Introduction
After almost completing my first year at Leeds Conservatoire, I can confidently say that I have felt a strong improvement in my abilities. Throughout the year, I have worked on all different aspects of MT performance through independent study in addition to classes, especially on the elements I have never studied before such as dance. Throughout this portfolio, I will be investigating just how much progress I have made as well as the work I did in order to develop to my current level. Within the depths of my personal examination, I will be focusing on my progress through the lens of dance which felt most alien to me when starting at the conservatoire.
Having done zero professional MT training before September, the realisation of how little I know was very daunting when I started. But, I have also learned that I have potential and that I’m willing to work hard and take in as much as possible in the next 3 years to do be the best I can. Although I haven’t been here for long, I have found my time here invaluable and I have tried to take in every lesson and teaching given to me here in order to improve and I trust that this will show in my portfolio.
Jazz
The first MT element I am examining is dance as I started this course with zero dance training and limited knowledge and I feel I have grown a lot. I am separating the three dance styles that I have been trained in as I feel my progress with each has differed between them. When starting this year, I was equally exited and apprehensive about starting my jazz journey as I have always loved to move but never had the opportunity to train. At first I was nervous that I would struggle to keep up with everyone else when learning techniques and routines but I was pleasantly surprised to find that wasn’t the case. Since starting I have adored all of my jazz classes with both technique and performance. I found that even with my dyslexia and slow processing disorder, I was able to quickly pick up and retain new choreography and apply any notes to my performance as seen with our first jazz routine in video one and two of the Welcome to Duloc dance from Shreck the musical and We Go Together from Grease.
In order to progress my dancing ability, since the start of the year I have booked a practice rooms at the Conservatoire one to two nights a week for me too go over choreography and exercises from the pervious jazz class. This helped me feel prepared for my next class having fixed any notes given to me. By taking time to improve on choreography or technique in my own time, it meant that I wasn’t receiving the same notes from the pervious lesson, allowing me to improve at a faster rate. In video three you can see me practicing one of the dances outside of class with a couple class mates that helped me to improve. Going over routines after we had completed them also helped to strengthen my long term memory which came in handy when going over and deciding what dances I would do for Christmas and end of year assessments. As well as improving my technique through exercises and practice, I also wanted to make sure that I was at a good fitness and strength level for dancing. I have always been fairly athletic so arrived in decent form but I knew I could improve for the benefit of my performance ability (which would help me to reach industry standard for third year). In order to work on this, I started to do daily workouts (along side my daily stretches) on top of my fitness classes to help my strength improve. The workouts focused on different areas of strength so that I was getting stronger in general and not just one area. Saying that, I did take priority on some areas to others such as my core which I felt especially weak on, this allowed me to feel more equal in the different strength areas. Doing this has allowed me to hit my new record of plank time which has now reached 3.5 minutes where as I was struggling to hold it for less than a minute at the start of the year.
Due to my consistency and determination with practice, I now feel confident and a better dancer for it. When starting I really struggles with pirouettes and found them very frustrating, but through exercises, repetition and strength training I can now confidently do a single pirouette and am close to a steady double. As well as technique, my stamina and strength have greatly improved, allowing me to perform long and high-energy dances as seen in video five. I have also seen a great improvement in my flexibility and how I have been able to apply it to my dancing. I can see a definite improvement in the height of my kicks in exercises and routines that I couldn’t achieve in September. Not only have I noticed the difference in my ability but so have my jazz teachers, after my Christmas assessments I was given encouraging feedback about my progress which you can see in photo one.
With moving forward in my jazz training, I want to continue to work on my strength and flexibility as I feel it is holding me back from a dance level that I could be achieving. With such a long break for summer in between first and second year I think it is crucial that I keep my strength and flexibility training up to par so that I don’t return for second year in worse shape than I left, if anything I should have improved over the break with the right maintenance. So that I don’t become complacent over the break, I plan to keep up with my daily flexibility training so that by the time I come back I might be able to reach my goal of front splits that I’m not far from completing. This will place me in a good position for my training to reach industry level as having good flexibility will allow me to perform more advanced moves and tricks, allowing me to have better job opportunities over people who have less flexibility. For my strength training, I aim to consistently go to the gym to work on the strength side of my dance ability and to take up running to increase my cardio stamina which will allow me to perform better for longer periods at a time which is key when graduating when you need to perform eight shows a week.
Ballet
I have always admired ballet and have loved watching performances of it in my local theatre, which meant I was especially exited to start learning and see how different it is from other dance forms. When I first started, one of the intimidating things I found was the different terminology for moves and skills as I found it very overwhelming trying to remember terms such as ‘Port de bras’ which means “carriage of the arms” (Port, “Ballet Manila Archives”). I had also never fully appreciated how difficult ballet was before I started training and the amount of discipline it takes to do it skilfully and gracefully. Although it was challenging, I thoroughly enjoyed the level of detailed it required which made it feel more rewarding when you had performed it correctly. Having done no ballet training, I found it very helpful that we started at the basics which allowed me to learn from scratch, it also mean that when we built up to more difficult moves such as a glissade which is a “Glide. A traveling step executed by gliding the working foot from the fifth position in the required direction, the other foot closing to it.” (American Ballet Theatre), I had the foundations of the move.
In order to progress in ballet, I have been working of the technical exercises outside of class a couple nights a week which helped my skills as well as strength. I also found it very useful doing practice with one of my class mates as we would help correct each other, I found that spotting errors on someone else encouraged me to correct them on myself as well as solidifying my learning when teaching someone else. One of the exercises I particularly worked on was my pirouettes which I thoroughly struggled with at the beginning (even more so that jazz pirouettes). I kept working on my balance but also my mental attitude about them which is what I found was holding me back the most. As I was always apprehensive towards them, it was effecting how I performed which continued the cycle. In order to get over this, I made consistent pirouettes part of my out of class practice so that they became less daunting. When doing the pirouette practice, I would watch myself in the mirror and correct one thing each time I did a new pirouette from the last one. I found this a very helpful exercise as it allowed me to focus on one correction per pirouette which meant I improved gradually, as seen in video seven.
I feel that I have progressed well in ballet and in my Christmas assessments I achieved a score of low 60s which I was very pleased about, having only done 12 weeks worth of ballet up to that point. I have continued to progress from there and I now feel more confident in my pirouettes and am able to confidently land a majority of them, even when included into a routine. My upper body strength has also massively improved which I also believed has improved my ballet abilities which can be seen in video eight where am preparing for my end of year assessments. I am also at a level where I am able to add some artistic expression into the routines that makes me feel even more confident and professional, this is key for industry settings as audition panels look for confidence and personality in dancers.
Over the summer period, as I won’t be able to attend many ballet lessons, I want to work on my strength facilities which will help me to perform ballet rather than individual techniques that I will struggle to correct myself on. I am going to focus on aspects like my calf and arm strength that will allow me to progress to singular leg techniques when I return in September. In order to work on this, I will add specific exercises such as calf raises and triceps dips into my workout routines.
Tap
At the start of the year I was intrigued to see how I would cope with tap as I was a little apprehensive about how clumsy on my feet I can sometimes be. When starting, I found it a little overwhelming with how much information you need to take in and apply to create one step sequence. When watching my teachers perform the moves I would often get confused and frustrated about what I was supposed to do and how I could replicate the moves. Although it took me a little longer to learn the steps, I generally enjoyed performing them and putting them into choreography. I found that tap quickly became my weakest dance principle out of the three and often frustrating. Due to this, I often let my emotions get the better of me which I feel has held me back a bit from where I could have been. Due to this, I knew I could be performing at a better standard if I came in with more of an open mind to tap.
To work on my mental attitude and get over the block I was facing towards tap, I started to do small sessions of it here and there throughout the week so that it felt less daunting of a task. I would both break down steps and go over choreography from class so that when I went back next lesson, I came in feeling more confident and was able to pick up new choreography easier. Although my improvement was at a slower pace than I felt my jazz and ballet was improving, it was getting better and my confidence was slowly rising. For my Christmas assessment feedback, I scored upper 50s along with positive notes about my progress and the potential for growth I had. This was much needed encouragement which allowed me to appreciate the progress I had made and pushed me further.
Tap is still my weakest dance principle to this day but I have definitely improved, mentally and technically. Although I still struggle a little with tap, I have learned to find the enjoyment in it especially with how far I have developed. At the start of the year, I wouldn’t have predicted how far I have now come and the amount I have been able to accomplish after roughly eight months of training. Although starting with some tap training would have been beneficial to me, starting at square one meant that I had no bad habits coming into the course and I started with a clean slate to work on. One thing that has helped me find my motivation is my appreciation for tap dancing and the history it holds. This has helped encourage me to throw myself into the dance and value the amount of culture that stands behind it.
With moving forward with my tap training, I am going to utilise the long summer break to go over all of the routines I have learned in class to continue to grow my confidence and ability. I will go over the routines with and without tap shoes so that I don’t hyper fixate on why I’m not making the right sounds and instead focus on the fundamental movements of the steps. As my confidence grows, I will be able to add a performance level to the dance that will strengthen over time. Adding this to my practice now will mean that in third year I am able to add artistry to my performances, ideal for when I enter the industry as a graduate. Having this ability is curtail when auditioning as casting panels want to see personality and drive from a performer about the work, it also shows your confidence in the craft to be able to perform it with appearing ease. When starting in year two, I would like a slightly better work ethic when it comes to tap as my enjoyment levels have affected how willing I am to train. Due to my frustration with tap, I have been reluctant to do as much work on it as I should have done, if anything I should be training my tap skills harder because it is a weaker skill. Doing tap over the summer will mean that I wont be able to brush it under the rug and forget about it till September, making it less daunting when I return.
Conclusion
I am pleased to say that I will be leaving first year feeling very proud of the progress I have made and how my dance skills have developed. I feel that I have utilised my time well for dance this year and that my consistency and determination with practice has paid off well and allowed to reach the level I am now. I am particularly pleased with my progression in ballet and jazz and, with having zero previous training, I feel I have coped very well and I am exited to see what I will be able to accomplish within year two. I wish I felt as confident with tap as I do the other disciplines but I am pleased that I am now able to bring a better attitude to my tap lessons and am more receptive to making mistakes and trying again. I would’ve liked to progress a little further at tap which was likely hindered by my reluctance towards it but I know that is something to be aware of when coming into year two. When returning, I want to put the same amount of energy and effort into all three of the dances so that my progress is more equal across them. I would like to focus more on tap throughout my week than I have been in order to keep my tap skills up with the other two dances. With regards to my future training, I hope to keep the same level (or higher) of hard work and attentiveness to my craft that I currently have. I feel with the amount of dedication that I have, I am in a good position to be a strong triple threat performer by the time of my graduation regardless of my lack of previous training. This is key within the industry and will give me the confidence to believe in my skills when facing auditions but also rejection which is inevitable.
Bibliography
(Port, “Ballet Manila Archives”)
—. “Ballet Manila Archives.” Ballet Manila Archives, 7 May 2020, balletmanilaarchives.com/home/2020/5/7/ballet-dictionary-sixth-port-de-bras.
(American Ballet Theatre)
American Ballet Theatre. “Ballet Dictionary | American Ballet Theatre (ABT).” American Ballet Theatre, 2018, www.abt.org/explore/learn/ballet-dictionary/.
