Perseverance pays off!!!

Well, after 3 months, 5 applications, and 1 audition, I am proud to say that my summer holidays are at last sorted. I've had offers of places from.Midland Theatre Ballet, Opes International (a new residential course in Nottingham) and Ballet Theatre UK emailed me today to offer me a place on their Pre Professional Summer Course- and Associate Scheme!! Yayya! After Elmhurst, I thought I'd get no offers at all this year... Now i've got three!! :-D :-D So happy!!!

Summer School Audition

Wow! I went to an audition on Sunday for Ballet Theatre UK's Pre Professional summer course. There were only 7 others in the audition but I thought that it went really well (although we were told where to stand at the barre, we weren't allocated places in the centre so I aimed for my usual favourite spot; centre front :-D my place at the barre was perfect too; right in the middle of the back barre!) I really think it was the best class i've ever danced. Barre was long and quite challenging, but the teacher, Chris Moore (Director of BTUK) explained all the exercises very thoroughly and made us feel at ease with lots of witty comments! In adagio, my favourite part of barre, we had to do a developpe devant; I knew this was a step I could do well, so with my foot well above shoulder height and a lovely slight cambre, I turned my head to give the judges a somewhat smug Cheshire Cat grin. It worked; the female judge smiled back and mouthed "Wow". Yeyya!!! That was when I knew I'd got a reasonable chance of getting in. In the centre, we started with a lovely ports de bras, followed by adage with pirouettes (caught sight of a nastily sickled foot in the mirror during a fouette to arabesque- whoopsie!) then a very pretty pirouette enchainement. Moving on to petit allegro (which I always dread- too fast!) we warmed up with a rapid sequence of small jumps. Then, to my delight, came a simplified version of my MTB ballet mistress Olivia Pickford's favourite enchainement; a sweet waltz of glissades and assembles battus. At last, we travelled from the corner, in a vivacious grand allegro, leaving me exhilarated, feeling for once as if I had truly out-danced all the competition :-D

Solo Choreography

Had an exam in Dance at school, on my Solo Choreography. It went really well, despite a minor injury... Basically, at the end, I fell forwards onto my hands and knees, banging on the floor. On Thursday, when I rehearsed it, I managed to bruise my wrist quite badly. I pursuaded mum to not take me to A&E- she wanted to, though!! I decided to ignore it and do the exam- I ended up in the nurses' office ten minutes later with an ice pack. Whoopsie....
Hopefully it'll be worth it though when we get our grades!

Graham Fletcher Ballet Associates

Went to an audition yesterday for the Graham Fletcher bsllet associates. I was lucky enough to get a  private audition, meaning I joined in a normal class, instead of attending an open audition later in the year. The standard of the class was absolutely phenomenal; it was without a doubt the hardest class i've ever done. It was utterly amazing, and I loved it- although the other girls seemed quite intimidating, as opposed to welcoming. I guess they justsaw me as a threat- although i'm no competition at all to them!!
Graham spoke to my mum afterwards, and said that I don't quite have the right physique to make it to Principal level of the Royal Ballet, but he seemed to think i had some potential, because he invited me back to the next class, which is on June 9th :) Hopefully then i'll be able to impress him enough to gain a place! :)