creature saves the day and rocks a purple wig at the same time? The Lilac Fairy, of course! But, before all of the drama—a dance.