Getting to know the world of classical dance

Even though I am a relative ignoramus when it comes to the world of classical ballet I cannot imagine a more exciting place to follow the art form than New York City. Not only is NYC home to the company that Balanchine built, the New York City Ballet, it is also host to three annual seasons of American Ballet Theater (soon to be two--ABT's Nutcracker is moving to California next winter), as well as regular visits from nearly all the major companies in the world. I am grateful to have discovered ballet in this city at this time. 

I must say that my exposure to concert dance prior to moving to New York had been extremely limited. Yes, I knew the Nutcracker existed and that it was a grand holiday tradition. I knew that Swan Lake was a ballet thanks to the animated movie and "Black Swan". I took a ballet class when I was in third grade that taught me the basics--I knew the positions and what a plie was. I quit after one year (in favor of my Jewish Day School's Israeli Dance Troupe) though some of my ballet pictures remain. 

I also went to an extremely memorable Alvin Ailey performance in New Bedford, MA during my junior year of high school, where I saw "Revelations" and was temporarily transfixed. Deeper engagement with concert dance would come later. 

My first "deep dive" into the world of ballet came because of a class I took as a whim at Yale: Dance in Musical Theater. It was the second semester of my senior year and I had not taken a performing arts class since Band my Freshman year of High School. Why did I do it? It was a fifth class and I wanted to take a risk and try something different before graduating. The class was mostly theater majors and I was way out of my league in terms of talent and experience. The very first day had us learning a combination from "Cool" from West Side Story. Needless to say, I was a klutz and could not learn the 20 second routine. 

That being said I was deeply impressed with the professors. One of them, Dan Egan, coordinates the musical theater curriculum at Yale. The other, Emily Coates, is one of the most interesting members of Yale's faculty. She was a member of the New York City Ballet in the early 90s, working directly under Jerome Robbins before his death. She then shifted to dancing in modern companies before beginning undergraduate work at Yale. She quickly made a name for herself and became the director of Dance Studies, collaborating with a wide range of faculty--obviously those in the Theater Studies department, but also in more unexpected places, like the Physics department! Because of the amazing faculty and the opportunity to learn using a very different part of my being I decided to stick with the class. 

The class focused on four major choreographers in musical theater: Agnes DeMille (of Oklahoma! fame), Jerome Robbins, Bob Fosse, and Bill T. Jones. For each of the choreographers we spent one part of our class learning about history and context, and the other part of our class actually learning their choreography--complete with traditional dance warm-ups! I had to do barre exercises--for a Yale class! For the record, my turnout is terrible and I could never be a real danseur. 

What made the class even better was that outside choreographers came to guest teach the class--people who had actually worked on Broadway and in ballet. For our Robbins piece ("The Bottle Dance" from Fiddler) we had Professor Coates, who had direct contact with Robbins. For the DeMille piece ("The Civil War Ballet" from Bloomer Girl) we had Liza Gennaro, daughter of Peter Gennaro (Robbins' assistant on West Side Story), and choreographer in her own right. For the Fosse piece ("Steam Heat" from The Pajama Game) we had Mary MacLeod, who performed in the Fosse musical/dance revue on Broadway. And for the Bill T. Jones piece ("Zombie" from Fela!), we had Maija Garcia, Jones' Associate choreographer. 

It was an amazing line-up and it was so fun to learn and discuss those dances. We finished the class with a performance of "The Bottle Dance" and "Steam Heat" for a group of New Haven high school students. I had a big group of friends come out and support me. It was a lovely part of the conclusion of my Yale experience. I am proud that I still know most of the steps to "The Bottle Dance" and could easily relearn "Steam Heat" after watching the videos a couple times. 

Another great feature of the course was that we didn't just look at dance traditions from Broadway--Professor Coates made sure to incorporate context from the dance world at large. That included the amazing ballets of George Balanchine, someone I barely knew anything about. I remember watching "Agon" for the class and being confused by it. I also remember Profs. Coates and Egan talking about Jerome Robbins deep insecurity vis a vis Balanchine; he could never live up. There must have been something special in the world of Classical (or neo-Classical ballet) but to be honest, without any real exposure beyond one or two YouTube videos I still had no appreciation. 

Only after finishing this class, moving to New York, and buying a rush ticket to NYCB on a whim, did I begin to realize how astonishing Balanchine's world of Classical dance truly was.