Holiday Reading for Party Planning

Happy belated Thanksgiving!  I hope you all had a fantastic holiday and that you're still nibbling away at those yummy leftovers! 
As the creator of The Ballerina Birthday, I obviously love a party.  Holiday parties have a special place in my heart as well, since the Christmas season is one of my favorites.  (It's one of the things that inspired me to create our Sugar Plum Party! Have you checked it out yet?!)
I'm sure I inherited my love of the holidays from my Mom, our family has always made a point to dress up our house, meals, crafts, and parties around the holidays.  It's a tradition that I love, and one I'm sure I'll pass on to my own family someday.
I also inherited my love of books from my Mom, she has a huge collection, and she especially loves cookbooks and entertaining books. I've been known to snoop in her collection from time to time, and I've found two new books that I think are great especially at this time of year, with parties and events and gift giving opportunities around every corner.
Pippa Middleton really captured the media's attention by being her sister Kate's Maid of Honor at the oh-so-memorable Royal Wedding last year.  Ever since then I've had a slight fascination with these sisters; they are both so elegant and chic, and as I dove into Pippa's new book, Celebrate, I came to like and respect her even more.  I love that her introduction opens with this:

"It's a bit startling to achieve global recognition (if that's the right word) before the age of thirty, on account of your sister, your brother-in-law and your bottom."

Classy, witty, and well-spoken.  I love her!  With years of experience working at her parents business and within the London event planning industry, Pippa offers not only useful tips, observations and ideas on hostessing, but history on events and holidays celebrated in the UK, which I found particularly interesting.  The pages are filled with beautiful photographs as well, taken by David Loftus.

Another great book I've found is Cupcakes and Cashmere.  Inspired by her very successful blog of the same name, Emily Schuman gathered some of her most popular blog posts, some additional in-depth tips, tricks and tutorials on staying organized and getting the most out of each season, and great photographs into her book.  I love that this book offers ideas not only on organization and hosting parties and gatherings, but tips on fun seasonal make-up, and festive wardrobe looks.

If you're looking to host either a grown up holiday party, or a kid-friendly festive gathering, both of these will get your planning wheels turning and inject a good dose of party planning excitement into your process!

A Sweet Sugar Plum Party

My holiday gift and to-do list has been in development since September, and now that it's November, I can feel the buzz of the holidays in the air!  

I'm excited to announce The Ballerina Birthday will be a new offering a new holiday themed party for the 2012 Holiday Season: The Sugar Plum Party!  Treat your Sugar Plum and her friends to a festive party that's sure to sparkle and delight!

The Sugar Plum Party will draw its inspiration from the holiday classic story of The Nutcracker.  Have this timeless story read aloud for 10 of your guests, who will be dressed to the nines in our fantastic tutus and dress up items that make our parties so unique.  Party leaders will guide guests through dancing their own version of The Nutcracker, using Tchaikovsky's music and interactive props!  End the afternoon with a special holiday craft that guests take home to remember their special day!

This is a seasonal and limited offer, and one we're confident will make your holiday season magical.  Bookings are limited, but we have a few select weekends still available! Additionally, if you book a  Sugar Plum Party before December 1, receive 15% off the Performance Fee!  We're also extending this offer to any Ballerina Birthday Party!  We can't wait to celebrate the holidays with you!

A Sugar Plum Fairy Wand: just one of the crafts guests

can do at the Sugar Plum Party!

A plum-y tutu perfect for The Kingdom of Sweets!

Serenade

Happy Election Day!  Have you gotten caught up in the whirlwind of all the election madness?  No matter your affiliation, today will be a busy and exciting day, so I wanted to provide a little respite and break from the election grind. So, take a look at this beautiful video of Balanchine's Serenade.  The lovely Ashley Bouder is interviewed, and this ballet just makes me breathe a little easier.  Enjoy!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!  I hope your day is filled with treats, spooks, and a whole lot of fun!  The past few weeks I've been getting in the spirit and creating and crafting some tricky and treaty projects, and today is the perfect day to share them!  Have a fun and safe Halloween!

Welcome guests to your house with a bevy of spiders!
Attach magnets to the backs of plastic spider rings
(take the ring portion off) and you have creepy crawlies
to attach to your door!

Use mini black trees and candy corn for a festive table setting.
I plan on decorating these trees tonight.  Use orange or silver buttons,
mini lights, whatever!

Of course I had to include a tutu!  I added a black flower
to this green and yellow one and it was a hit with my
students, who pretended to be witches brewing spells
in it!

Nureyev: A Life in Dance

The Bay Area can be a Mecca for artists, dancers, musicians and generally the art inclined and enthusiasts.  There is always something art oriented happening in the Bay, and it's fantastic!  I wanted to share some information about an exhibit that's at the de Young Museum in San Francisco.  Rudolf Nureyev: A Life in Dance is a special exhibit running now through February 17th showcasing costumes and photographs from the legendary dancer and choreographer's personal collection.

Costume by Nicholas Giorgiadis for Rudolf Nureyev in the role of Prince Florimond inSleeping Beauty, Teatro alla Scala, Milan, 1966 (left) and costume by Ezio Frigerio and Mauro Pagaono for Rudolf Nureyev in the role of Romeo, Romeo and Juliet, London Ballet Festival, 1977 (right). Collection CNCS/Rudolf Nureyev Foundation. Photographs by Pascal François/CNCS

As well as being an acclaimed dancer, working with some of the greatest ballerinas of all time (Margot Fonteyn among them), Nureyev was a choreographer, director and ballet master as well.  As a performer, he was meticulous about his costumes fit and appearance, and he had an obsession with fabric, decoration, style and line for the costumes of the ballets he choreographed as well.

Rudolf Nureyev in La Bayadère, Palais Garnier, 1974. Photograph by André Chino. 

Visit the de Young website here, or check out the Press Release about the exhibit.  I can't wait to get to see this exhibit soon and will be sure to report back!  If you've already been to see it yourself, I'd love to hear from you and know your thoughts! 

Ballerina Halloween Characters

Halloween is just around the corner! Still looking for costume ideas?  Look no further...
I always love asking my students what they plan on being for Halloween.  After a myriad of responses that usually include: mermaids, ballerinas (duh), fairies, witches and Disney characters, I ask them what they think I should be.  They usually ponder for a moment or two, and provide me with a litany of creative responses.  My favorite this year has been a princess zombie.
So I got to thinking about Halloween characters and costumes that could be ballet and dance inspired.  "Ballerina" is a pretty general character to portray, why not spice it up a bit and get more specific if your budding ballerina (or maybe you) are interested in being a creature from the dance world for Halloween.  Here are some ideas for characters and costume ideas too.  Happy Spooking!

Medora from Le Corsaire
Medora is a spunky harem girl in the Ballet Le Corsaire, a la Jasmine from Aladdin.  Set to be sold to a Pasha, Medora and her friend Gulnare embark on a set of adventures with Conrad the pirate and his slave Ali in this ballet.  

Viktoria Tereshkina

I love the idea of a yellow tutu and leotard, sparkled up and with a floaty veil or scarf to give the costume an Arabian Nights kind of feel.  Or some baggy pants (you could use ribbons or hair ties to pull the pants in at the ankles and knees) and channel Princess Jasmine.

Coppelia from Coppelia
Click here for the full story on Coppelia.  She's a great option because not only is she a 'ballerina' but a doll as well.  A ballet dress with an apron, and some fun and funky make up will make an easy and cute doll look.

Jewels
Balanchine gave us this gem of a ballet and this is a great option if you have a ballerina on your hands who LOVES a specific color.  Emerald, Ruby and Diamond were the original variations, but think outside the box!  You could also go Lilac Fairy from Sleeping Beauty!

Ariadne from Errand Into The Maze
Wanting to go a little more trick rather than treat? Martha Graham's Errand Into the Maze explores the Greek tale of Ariadne and the Minotaur.  Here is a picture of the traditional costume used.  This could also be a great costume to use make up on, both the face and the body!

Miki Orihara

La Sonnambula
We can again thank Balanchine for another darker character in La Sonnambula (The Sleepwalker).  Also an opera, this haunting character floats mystically through her story in a long white nightgown, hair down, with a single candle lighting her way.  It's not only a chilling costume option, but a chillingly beautiful ballet.

Wendy Wheelan

Ballet 101

In honor of our 101st blog (don't worry, this is my last celebratory number based blogs until 200... or so), I wanted to offer some information on ballet basics, Ballet 101, if you will.  For those of you who have little ones in ballet and you see all the prancing and spinning and emulating of 'ballerinas', this may shed some light on why we do the crazy things we do in ballet.  Even if you know all the basics, it can be fun to learn some new facts (which I've also included here, with the help of the site abridgeclub.com)

Ballet 101

Tutus: Tutus may seem like an odd thing.  Why on Earth would dancers don an itchy, fluffy skirt that reached to their ankles to dance in?  Good question.  It was actually to portray the ethereal and light otherwordly beings that the Romantic era dancers were playing.  In ballets like Les Sylphides, choreographers wanted dancers to seem like the were just skimming the floor (hence the development of pointe shoes as well) and convince audiences that they really were from another world.  As ballet plots and technique developed, tutus got shorter to show fancier footwork.  Starting with Balanchine, many choreographers ditched the tutus all together to focus the choreography and the dancers more on pure movement rather than costumes.

An example of the clean (and non-tutu) costumes Balanchine preferred

Turn Out: Rotating the legs outwards to resemble a duck is also a quality that many question about ballet.  What purpose does turn out serve?  Well, besides giving students something to work out (check out this great video from a previous blog), turnout allows dancers to move quicker than if they were working from a parallel position.  In the court of Louis the XIV, not only did men's fashions (in that day, men did the majority of theatre dancing) demand them to use turn out (their wide topped boots forced them to turn their legs out when they moved), but theaters in that day sat audiences only on one side, and dancers could really only move side to side, and were not allowed to turn their backs to the members of the audience.

Barre: A horizontal wooden hand rail that runs around the wall of a ballet studio.

Warm-up: Exercises taken at the barre (and sometimes centre on the floor) to stretch, lengthen and loosen the body and muscles and prepare them for the more intensive dancing in the centre including jumps and turns.

Positions of the feet: First, Second, Third, Fourth and Fifth.  These have been developed and changed over time.  Beginning students usually only work from First, Second and Third.  Fourth and Fifth positions require more control over the turnout muscles, spine and upper body.

Port de bras: Carriage of the arms that coordinate with the positions of the feet.  Positions of the feet and port de bras are the basis for all classical ballet exercises and much choreography.

Plie: An exercise in which, standing erect and with back straight, you move down and up with

 the bend of the knees.

Releve: A movement in which you rise up high on to the balls of your feet. 

Centre: a group of exercises similar to those at the barre but performed in the centre of the room without the support of the barre. 

Arabesque: A position in which you balance on one leg (or bent leg) with the other

stretched out behind you.

Allegro: An Italian musical term meaning quick and lively. In ballet, allegro steps are completed in fast tempo.

Petit Allegro: Small jumping and turning steps.

Grand Allegro: A combination of large traveling steps and jumps.

Curtsey: A movement by the female dancer where she places one foot behind the other and bends both knees that thanks the instructor at the end of a class, or an audience at the end of a performance.

Bow: A movement by the male dancer where he bends from the waist down that thanks the instructor at the end of a class, or an audience at the end of a performance.  Both curtseys and bows can also be referred to as a Reverence.