Dance diary: Sous-sus(sudio)

I just like saying that. (Though Thom would roll his eyes at me for making any kind of Phil Collins reference, ha.) Anyway, just a quick post this time to go over last Saturday’s class.

Class notes

New steps:

• battement soutenu
• sous-sus
• petit battement

Actually we had started doing battement soutenu and sous-sus at the very end of the previous class, but we only just put together the names to those steps in this class. All seems to be going well so far. Along with a few corrections I also got “good job!” a few times from our teacher, so that’s encouraging.

Every now and then I wish the pace would pick up, but then I realize how demanding ballet technique is, even for simple steps, especially for someone like me who hasn’t danced regularly in a long time. So, slow and sure is good for now. That said, I do feel myself becoming a bit more flexible, which is another bit of encouragement. Also, as if ballet steps weren’t already creeping into my everyday life, we did enough port de bras last class that now when I reach for anything, even a pen at my desk, I’m all, round the arm, relax the hand…

By the way here’s a video on arm positions from the Royal Ballet glossary (though the thumbnail image was unfortunately captured between positions; that’s not actually fifth):

This coming Saturday is the last class of this workshop, which is only four weeks because our teacher is going on a trip to Russia. I had wondered what to do with myself dancewise before she returns to lead the next phase of the workshop, and she recommended a class for us to drop into in the interim. Good stuff.