What is the best path to a career in ballet?

My daughter is 11, almost 12, years old and is very serious about a career in ballet. We turned from ballet classes being a past time to being a serious decision about 2.5 years ago. Now she is taking as many ballet classes as she can where she is and taking private lessons and performs with a local dance company. I am wondering if where I have her studying now is good enough. Or if it's good enough for now. And when do I know that it's time to make that big leap to a new school. At this point it may be a school that is more than an hour away, which is a lot of driving for 5 days a week with 2 younger brothers in the car. But she's serious and she's good (I have been told by others - I don't have the knowledge to know one way or another). The tuition cost wouldn't be any more if we dropped the private lessons, but we are completely stretched to the limit now and it would be more in gas for sure. But we don't want her to miss the boat so to speak. HELP!!!! I need advice.

What is the best path to a career in ballet?imax theatre

She should be auditioning for ballet summer intensives either this year or the next if she wants a career in ballet. Some I would recommend are School of American Ballet, Boston Ballet, Ballet Chicago, Pacific Northwest Ballet, and San Francisco Ballet. All of these (and more) are nationally acclaimed schools that either have a professional company as part of the school or are connected to a professional company, like SAB is connected to New York City Ballet. They tour all over the US in January and February, some even into March, and hold auditions at various cities. Check their websites to find out when they are coming to a city near where you live. Also do some research on the cost od tuition and room and board (which together cost anywhere from 4-5 thousand) and the cost of plane tickets. It's also a good idea to pick a school that's very close to either a relative or a friend who could house your child, cutting the cost by more than half. The schools I have mentioned od have age limits, so make sure you qualify. As long as you're old enough by the time of the program, not the audition, you're fine.

After a few years of going to intensives, your daughter might be accepted into the year-round program of one of the schools. In this case, she would have to be old enough and mature enough to move away and live at the school. When she's about 18, she might get an apprenticeship, which is a pre-professional position with either that company or another one. At 19 or 20, she may get into the corps de ballet and become a professional dancer. She can then move up to soloist and even principal. A dance career is VERY difficult to acheive, and there is a LOT of competition. Some girls can be incredibly mean, but that usually means they're intimidated by you.

Well, I guess I can't explain EVERYTHING here, but I've inclded as much as I can. You'll both learn more as you do research and talk to people who know more about this that I do. Good luck!

What is the best path to a career in ballet?performing show opera theater

I'm not sure where you are, but there are some choices

1. Have her move to a more popular studio: this is good because she will be working with choreographers that are already in the ballet world. It's not always about what you know, but who you know. Ballet-focused studios often have connections and their dancers can audition for sister companies and roles in their productions

~This could just mean taking weekend classes or workshops at other places

~If she permanently moves, she will be surrounded by others that have the same career in mind. This will probably create more competition, but that always helps to build skills

2. She def. should be auditioning for as many summer programs as possible. The more choices she has to pick from, the better. Check out intensives not only out of town but near home, because she could get accepted to the ballet schools.

3. Encourage her to stretch and practice at home, even if it means boureeing around the house or holding poses at the counter. Every little thing will help.

Good luck and I know your family will make the right choice. I hope that I could help. Happy 2008 ( :
The ancient (at least in computer terms) alt.arts.ballet newsgroup compiled a FAQs that includes a long list of points to consider in response to the question, "I don't know a thing about ballet and I'm trying to select a school for my child. Where should I look? And what should I look for?"

http://www.dancer.com/tom-parsons/faq_3....

Be sure to read #16 as well, "What is this 'Dolly Dinkle' business, anyway?" to know what to avoid.

Next, you should run (or grand jet茅, perhaps?), not walk, to the "Ballet Talk for Dancers" message board

http://dancers.invisionzone.com/index.ph...

where you will find thousands of fellow dance moms like us (and where the screen name of "dancemom" has long been taken), along with hundreds of dance professionals to answer your questions. However, with so many questions already asked and answered, you will be encouraged to spend some time browsing through past discussion threads where you will gain the equivalent of several books worth of knowledge.

Meanwhile, since audition season is upon us starting this very weekend, you really should run out and pick up a copy of the January issue of Dance magazine for dates and locations of summer intensive auditions and then look for the ones that will be coming close to you. There's a good chance that some will be held at that school that is one hour away. You could call them to ask if they know of any auditions that will be coming to your area.

I gave my daughter the opportunity to audition for programs when she was barely 12 - a year before I thought she was ready to go away for a selective dance program. When she was 12, she attended a two-week, non-audition program that was just a 3.5 hour drive away. She loved it so much that she attended TWO, 2-week programs when she was 13. It's when you're about to start high school that a ballet student really needs to start auditioning for and attending the "big name" summer intensives. There are dozens of them and many of them offer year-round programs that use the summer programs as a way to evaluate potential students. BT4D has discussion threads on virtually every program, so you can talk to other parents and students to learn more about them. My daughter opted to pursue a well-rounded dance education in ballet, modern and jazz via the college route, so she didn't follow the usual ballet track. However, it DID become a struggle to find advanced training for her close to home so she wound up leaving home a year early.