Creating Your Own Adult Ballet Training: 11 Insights from Taking Pre-Professional Classes
If you are like me, then you’re in for more than just taking ballet class.
Warming up the rotators :)
You actually want to get really good at ballet. You want progress and proficiency. You don’t just want to be the cute adult who was brave enough to start late and now looks like a beginner forever. You actually, at some point, want to look like someone who had systematic training.
But as we all know, “systematic training” is exactly the challenge here. When you start as an adult, you often get into it through drop-in classes that per se do not offer a systematic approach to technique. You have to piece it together, maybe add privates into the mix, and get creative.
About 1.5 years ago, I asked myself how I could create some sort of pre-professional training for myself. Not necessarily in all aspects, but at least some format that would be more than taking a drop-in class every day, and that would offer a meticulous progression into movement patterns and technique. This thought process was mainly sparked after I had met my current teacher Evelyn Hart back then. I had started taking her barre, and the impact her teaching had on me was tremendous. If you’ve read along here for a while, you know that I finally started training with her regularly online during the pandemic earlier this year.
Fast forward to now, and I can say that I’ve hit a major milestone towards my ambitious training dream - by joining Evelyn Hart’s two current pre-professional students and taking class with them every day. In addition, I still take two full classes with another teacher. Altogether, and if I add stretching and conditioning into the mix, I am currently in the studio for 3-4 hours per day on 5 days per week.
But this article is not about the amount of time spent in a studio. By joining Evelyn’s classes, I feel like I have taken a plunge into something very novel and unique. A very different approach to class. Because Evelyn is only to some extent concerned with how classes “have” to be, and very much gives them her very own spin. And to my delight: Neuroplasticity plays a big role. She might not call it this way, but I am finding that she intuitively teaches based on neuroplastic principles! I am having so many aha-moments regarding how my body works and in particular, how turnout works. At the same time, I feel I am starting my ballet learning from scratch again right now, unlearning so much of what I have learned before.
So what does this have to do with YOU? Well, I thought that I could share with you the eleven ways (random number, I could list many more :-D) in which my experience of Evelyn’s classes differs from your typical adult ballet drop-in class and how these ways are beneficial to learning. For each one, I will also show how you can apply and integrate it to your own situation. My hope is that this list of insights can inspire you to make the little and bigger shifts to a more effective way of learning ballet!
Ready? Let’s do this! In no particular order, here are the hallmarks and how you and I can apply them even when we are in a more traditional adult ballet class setting:
1. Simplicity and no sweat. Evelyn’s class is kind of a “laboratory”, and less of a “gym”. While it’s a very advanced/pre-professional class, you would be surprised at the simplicity of the barre exercises. Nothing fancy, and while she does do a whole barre, most of it really are tendus. Center also starts with simple port-de-bras and tendus, and then slowly gets more complex. The cardiovascular intensity is generally quite low, on the other hand the class is quite long (it usually exceeds two hours, the barre alone is usually more than an hour). Evelyn takes a lot of time for very specific individual corrections and for explaining concepts and movement patterns that are key to ballet. In fact I would say that it is one of her big strengths to spot something in a student, stop, correct, explain, and then integrate the concept that she just explained in the next exercise. Meaning, while she does have her class pre-prepared, she doesn’t shy away from adding/modifying especially her barre exercises when she wants to solidify a point. While all this sounds not very “tough” and less structured than a regular class, again, from a neuroplastic standpoint this approach is pure gold. And it IS actually quite tough - on the details and intricacies. Because first and foremost, she wants her classes to teach movement patterns, period. Not stamina, not mindless brute strength. I.e. she wants her students’ brains to learn the correct activation of muscles. And for that, you need to avoid fatigue, for instance, so you can’t do it in a high-intensity-blood-and-sweat environment. You need to make sure that the students can actually feel how it is supposed to feel. You need as many high-quality repetitions as possible, so she might repeat an exercise several times if she feels it will benefits the students. You need variations and approaches to the same idea from different angles. You need to feel that it is ok to experiment and make mistakes or fail at feeling something. She is encouraging dialogue and letting students share what they feel. When she gives a correction to one student, she encourages the other students to watch and spot the difference. And regarding stamina - that is built elsewhere, for example through having long days and rehearsals.
How to apply this: So while all this is not possible in your typical drop-in class, this is something we can keep in mind when working at home: Take time for “laboratory work”, for research. For example, see how many different ways you can find to turn out in first. Or in fifth. Or do a plié. Or if you have trouble with something in class, take it home and spend an hour with it: Break it down, do it slow, do it faster, do it on flat, on demi-pointe etc etc. In general, don’t feel pressured to rush the process.
2. There are 3-5 perparatory exercises before the plié. If your regular class experience is like mine, then you probably start barre with pliés or maybe one preparatory exercise. In her class, Evelyn does a full of at least 10-15min of exercises before the first plié. These are usually gentle but very mindful tendu exercises that include different “add-ons” (like foot flexion, toe movements etc) in order to remind the brain of the right way to rotate the thigh bone in the hip joint socket. What she says about this is totally right: The plié is a full-range exercise and places a high demand on hip joint mobility, so the joint needs to be prepared! I must say that I totally enjoy these many preparatory exercises because it’s a more systematic ramping-up and gentle start into class and it also helps me find a sense of calm and start feeling things in my body.
How to apply it: So now, when I do another class, I make sure that before the class starts, I not only do my stretching/rolling/mobilizing, but I also do rotation-initiating movements and simple tendus in standing.
3. Tendus ALL THE TIME. While Evelyn does a full barre, when you look at the exercises, tendus are part of everything. They are the main bulk of the barre. Often, she will take about half an hour just for tendus from first! Yes, she does touch rondes de jambe, frappés, fondus, grand battements, but she sneaks those tendus into all of them.
How to apply it: Tendu ALL THE TIME.
4. Pelvic alignment ABOVE ALL ELSE. I would say that this is the signature premise of Evelyn’s approach to teaching ballet, and really one of her demonstration and teaching strengths: Only with the EXACT proper position of the pelvis can full turnout be achieved. It sounds almost too simple (it’s not), but it’s slowly dawning on me how crucial the proper tilt of the pelvis is for the full range of external hip rotation to follow. In fact, it’s been a game changer for me and I am currently experiencing how much more turnout I have than what I always thought. But this is also the hardest part: Creating AND maintaining the pelvic alignment is a HUGE task, because you have to override postural patterns that have been with you all your life. A “natural curvature” between your pelvis and spine just won’t cut it if you want full turnout. It’s a strict on/off thing: It’s not enough to be “quite well” aligned. Full hip rotation will only be available if you hit the exact alignment that the pelvis needs to be in. It’s like using a key to unlock a door: If you put the key 99% into the lock, you won’t be able to turn it. You need to get it in fully 100% to turn it and open that door. So that’s why her barre revolves around tendus, because you want a low-impact situation in order to really pull that pelvis into alignment.
How to apply it: While it’s THE biggest and most important challenge, it’s also a very accessible one, meaning you can practice and play with it any time even outside of class! Whenever you are standing, or even walking, you can try to pull up the front of your pelvis (the pubic bone), let the sacrum drop, and relax all of your hip muscles as much as possible.
5. Use of arms is optional. This is something that surprised me most in the beginning when I first started taking Evelyn’s class - the girls never used their arms especially not during barre, but often also not during center exercises. Instead, they would put their non-barre hand for example on the sacrum, in order to feel the the pelvic alignment while doing their exercises. At some point I asked Evelyn about it and she said that not using the arms helps with focusing on what really matters - and that, to her, is pelvic alignment and the bones of the legs. She said that in her experience, when the pelvis alignment is understood and embodied, the use of the upper back and arms falls into place naturally. Now, this contradicts the common ballet class belief that everything has to be active and in place and perfect; but coming from a neuroplastic perspective, this armless approach makes sense. The brain simply can’t focus on several things at the same time, so it makes sense to build alignment systematically, and starting with the legs and pelvis is absolutely crucial. There is also an emotional sense of calm when you focus on one main area and can use your hands to connect to your body vs holding it in second.
How to apply it: So now when I am in other classes where the arms are normally used, I usually do the first barre exercises without using my arms, and then add my arms once I feel that I have a sense of where my pelvis is and my hip joint is warmed and opened up a bit.
6. Connecting turn-in and turn-out. So there is this huge focus on turnout in ballet, right? I mean, yes, for a reason haha. And I always had this ambition to not spend any of my precious ballet time in parallel. Because what for. But what I am learning more and more from Evelyn’s teaching is that there is immense value in understanding and feeling the relationship of a neutral to a turned-out leg. So, for example, her first preparatory exercise is almost entirely on parallel legs, and then she often adds other barre exericses with a turn-in-turn-out component. The reason why this is so valuable is that it teaches the body how to activate the deep rotators without using any of the superficial muscles (aka butt). This was another game changer for me.
How to apply it: So this is also something I am adding to my warm-up before “regular” classes, as it let’s me start the barre with already activated rotator muscles. (No coincidence that my Turn On Your Turnout training guide also has some turn-in-turn-out elements!)
7. No music. [EDIT: After publishing the article, Evelyn clarified that it is her ideal scenario to always have a pianist and live music for barre and center. However, during these Covid times, she tries to keep the number of people in the studio as low as possible and therefore does not bring in an accompanist. And on Zoom, well, it would be a bit lost :-)] This is quite remarkable: For her barre, Evelyn does not use any music any more. I mean, I have had other teachers that worked without music (in privates) but it’s still remarkable for Evelyn, because she is like the most musical person I’ve ever met and places a lot of emphasis on musicality in her teaching. Exceptional musicality was what made her stand out as a dancer, and music was what helped her build her own technique. So why does she not use any music during barre? First and foremost, it’s a practical thing. It saves her lots of time, and it lets her approach and correct her students during an exercise in a much more flexible way. Second, just because she doesn’t use music does not mean there is no musicality. In fact, she counts and “narrates” all the exercises in different ways, so there is an inherent rhythm and melody to it. Personally, even though I like music, working without music does a lot of good for me. The main reason being that it takes out any rushing and allows me to really experiment, sense, and feel into my body. It’s less distracting and lets me focus on whatever I need to focus.
How to apply it: Isn’t it liberating that you can practice tendus any time and anywhere, without having to have proper music? Try to find rhythm. Maybe experiment with counting or singing it out.
8. Use as little as possible. This was initially the biggest aha-mindblow-moment when I did the barre with Evelyn for the first time last year. I had been trained that creating ballet legs required full-out muscle activation. In fact, in all the sports activities that I did during all my life, intense muscle activation was my way to stability and power. And now here is this slim woman cueing me to let go of all that. And it’s such a contrasting experience: Attempt the almost impossible miracle of completely changing the habitual alignment of your pelvis and maintain it, but please don’t use any muscle for that :-D Well, of course you will use muscle, but the idea is to use as little muscle as possible to achieve the desired result. And it continues to amaze me how little is actually necessary. This applies to anything Evelyn teaches: Stop grabbing and tensing your muscles everywhere, so it also applies to her port-de-bras, for example. Her mantra is to free the joints so they can move unobstructed, and then you can add movement and muscle activity. It’s still the biggest challenge for me, but at least I have made huge progress in becoming aware where I am tensing and using more muscle activity than is actually needed for the movement.
How to apply it: This sensing now follows me in everything I do in every day life: For example I noticed that I am tensing the sole of my right foot when I am walking. Or that I am tensing the outside of my right hip when standing. Or that I am tensing the muscles between my shoulder blades when standing or sitting. It’s also such a huge metaphor for life, right? How often do you put too much thought, stress, worry, tension into a situation? How often do you try to muscle through with more work and effort? How often are you trying to be extra nice or behave well so that other people will like you? When I watch Evelyn demonstrate it’s such a liberating feeling of seeing true effortlessness and super high movement quality from very little muscle and seeing her full personality in all of it.
9. Bones eat muscles for breakfast: This is another thing that instantly made me resonate with Evelyn’s way, and it’s big in my own teaching of turnout and movement patterns for ballet. It’s actually related to above point, a generalization of the pelvic alignment idea, and it’s in essence the most fundamental biomechanical concept. What it means: Always ask yourself where the bones need to go. So instead of worrying about muscle activation - simply direct the bone. Even just as simple as in turnout: Instead of being concerned with hip muscle activity, think about the top of the thigh bone in the hip joint socket and what it means to rotate it. When you really imagine it, you will realize that your outside hip muscle activity will pretty much drop to zero, and your bone will rotate much more easily (and more, too) because you automatically activated the most efficient and effective muscles for this task: The deep rotators.
How to apply it: In order to be able to direct the bones, you actually need to know where they are and how the joints move. For me, this means looking at my skeleton Ricky (whom I have turned into a half-skeleton a while ago) and really familiarize myself with the position of the sacrum, the hip joint sockets, and the femur - over and over again. Because my brain does this funny thing where, in my mind, I typically place the hip joints too much to the side of the pelvis, and I also think that the sit bones are farther back than they actually are. So I have to “correct” this internal representation of my anatomy regularly, until my brain has had enough repetitions to place them correctly. If you don’t have a skeleton at home, then even looking at images of skeletons is great, and Google has plenty of them!
In case you were wondering, my hand is imitating the chair ;-)
10. Imagery is strictly experiential. So those of you who have followed me for a while might remember that I am not a fan of imagery at all. It actually triggers me when teachers use some sort of your-pelvis-as-a-bowl-filled-with-water-don’t-spill-it metaphors. It’s not that it’s wrong, I just find it incredibly hard and distracting to process an image while doing and trying to feel a movement. Evelyn, however, has taught me the value of effective imagery, but here is the difference in how she uses it: She almost exclusively uses images that she can immediately make palpable. So when she says that the pelvis, legs, and feet are like a martini glass, she brings an actual martini glass and places it in front of the pelvis and legs. Or when she says we should feel our sitbones sit on a chair in order to create the proper pelvic alignment, she actually lets us sit on a chair and tendu from there. Or when she taught me how to point my foot and said I should imagine my toes kicking a small ball, she made me take a small piece of paper and kick it with straight toes. She is also really good at using purely anatomical images, i.e. describing pathways of bones and directions of rotations.
How to apply it: One way for me when I am in regular drop-in class and the teacher comes up with an image that feels distracting, I simply allow myself to ignore it. I think we have to be honest with ourselves and discern what works and what doesn’t. Even some of Evelyn’s images don’t work as well for me, so I just try not to engage with them too much or find ways to replace them. On the other hand it is a great exercise to get creative and see how you can use objects around you to create images and actually physically feel them and play with them.
11. It’s about the basics forever. So this was surprising to me, and it really takes a lot of pressure off. It’s so interesting to see how often Evelyn addresses very basic technique principles with her pre-professional students. I am talking stuff like hiking up the working hip, not being turned out, sticking the butt out (=letting the pelvis tilt forward), not crossing the legs enough, knees not being straight etc etc…and we are talking incredibly well-trained and gorgeous dancers here that are about to make the leap into the professional world! So this just shows that the work never ends, and that there is always room for significant improvement of quality. I find a certain kind of relief in this, because it means that it’s ok to struggle and not get it, and that it’s not that we as adults started too late or are not smart enough - it only means that ballet movement concepts are very challenging and difficult to learn per se! So no need to be frustrated or embarrassed - on some level, we all - kids, starters, trained dancers, professionals - try to master the same things, no matter how talented or advanced we might be.
How to apply it: Be at peace with always coming back to the basics. Actually, be proud of it - cause you might just be working on the same thing as your favorite ballet star. Cheers to that!
So this is it, these are my favorite insights from these very unique classes so far. I think the main takeaway is that while we might be typically going to “regular” adult drop-in classes, we need to
create time and space for unstructured experimentation and movement “research” (yes, this is your home ballet laboratory!)
have a few fundamental concepts that guide that research (like, for example, the pelvic alignment, or knowing where your bones are)
not be afraid to question common practices and really notice what kind of teaching approach and concepts resonate with your body. Because often times it’s not about right or wrong, but more what YOU personally need to achieve the desired technique result.
And as for the idea of creating your own ballet training that gives you what you need, I think it’s important to really stay atuned to what you actually need (and love!). And then keep your eyes and ears open, and trust that things will come into your life. For me, the starting realization was that I was tired of muscle-ing my way through everything, so I instinctively latched on when I found an environment where letting go of excess muscle activity was the guiding light. And also, don’t try to make it perfect from the start. For example, while I am loving Evelyn’s class, it’s technically not a 100% fit because it’s geared towards the pre-professional students. So I try to keep up as good as I can. Which often means that I am not able to do the allegros, because I don’t have the skill for them yet and/or I can’t pick up new combinations that fast. But it’s ok, it’s one step and one milestone after the next. For now I am grateful for all that I can soak up, and I hope that by sharing some of it with you, you can soak up now, too!
I hope you got something out of this! From the insights that I shared above - did any of you came as a surprise? Or did they confirm what you have felt for a long time? Feel free to share!
[Note/Disclaimer: I have Evelyn’s permission to record myself in class and share my insights. Whereever I quote what she said, I am paraphrasing - so just a heads-up there is always a small chance of misinterpretation. Should be very small though :-)]