What do ballet dancers do

Notify me of new posts by email. Dance Informa Magazine. Share this:. Recommended for you. Queensland Ballet Academy holds first Open Day. Click to comment. Leave a Reply Cancel reply Your email address will not be published. NZ Dance News — January. It can take up to two weeks of solid work to produce a single tutu.

Female dancers usually begin their training en pointe at the age of eleven or twelve, although this can vary. Before a dancer can begin pointe work, they must do extensive work to strengthen the feet and lower legs — otherwise they risk injury, possibly permanent. Of those, 5, are pointe shoes. The ladies also use pairs of tights a year. The only time a male dancer would ever wear pointe shoes is for a specialist character role for instance the Ugly Sisters in some versions of Cinderella , or Bottom, who is transformed into a donkey in The Dream.

Our pianists accompany the dancers in class and rehearsal. Our pianists also play solo piano for performances of works like Ballet Imperial and Dyad The dancers do it themselves! For specialist make-up used for roles like Puck in The Dream and Carabosse in The Sleeping Beauty , the costume designer will often supply a drawing demonstrating how the make-up should be done, and the dancers will be given cosmetics to achieve that look.

Usually, however, they buy their own make-up. Where does it come from? No one really knows! It's specific to Australian dance culture. Ballet was first codified as a system of movement in the 17th-century French courts, and the terms have been handed down over generations. At The Australian Ballet, they can. We are one of the few companies in the world to offer full-time contracts to dancers — so they have access to leave, including parental leave.

Several of our female dancers — including principal artists — have left the company to have children, and almost all have returned to the stage. The Australian Ballet has a world-leading medical team that has worked wonders in injury prevention. However, just as in the highest levels of sport, sometimes injuries are unavoidable. Dancers are encouraged to report strains and niggles early, and to spend time away from performing if necessary. All of these items are loaded into tractor-trailers and shipped to the theatre where they are stored backstage.

Often items from several different ballets live backstage until it is time for the ballet to be performed. When dancers rehearse in the studio a pianist plays the music for them. It is usually at the dress rehearsal that the dancers hear the orchestra for the first time.

It is also at the dress rehearsal that the dancers have their final opportunity to try on their costumes, work with the props and scenery and practice the steps on the stage. Everyone's hard work is rewarded the moment the curtain rises and the ballet begins. Female ballet dancers are able to stand on the tips of their toes by wearing a special shoe called a pointe shoe.

Each dancer at The National Ballet of Canada is specially fitted for their pointe shoes and have their shoes made perfectly to fit their feet. The shoemaker uses a mold of the dancer's foot size and then places layers of glue and canvas over the mold to make the toe area into a "box" to support the foot. The shoe is then hardened in a very hot oven and finally covered with pink satin.

The sole of the shoe is made of hard leather which prevents it from bending too freely, and also helps to support the feet as the dancer rises up and down off their toes. To keep the shoe on securely, the dancers sew satin ribbons to the sides and tie them tightly around their ankles. The dancers also cut the satin off the tips of the toes and apply rosin a powdered substance also used by stringed instrument players and baseball players to the tip and bottom of the shoe so they do not slip on the dance floor.

When the dancer gets a new pair of shoes, they are very hard and would be uncomfortable and noisy to dance in, so the dancers spend time breaking in their shoes by gently hammering them or wedging them in a door frame. Wearing new shoes for ballet class and in rehearsals can also help to soften them to be more comfortable for a performance. When dancing, sweat and body heat soften the shoe even more, to where it can no longer support the dancer's foot.

Pointe shoes generally last a maximum of eight hours, depending on the difficulty of the choreography, however some dancers can go through one pair of pointe shoes in a single performance.