Tips from Finis Jhung for Boys Attending Summer Ballet Intensives

I’m still trying to get a really great post from someone on how to get in shape for a summer ballet intensive – little late for Julian, who will have completed his first day at the American Ballet Theatre summer intensive by this time two weeks from now. In the meantime, however, I did get ballet great Finis Jhung to offer me a few really short tips.

Since 1972, Finis Jhung has been a mainstay of the New York dance scene. He has taught dancers of The New York City Ballet, The American Ballet Theatre, The Joffrey, Ailey, Taylor, Graham, and Cunningham Companies as well as star gypsies from Broadway, aspiring professionals, and amateur adult beginners.

While running his own studio until 1987, Finis was also founder, artistic director and choreographer for Chamber Ballet USA. Since then, in New York City, he has taught at The Broadway Dance Center, The Alvin Ailey American Dance Center, Peridance, Ballet Arts, The New Dance Group Arts Center, and Steps. Currently, Finis is working on Broadway with the boys of Billy Elliot: The Musical. He teaches the boys who are now performing the lead role of Billy as well as those who are in training as future prospects. For more information on Finis’ dance career, click here.

Although he was too busy to expand on his advice, Finis was kind enough to offer the following five tips for getting in shape for a summer ballet intensive, like the ABT six-week intensive, and direct boys (and their parents) to some of the videos he has produced. Here’s what he had to say:

Finis Jhung’s 5 Tips for boys Who Want to Get In Shape for a Summer Ballet Intensive

1. Strengthen your core muscles with slow roll ups. Strengthen your torso, shoulders, and arms with push-ups.
2. Improve your flexibility, turn-out, and extension with the DVD The Finis Jhung Ballet Technique: Stretch, Turn-out, & Extension.
3. Learn to plié with resistance so that you will turn more securely and jump higher. Make sure you know how to get the most out of your barre exercises. Check yourself with the DVD The Finis Jhung Ballet Technique: The Power Barre.
4. Practice your pirouettes and tours along with Competition Medalist Joe Gatti in the DVD The Male Ballet Dancer.
5. Stand sideways to the mirror and do 32 changements without tilting the pelvis, with knees correctly aligned over the toes, and without making a sound.

 

I asked him how often to do these exercises and moves and how may of each to do each time, but he was unable to answer due to time constraints. So, I suggest that boys begin with how ever many they can do comfortably and work up either every day or every other day. Or, better yet, ask a dance teacher or ballet teacher for advice.

All the DVDs mentioned are available at www.finisjhung.com.

Hopefully, I will still be able to get some more information form someone else…

Julian hopes to take a class or two (or more) from Finis while we are in New York. If I can swing the cost – very questionable given all that we will be spending while in NYC, I might try to fit in a private lesson with him. Finis says he can accomplish improvement quickly with a dancer, and, according to his website he will: “Teach your muscles to remember the correct sequences of movement that will take your dancing to a place that is beyond emotion. In other words, you don’t have to ‘feel’ like doing something. When you really know how to do it, you will be able to do it. That’s what technique is. Well trained muscles will have you turning and jumping and balancing, no matter how you feel. Learn to work from the inside out. Ground yourself so you can really fly. Get into the zone!”

Sounds great to me and to Julian. Again…we’ll see how the funds go. With airline tickets, sublets, the cost of the program, and classes at Broadway Dance Center, maybe a Broadway show, etc…Whew. This will be an expensive summer. Finis might not fit into the budget.

 

 

 

I’m still rying to get a really great post from someone on how to get in shape for a summer ballet intensive – little late for Julian, who will have completed his first day at the American Ballet Theatre summer intensive by this time two weeks from now. In the meantime, however, I did get ballet great Finis Jhung to offer me a few really short tips. 

Since 1972, Finis Jhung has been a mainstay of the New York dance scene. He has taught dancers of The New York City Ballet, The American Ballet Theatre, The Joffrey, Ailey, Taylor, Graham, and Cunningham Companies as well as star gypsies from Broadway, aspiring professionals, and amateur adult beginners.

While running his own studio until 1987, Finis was also founder, artistic director and choreographer for Chamber Ballet USA. Since then, in New York City, he has taught at The Broadway Dance Center, The Alvin Ailey American Dance Center, Peridance, Ballet Arts, The New Dance Group Arts Center, and Steps. Currently, Finis is working on Broadway with the boys of Billy Elliot: The Musical. He teaches the boys who are now performing the lead role of Billy as well as those who are in training as future prospects. For more information on Finis’ dance career, click here.

Although he was too busy to expand on his advice, Finis was kind enough to offer the following five tips for getting in shape for a summer ballet intensive, like the ABT six-week intensive, and direct boys (and their parents) to some of the videos he has produced. Here’s what he had to say:

Finis Jhung’s 5 Tips for boys Who Want to Get In Shape for a Summer Ballet Intensive

 

1. Strengthen your core muscles with slow roll ups. Strengthen your torso, shoulders, and arms with push-ups.

2. Improve your flexibility, turn-out, and extension with the DVD The Finis Jhung Ballet Technique: Stretch, Turn-out, & Extension.

3. Learn to plié with resistance so that you will turn more securely and jump higher. Make sure you know how to get the most out of your barre exercises. Check yourself with the DVD The Finis Jhung Ballet Technique: The Power Barre.

4. Practice your pirouettes and tours along with Competition Medalist Joe Gatti in the DVD The Male Ballet Dancer.

5. Stand sideways to the mirror and do 32 changements without tilting the pelvis, with knees correctly aligned over the toes, and without making a sound.

All the DVDs are available at www.finisjhung.com.

Hopefully, I will still be able to get some more information form someone else…

Interview with Duncan Cooper (Part 2): Need For Technique & Movement that Tells a Story & Portrays Emotion

Sorry for the delay in writing another post. Things have been a bit crazy at my end. I had a trial period for a writing gig I didn’t get (which took up an enormous amount of time for four weeks). I’ve been gearing up my new column at Examiner.com. Plus, we’ve had time spent on National Dance Week events, apartment searches in New York (finally found one!), parent observation day at the studio, writing and sending out press release for the year-end company performance, and attempts to find decent ballet tights to keep Julian outfitted for the American Ballet Theatre summer intensive. This week at the studio we have student reviews. In two weeks, Julian performs in Copellia with Los Gatos Ballet (find out how to purchase tickets here)—which I have to miss because my daughter has her final synchronized swim meet in Sacramento— and the following week is tech week for Teen Dance Company’s 10^th Anniversary Concert (purchase tickets here). Then, of course, we have the concert, and the dance year officially comes to an end. Phew!

At least at that point we have a few weeks of “down time.” However, Julian plans to dance up a storm in between studying for finals so he is in shape for ABT. In fact, tomorrow he is meeting with two of his old teachers to work on conditioning. No rest for the weary.

I have not, however, forgotten that I need to post the second part of my interview with Duncan Cooper. If you don’t remember who Duncan is, please go back to this post to read the brief bio I offered. While in the last post Duncan offered his strong opinion on dancers’ education inside and outside the studio, in this post he answers questions I posed about the issues he sees most commonly in male dancers.

Boys Must Slow Down and Learn Technique

I asked Duncan this question specifically, “What technical dance issues do you see most commonly in boys?” His response was short and to the point: “Lack of technique.”

 “So, how can boys resolve this issue?” I queried, of course, as a follow up. He answered, “The solution to that is to get into classes and to slow down and get the basics. With boys, lack of technique is more prevalent, because there are fewer boys interested. So, they often learn late about it and scramble. Like young boys just going into marshal arts, they wants to break bricks and do all these great tricks, but they don’t want to do any of the foundational work that’s required. They don’t want to sit on two logs for five hours; they want to take the easy route.”

When Duncan gives boys challenging choreography at conventions—something Julian, in particular, enjoyed about the classes he took with Duncan at NYCDA, he says few of the boys he sees in the room at conventions have the ability to do the moves correctly and “most of those boys have not earned the right to do those steps yet.” This brings up a common issue.

Expectations for Girls Are Higher

“Often we let boys do more than they should, because there are so few boys and we want boys so badly,” Duncan explained. “Women are often much better than boys, because there are more of them and we expected more of them. So, the technical level of what is expected of them is higher.” In other words, they rise to the level expected of them.

Be a Matinee Idol

Duncan said he also finds a need from boys to connect with their masculine side. “It’s not always just steps; it’s also your inner movement. I say to them, ‘Be a matinee idol. Be Johnny Depp or Brad Pitt.’”

Additionally, he said, “There is sometimes a loss of connection with them with musical phrasing. They rush through the music, so they don’t really hear the music. And then they need to relay that music in a matinee idol style.”

While dancing in a masculine way is a given, Duncan suggested boys watch Gene Kelly in any of the films he made. “Notice his charisma, his character. He’s a real man dancing on stage,” said Duncan. “Or watch Fred Astaire. See how they both relate to women and tell a story while they dance.”

 Movement Tells a Story

All of this is important, Duncan explained, because nine times out of 10 if you dancing in a show on Broadway or even doing a full-length ballet your movement tells a story. Boys need to learn how to have their movement tell the story of their dance or of their inner dialogue. “It’s not just movement for movement’s sake, because that gets boring,” Duncan said. “We want them to learn that their movements tell a story, whatever that may be, whether there is an actual story to the dance or not. If I make a gesture, it means something, it means something to you…We want them to bring their individuality out in the movement. We want it to be unique to them but we want them to stay within the framework of the choreography that the choreographer is giving them.”

No Movement Without Emotion

Duncan added that he would like boys to understand that there is no movement without emotion either. “I don’t mean be overly dramatic. But movement comes from emotional content. It’s not just this emotionless move. Whether you are relating to a women or the audience is moved by you. The greatest dancers can step onto stage and they haven’t done one step and the audience goes, ‘Ahhh,’ he concluded.

Note:Duncan had more to say, and I’ll hopefully have time to transcribe the last part of the tape and post another blog add this coming week.