Mikhail Barysnikov in Don Quixote.
There is an online ballet dictionary. Check out this link to see_some_professional_ballet dancers_demonstrate_the ballet vocabulary. Watch the quicktime videos and check out the definitions of glissade, ronde de jambe, and assemble. Tell me what you'd like to incorporate into your movement from watching these dancers.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
On Line Ballet Dictionary
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32 comments:
After watching Barysnikov, I have an urge to do fouettés (sauté and en tourant) and tour jetés. The dancers on ABT's Online Dictionary all have very exact and precise movement. Every element of their body appears in perfect alignment. I especially enjoy watching Angel Corella perform eleven pirouettes!
I would like to incorporate about 15 more years of dance training into my movement after watching these dancers =P
I think that a lot of the reason they look so good doing the basic moves has to do with carriage of the upper body - the shoulders are down, the arms float independently of what the legs are doing. I watch their legs but my last image of the move they are demonstrating is of the dancers upper body.
I would love to be able to perform endless pirouettes and learn how to spot better so I don't get dizzy. I also love entrechats! They used to be some of my favorite things to do in ballet when I was little. I would like to be able to do grand jeté as well.
I would like to integrate the hip and abdominal stabilization that is present in all of the dancers. I would like my line to be correct and my balance like graceful and flowing like the example. Also the allegros and assemble seem effortless which is waht I am aiming to experience and straight consecutive piorouettes.
The Mikhail Barysnikov video is almost perfect. I would really like to fly up in the air while doing the tour de force(even though it's more of a guy thing), also being able to incorporate tour jete, saut de basque and Fouette rond de Jambe en tournant:) I think it's going to be AWHILE before I'm even able to get those down. Incorporating pirouettes into combinations are always fun!
My favorite part about watching professional ballet is appreciating how much strength and technique these incredible dancers have and how gracefully they present them. The hardest part is to hide how hard you are working and make it seem effortless. Being dancers, we all know just how hard some of these moves are, but the audience doesn't and conveying a beautiful dance to them is what makes a performance truely great. I would also like to work towards tour jetés as well as more pirouettes and leaps.
Man, he's beautiful... Sigh. Have you seen his old movie? The title is something like "White Nights" or some such. I hear it's kind of autobiographical... Anyway, there's this scene where he bet someone he can do as many piroettes as they had pennies in their pockets. They had 15 cents. He did 16 piroettes just for good measure. It rocked.
What I love most about Barysnikov is that he is not trying to be pretty. The beauty is in the line, the movement, and the focus of his body and his intent. Oh, and I like to watch him go up. And up. And up!
Watching these dancers has made me really inspired. I would love to be able to start turning and feel like i was never going to come down. I would like to work on pirouette technique and get better at them. I would also like to incorporate more feeling into my dancing so i'm glad that we worked on that today in class. I hope that we do those kinds of exercises more often. :)
I have loved Barysnikov since I was a very young girl. My mom owns the movie "White Nights" and I have watched it more times than I can count. This video of Barishnikov in Don Quixote is also mesmerizing. I never tire of watching his videos, because he seems to jump, leap, and pirouette with such ease. Even though his body is erect like the dancers in the ABT's Online Dictionary, it doesn't seem as stiff to me. He has anextra amount of passion in his dance. This is something I hope to achieve one day.
Aaah! He's friggin' amazing. This video was actually really inspiring because often times when I'm doing jumps, I get so heavy and I have trouble finding that lift. My last ballet teacher would always say that I jump like I have a stack of books on my head. Barysnikov will remind me to center my stability in my core and to stay light on my feet.
After watching this video I am in amazement at his precise technique. He has such a direction when he his flying through the air and doing his endless turns. I would love to take his passion and incorporate that into my dancing. His a sureness tells the audience that he knows exactly what he is trying to convey through his movements. His body is in perfect alignment and that makes his turns look amazing!
Watching the video of Barysnikov, as well as the videos on the online dictionary made me realize how important your core and your upper body are when performing ballet moves. I want to improve on my balance and turns by working on keeping my core tight and my upper body properly aligned. All of the dancers in the videos make the moves look so effortless, and hopefully some day I will be able to perform ballet moves with the same level of skill. I hope to work a lot on my arms as well, as I often feel like I am doing them wrong. These videos made it seem like strong arms that are positioned properly really help with the execution of turns and jumps.
The biggest thing that goes through my head is...LORD, I NEED MORE ABDOMINAL STRENGTH. Flexibility can only take you so far and knowledge of the technique will only help you execute steps "correctly" when your body has the strength.
Perhaps their tummies are actually lined with steel. That would explain so much. I bet that's it.
I would really like to work more on my develope to the back, making sure my hips do not spin out. Also, I will continue to think of pointing my toes while jumping.
Um...I'm going to go do some sit ups. :)
OH MY GOD! how cool is that! i want to be able to at least do a couple of pirouettes.. without tumbling and spotting better. i'd like to be able to have strong core, or just strength to name it, so i can keep my balance. He looks so strong and mighty and i love it :P
i can see he was thinking "up..up.. im flying" and it does really work, and we even got blown away by it. I NEED to do that! i cant even do aa nice assemble , cant get my feettt up!!!
I read all of these fantastic comments up to here on 1-29-08.
I think all of those dancers are amazing! If there is one thing i wish i could learn to do in ballet that would be fouettés. They look so cool but i know it takes incredible posture and technique to do and make it look effortless. When i watch Barysnikov i can see what you tell us in class, that when we turn or hold positions you have to reach up. If you slouch you can never hold the postition, and i think that is my biggest problem-posture.
wow! that is all i have to say. i will keep that image in my head throughout the day, and hopefull someday my moves will look 1/10 as good as his!
His length and control are so solid. And speaking of barysnikov and awesome core control, this is a clip from one of my favorite movies. And yes, that is Gregory Hines, another wonderful dancer. Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sb5bN_zTg4M
(You have to copy/paste it because i don't know how to make nifty links like thomas)
-erika bergman
After watching those videos (and many more) I realized I need to work on my assemble's. Specifically I need to work on making sure my feet touch while I'm in the air. When I watched the video I was absolutely amazed by the articulation of the dancers feet. All of their moves are so graceful, specific and beautiful.
This dictionary is a great resource, I'm not very familiar with many ballet terms, so this will definitely help me catch on a little bit faster.
Besides all of the crazy amazingly difficult and beautiful moves in the video, I really enjoyed watching the contrast of the high intensity spinning to Barysnikov's standing positions. It's like he moves so fast and for so long and just stops all of a sudden. It'd be great if we could incorporate that into our movement because it's simple, but so visually appealing.
Very cool website. I also really enjoyed watching the Barysnikov; he's incredibly inspiring and I feel like watching him clears my head a little bit and reminds me to just dance and not overanalyze the steps and what I am supposed to be doing. I would also like to work on pirouttes and, like Farah said, my core strength. Sometimes I have trouble balancing and I think that might help me improve a bit.
Once we have enjoyed our rock n roll ballet, we will do some core strengthening lying on the floor.
Baryshnikov was an early inspiration for me as a younger dancer. Once, he came in to class late while I was dancing in New York and stood behind me at the barre. It was amazing to turn around and see him there, but it kind of scared me to think that he was looking at me when we turned around again to the other side.
Louis
After watching a few of the online dictionary demonstrations, I became addicted and watched every single one. They were very aligned and graceful. The dancers incorporated head movement and their arms were gorgeous. Gahh. Barsynikov was amazing.
After watching Mikhail Barysnikov, I was surprised how beautiful his movement. Every single his movement makes me feel he is flying in the air. He have such a great body balance,it probably have to takes me years by years of training to able to be dance like Mikhail Barysnikov. I watch his leg when he making turns, i was very impress by the strong legs and the balance. Also his upper part of body holds him up when he turn. After i watch the video, i feel like so hard to be a good dancer, As a good dancer, every part of body movement,you have to take as a consideration,Practice makes different, i belive all the great dancer spend a lot of time practice in dance. This is sometimes i need to do, so that i can become a better dancer later in the future.
His strength and flexibility is so amazing. He makes such beautiful movements look so simple!! Every movement is a pose! his alignment stays so sturdy yet he is flexible and does crazy movements. That was soo cool!
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I appreciate having a resource for the ballet terms in order to refer somewhere. I really need to work, after watching these videos, on lengthening my body and reaching through all of the combinations. My technique needs to improve so I hit every position exactly and correctly.
I'm so behind! Sorry, Louis. I look at the blog a lot, but I get so caught up in reading everybody else's comments and watching youtube ballet videos that all of the time that I had set aside for actually responding somehow disappears.
After watching Baryshnikov and going through the online ballet dictionary, I would really like to incorporate more fluidity into my movements. Even in the dictionary, where all of their movements were so technically accurate, there was a definite flow to the steps. I feel like that is something that is missing from my dancing. I've also always had a really hard time with multiple pirouettes, so I think that I need to work harder on my upper body positioning and spotting, which you can tell from the videos is so important.
There are a lot of things I want to and need to incorporate into my own movements. Even if I was EVER the best dancer in the world.. there's ALWAYS room for improvement. Since I'm not even close to being the best dancer.. I think I will start out with just a few improvements, such as: learning to keep my arms in the correct position without limp elbows or lifted shoulders, facing the right direction, and maybe presenting with confidence.
I am very much impressed how Barysnikov uses his body. I am not sure if he is totally content with his own performance, he, at least seems like performing perfectly as he wish. I wish I could do pirouettes exactly as I imagine. It would be the best feeling.
Through watching videos and dictionary, I realized that improving technique is not only achieved by physically focusing on certain step, but by enhancing the concentration and integration of the whole movement with a lot of passion.
Barysnikov's upper body carriage is absolutely amazing, and of course, his core strength as most everyone has mentionesd - what a combination of strength and grace. I am a little embarrassed to admit that I have never seen him dance before! Can you believe it? SO I am happy to see his the video after all of these years of hearing his name - isn't there an 80's new wave punk band that sings something about Barysnikov???
The online ballet dictionary is amazing!!!! I will totally use this as a reference now. I love the jete entrelace. I'd love to work on improving a lot of the complicated foot patterns - glissade, jete, assemble. The problem lately has been that those movements tend to be toward the latter half of the class when I am having to ice my toe - stunting my progess in exactly what I need and want to work on. : (
Turns/spins are also on my list...
I would love to be able to turn almost effortlessly, though it is not effortlessly. I suppose that is what ballet is, making it seemed controlled and effortless while having to put a great deal of effort into it.
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