Just One More!!!!

Just as I thought auditions were over, my friend text me last week; "Joffrey Ballet are holding summer intensive auditions in London!!" Of course, the allure of a trip to my favourite place was irresistible (although tinged with the tiniest bit of sadness knowing that my last trip to Covent Garden, for my Royal audition, was filled with hope of a ballet school place, a hope that is now extinguished for at least another year).

I arrived in London (having successfully navigated the Underground!) and did a Russian ballet class at DanceWorks. I have always admired the Russian dancers, and adore the Russian style, however a negative audition experience involving a rude principal and a very strict teacher who spoke- or rather, yelled- in Russian throughout the class, had somewhat diminished my desire to learn the Vaganova style. I didn't really know what to expect in the class, but was pleasantly surprised by how lovely our teacher, Zina Mamedova, was. Zina trained at the Vaganova, danced with the Kirov, then became Principal of the National Ballet Theatre of Prague! 

We did a lot of barrework, focussing on building strength through slow, repetitive movements. The centre work was faster paced, with four lovely grand allegro enchainements!

After exploring beautiful Hyde Park, I travelled to Covent Garden. The spiral staircase to exit the station was a good warm-up; 193 steps! I visited all of the dance shops, before arriving at Pineapple Studios for the Joffrey audition. 

There were just seven of us in the audition (although as Joffrey tour worldwide for their auditions, I'm not expecting a place at all!); the man who taught the class was wonderfully enthusiastic, and gave some really useful corrections. He was particularly meticulous regarding alignment; for example in arabesque he didn't want us to pitch forwards at all (contrary to what I have been taught!); it was quite hard to adapt to the unique Joffrey style!

The pirouette enchainement was lovely; despite having not danced for 2 weeks over Easter, I managed a few triples, which I was very pleased about as I was expecting it to be a disaster!! 

During certain exercises I had to remind myself to smile, but in grand allegro I couldn't help but smile, as it felt as if all of my favourite steps had been put into one enchainement!

They said we'll hear the results of the audition within 3 weeks- although I'd absolutely love to go to New York, it isn't financially feasible, so I'm looking at summer schools in the UK instead :P

Audition Conclusion

I've completed all of my auditions (Royal, Northern, BTUK, London Russian & Hammond), and am very sad to say that unfortunately I wasn't offered a place this year. However, the past few months of auditions have taught me so much- independence, confidence, and most importantly, how to cope with rejection!! I have made the decision to study a BTEC Dance course at college, with the aim of auditioning for ballet and contemporary schools in early 2017. That seems like an eternity away!! But I suppose I knew all along that I wasn't ready for vocational school this year; within the next two years i hope to continue to improve my ballet, and increase my knowledge of contemporary. I also teach at my local dance school; there is nothing more wonderful than bringing joy to young children, giving them the gift of dance.