Done and done

Did our Nutcracker performance last night and it went well especially considering the horrid dress rehearsal earlier in the day. Theater sound system didn’t like the cd with half of the music and quit partway through the show and the back up disk was at the studio. The Mother Ginger platform broke the day before and had to be partially rebuilt in the dock area of the theater. And what I found really disappointing is the professional dancers hired in to do the character parts, cavalier and prince rarely made rehearsals and when they did were usually late and generally very rude. The younger kids were told early on to look to them for examples of how to rehearse and behave in the theater, the amateur adult dancers carried themselves much better. I’ve done two Nutcrackers in the last two years and while fun I think I would like to be back in the audience watching, something odd about being on the stage after the years of watching my youngest daughter perform. Have to be honest with myself as I would really like to do something else besides the party scene, like maybe mouse king or another costumed part where it’s not apparent that I’m an older male. It’s time to return back to being strictly a student, anonymity sometimes has it perks.

A week to go

Don't know whether to be happy or sad that Nutcracker is next weekend. My partner and I are working well together and know our parts and the musical ques so it's easier to polish the little things to make ourselves look better. And the story being told is rich with more detail that I seen in other Nutcrackers. Guess that's the part to be happy about. The sad part is that it looks like none of my family or friends will be coming to the performance. Mother in law has Alzheimer's and is taking up more and more of my wife's time, church potluck is the same night as the performance and mother in law is instant that she and Cathy go. Looks like my daughters won't be there either, one used to be a dancer but go hurt and now won't watch anything, says it hurts too much to watch. Other daughter and her husband don't have any interest and friends from last year made empty promises about going so I haven't said anything about this years performance. Makes me feel pretty down right now.

I'm baaaaak

Been missing a lot of classes and so far only one Nutcracker rehearsal due to a cold, flu, mystery virus that has been plaguing me the last two weeks with headaches, exhaustion and general feeling of weakness. Hopefully things will be back to normal soon. Nice thing happened with Pas De Deux classes last weekend, the young ladies assigned to work with me the last class were extremely keen on working and made for a very enjoyable class. Both were from the studio that my youngest daughter used to take classes at and I was amazed that I could tell the difference on who has been training them. While all of the lifts we did while simple (over head, fish) I could tell by feel when they were coming out of the plie and time the lift almost perfectly every time with little effort. Have to let Miss Sue (Sue Knaak) know her that her former students are strong and have really good work ethic when it comes to this kind of work. David let them know in class that he is pleased with the progress being made in working with partners as it is difficult and you have to learn to adjust your comfort level. Speaking of such, the reverence he gave last week involved the men wrapping our arms around our partners shoulders in an embrace as the final pose. Talk about uncomfortable! I even whispered that comment to my first partner. I’m sure she felt the same way I did. ;)