Please Help TDC Continue Turning Out Great Dancers

Like many non-profit arts organizations, TDC, where Julian dances, has felt the hit of the economy. The company has been smaller than usual over the last few years, but, in fact, it must remain rather small for the program to be effective.  And the program is effective, turning out top-notch dancers that go on to Julliard and some of the other best-known and well-respected dance schools in the nation as well as into professional companies and onto shows like So You Think You Can Dance.  It’s a program that doesn’t stress competition but rather dance as an art form, offering its dancers an incubator of sorts where they can work together and with professionals to create an amazing energy that makes them strive to be the best dancers they can be…and helps them to achieve that goal.

All the money that comes in from tuition and fundraising is spent on the kids at TDC in one form or another. However, with a small company and the economy making it more difficult to get donations, TDC, like many non-profits, needs more financial support than ever. So…I’m asking my readers here to help in a way that doesn’t cost you any money at all. All it takes is a click…

If you are a Facebook user, please follow this link to the Chase Community Giving page:
http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/search

You’ll be asked to join, or become a fan, and then you can type in Teen Dance Company of the Bay Area and vote for TDC. The non-profit with the most votes gets a $25,000 donation!

Julian and all the kids at TDC will really appreciate your support of their program. I will, too.

If you would like to make a direct donation to TDC, you can do that here: http://www.teendancecompany.org/support.html

Thank you!

One “Billy” Retires and Billy Elliot Cast Undergoes Changes

Quite a while ago I reported that a publication had it on rumor that on of the boys who play “Billy” in Billy Elliot would be leaving the cast, and I tried to figure out who that might be. However, it’s taken a very long time for one of them to actually report that he will take his last curtain call. (So, I guess that magazine didn’t have their information quite right…which was actually pointed out to me by a helpful blog reader.)

On August 28, however, Playbill.com reported that Tony Award winner Kiril Kulish, one of the three young boys who created the title role in Billy Elliot the Musical here in the U.S., will play his final performance at the Imperial Theatre Oct. 3 at 8 PM. Alex Ko will then joins the cast of rotating Billys the week of Oct. 5.

This will be Alex Ko’s Broadway debut. I was amazed to learn, however, that he was the youngest student admitted to the University of Iowa Dance Department at age 12 and has been guided by ballet masters Eloy Barragán and George de la Peña. (Julian had de la Peña as an acting teacher at American Ballet Theatre this summer, and he appears in the first video in my last post about Patrick Swazye.)

We loved Kiril’s performance, although we were sorry not to see David Alvarez. That said, his performance was flawless all the way around. I actually spoke to him briefly after the show and asked him about an interview. He directed me to the PR department, like a good little boy. Maybe now I can actually get him to talk to me! (I did not pursue the PR department at the time; I figured it would be too difficult. It might be less difficult now.)

My son, Julian, danced a few times this summer at American Ballet Theatre with David, another “Billy,” who claimed he was already too tall for the roll. However, he seems to still be taking the stage…at least for the time being. So, I wonder what the criteria are for leaving the show, and who decides — the boys or the director?

Tony-nominee David Bologna, who plays “Michael, will soon leave the cast as well, playing his final performance Sept. 27. Keean Johnson, previously an understudy in the role, will join the rotation in the role of Michael with Trevor Braun. We saw both David and Trevor, who were both awesome. Really, they were great.

I’m glad Julian and I saw the show twice while we were in New York with the original cast, although we only saw Kirul Kulish and the understudy, Tommy Batchelor, in the role of “Billy.” We would have loved to see Alvarez, since Julian had met him and taken class with him. We also wouldn’t have minded seeing Trent Kowalik. We wondered if Tommy had actually moved up from being an understudy; he’s no longer listed as an understudy. He looked like more of a tapper than a ballet dancer to us.

Haydn Gwynne, who originated the role of Mrs. Wilkinson in the U.K. and Broadway productions of Billy Elliot, is also ending her New York run Oct. 4. She was superb! Gwynne will be followed by Canadian stage actress Kate Hennig, who begins performances on Broadway Oct. 6.

Tribute to a Male Dancer: Patrick Swayze

I had to at least mention the passing of Patrick Swayze this week. We don’t often think of him as a “trained” professional dancer, but, in fact, that’s exactly what he was. His mother was a choreographer, and he claimed he began dancing in the womb.

I remember him most in Dirty Dancing, and you can find lots of clips from that movie and his other bigger hits on YouTube and elsewhere. Here are a couple you may not have seen that will show you Swayze the male dancer in a different light.

I, for one, am very sorry to see this very masculine dancer leave the earth plane. What a great role model he was in so many ways on and off the big screen for our boys.

In  the movie One Last Dance (1993) with his wife, Lisa Niemi, who directed the film, and George De La Pena. (If you watch the movie, which I plan to do, I’m told that in the trailer Swayze  explains why dancing is magical: “It’s like living in a beautiful storybook where you can fly if you want to; you can reach up and grab a star.”

[]

Swayze and his wife at the World Music Awards 1994

[]

Of course...from the end of Dirty Dancing…the Swayze we know best.

[]

OMG! Home 2 Weeks and No Time to Write!

I have to apologize to any faithful blog readers! I have been back from New York City from two whole weeks, and I have not had a minute to write a blog post. In fact, I should be working on a column for Movmnt magazine or editing for a client right now, but I figured I better right something soon or no one would bother continuing to read this blog!

Re-entry into normal life in California was a bit odd for Julian and I. We really found it quite odd to be back home after seven weeks in the city. That said, life was not normal. My stepson arrived just one and a half days after we got back, and Julian immediately went back to taking evening classes at Teen Dance Company.  Plus, we had to juggle my daughters internship schedule, which took her in the opposite direction to the University of California-Santa Cruz; TDC is in Mountain View in the valley. Between doing things with my stepson and reacclimating to driving every day and every which way, my work began to pile up. It was a bit crazy.

The first full weekend we were home, Julian received a text message from a fellow TDC company member asking if he was auditioning for Mark Froehringer’s Nutcracker in San Francisco. Well…we had thought about doing so, but it wasn’t on my radar…at all. In fact, I haven’t been using my daytimer at all. So, we jumped up and showered and drove like a bat out of hell into San Francisco.

Now, the woman who choreographed the Nutcracker Julian was in last year has already been emailing us as well. She’d like him back, although at 5′7″ or more, I think he’s a bit tall for Fritz. (She says he can do more this year; last year he also did the Russian dance.)

Give me a break, though…summer’s not even over and we are thinking about a performance that happens in December. And for Julian, it’s another hard choice: Dance with friends or dance with a professional company. (He was asked to do some awesome partnering during the audition in San Francisco…) For my husband and I, it’s also a hard choice: an hour and a half drive to San Francisco every Friday and Sunday from mid-September until mid-December. (And I was all excited that my daughter is giving up swimming, which means we finally have Friday’s free, since TDC doesn’t have classes on Friday.)

Anyway…back to NYC. I promised to tell you about the great teachers Julian danced with there, in case you should happen to find yourself at Broadway Dance Center. Some of the ones he liked the best were guest teaches, however. By far, he enjoyed contemporary classes with Slam the most. Slam, otherwise known as Salim Gauwloos brings to his teaching and choreography not only his technical ballet training but also his experience as a dancer with Madonna. Yes, he was a big MTV star and her touring dance partner. Yet, he now choreographs for the likes of ABT and the Orlando Ballet. Julian took three classes with him, and loved his choreography and working with him. It didn’t hurt that Salim noticed him and commented on his technique, even using him to demonstrate in the second and third class. (Sorry…had to brag a bit.)

Staying in the contemporary vein, he really enjoyed a class with James Tabeek, who was in the 1st national tour of the Broadway show Wicked,  and appeared on Broadway in Taboo and Beauty and the Beast.

Julian took two jazz classes with BDC favorite and staple Sheila Barker. He adored her class and her. She came out and gave me a hug and a kiss just for being Julian’s mother! (By the way…I got a hug and a kiss from Slam as well, which I think I enjoyed more.) He worked super hard in her class and she corrected him a lot. I highly recommend her class to anyone wanting to take jazz. (By the way, I think I mentinoed that Julian took two Broadway jazz classes at Alvin Ailey with Sue Samuels, mother of tapper Jason Samuels Smith. They were fabulous as well, and I highly recommend her and a trip to Alvin Ailey if you can make it. However, she teaches beginner classes at BDC.)

On to hip hop, which Julian had the most fun taking at BDC. He tried several class, always looking for “old-school” hip hop rather than “MTV” hip hop. He loved classes with Bam and Leslie Feliciano and Kelly Peters. He also enjoyed one with Luam, although that wasn’t as old school as he enjoys. These classes were all packed…I mean packed. Luam’s class had 72 people in the studio at one time. (Again, he was sorry not to take Jared Grimes class, but he was away.)

I’ve already covered tap; check older posts for information on that. Julian really didn’t do any tap the last week — and no ballet. He had done those two art forms for six weeks. He stuck with contemporary, jazz and hip hop that final week in New York.  And he had a blast and got great feed back from almost all the teachers at BDC. He kept up in even the most advanced classes, and his newly-improved technique was noticed. So, overall, a success all the way around.

Plus, he returned home without injury. The heel issue healed up and never  came back.  He never had another bout of dehydration. Success.

This week he completed six hours of dance per day again. TDC had its annual summer dance intensive. He also took a master class at a local studio taught by Sonya Tayeh of So You Think You Can Dance fame. We had met her in New York City. He had his picture taken with her, and it’s now his Facebook profile photo. How cute is that?

The TDC intensive culminated on Friday with auditions for the company. Unfortunately, a few of last year’s members didn’t return, but we have some great new dancers who auditioned and made it into the company. The company is still a bit small, but we hope to gain a few more in the next few weeks or in December. (If you know any teens in the Bay Area – CA looking for a great studio that focuses on dance as an art form and on contemporary, modern and classical ballet, please send them to TDC for an audition. They can still join the company, although they might not be in all the peformance pieces this fall.) The kids also study tap, pilates and a little jazz and hip hop.

Julian is in the company again, and he made it into the first three pieces of choreography, so he is very happy. He will miss a few of his friends who didn’t return this year, but he actually has a few friends joining him from other studios that he knows. So, I hope it will be a great year for him.

Today he’s in the studio all day learning choreography fo ra modern piece. Tomorrow the same. This week, he will miss most of the tap festival in San Francisco to attend choreography sessions at TDC instead, but we might get a few classes in if he’s lucky. It had been our plan to attend most of the week.

Oh, and I’m waiting for MRI results on my twisted knee from that first weekend in NYC. So, think some positive thougths for me!

Okay…that gets you up to date. Off to a running start. I never even got a chance to catch my breath.

Next, a post not from me but form someone from Julians distant past…and then one from Denise Wall!

Last Day in New York City

As I write, Julian is enjoying the last 30 minutes of his last class at Broadway Dance Center, an old-school hip hop class. He’s taken so many great classes the week, I can’t begin to even write about them — at least not right now. I’m too exhausted! I can’t imagine how he isn’t tired, but then again American Ballet Theatre’s intensive put him into some superb shape.

He danced for three hours on Monday, five on Tuesday and six on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. He’s taken tap, hip hop, jazz and contemporary classes. No ballet…enough of that after six weeks, but he was super happy to find some turns in his contemporary classes. We’ve been very happy with the instruction at BDC. I’ll write more when I get home about the particular teachers he enjoyed. And he and I were both happy to have him complimented in all his contemporary and jazz classes. It seems his classical ballet training is paying off.

So, tomorrow we get back on a plane and head home. Back to normal life, whatever that is.

I’ll elaborate a bit more on our experience when I’m back on home ground. Right now, I’m going to watch Julian do some hip hop, something he rarely gets to do in California.

[By the way, thanks for all the great comments I've received since in NY!]

Week 5 of ABT Summer Intensive: Winding Down

OMG! We have less than a week and a half less until the American Ballet  Theatre’s summer intensive ends! Hard to believe…Julian is still having a blast, but I’m a bit homesick at this point, stressed about work and wishing we weren’t staying for an extra week. We are just doing way too much.

At ABT, Julian’s choreography classes are finishing up their numbers and preparing for the show. They have a rehearsal next Wednesday. Other than that, everything is the same as usual…and he still loves the partnering classes the most. He  learns more in those than in any other classes. Probably the biggest disappointment (other than the ballet performance piece) lies in the fact that the boys class doesn’t do a whole lot of “boy’s stuff.” It’s mostly technique and it totally depends on who teaches as to whether or not they do jumps or turns or the like.

In any case, he has learned a ton and improved. He has also made friends and had fun. His body is no longer sore, nor does his heel hurt. And he hasn’t gotten dehydrated again.

He took two tap classes at Broadway Dance Center with his old tap teacher from California and former Tap Dog Anthony LoCascio. You can see them tapping together here:

[]
 

He’s also been back to tap with Michelle  Dorrance, which he just loves despite the difficulty of the class, and last weekend he tapped with Avi Miller and Ofer Ben after buying a new pair of their Miller and Ben tap shoes. (He didn’t wear them to class, however, because I didn’t want him to get blisters!)

This weekend he has a tap lesson with Jason Samuels Smith! Whoo hoo! That’s an opportunity you don’t get every day. I wrote an article about one of his projects and interviewed him for my book on mentoring boys who want to be professional dancers…so…I had an in.

I went to NYCDA’s national convention to meet with Denise Wall, mom of Travis Wall and Danny Tidwell. I interviewed her for a blog post (that will show up here after we get home). I then went back with Julian, and we watched her company perform several of pieces choreographed by Travis and by Jason Parsons. Julian was quite inspired by the choreography.

We met four of her sons, including Danny Tidwell. We also met Jamie Goodwin, who is dancing with Rasta Thomas’ Bad Boys of Dance…yes, they have one number with two girls. He also got to talk with two guys in Rasta’s company — nice young guys (18 and 19), who were thrilled to have the opportunity to dance with Rasta. Julian would be, too, but he said he wasn’t sure he’d be thrilled about giving up college to do so; one of the boys had completed just one semester when Rasta asked him to join. He plans on going back in 6-12 months. Last, but not least, we got to briefly meet and talk to choreographer Sonya, whose work can be seen on So You Think You Can Dance. That was a thrill as well.

Julian is supposed to have a private lesson with Denise Wall the last week we are in New York. We are really looking forward to that as well, and I hope it pans out.

And last night we saw West Side Story, our last big Broadway dance event. It was a bit of a let down. The acting wasn’t great; it lacked the passion of the movie and too much of it was in Spanish, leaving us non-Spanish speakers in the dark about what was being said. A little bit of the dance lacked spark, too, but overall the dancing was very good. We enjoyed Cody Green, however, who I’ve had my eye on for my book, and I was able to ask him to participate! He agreed, so I’ll be following with him later on.

My daughter comes in tonight to explore NYU, and then my sister arrives. I’ll try to get at least one post in before the end of the intensive, but no promises. I’m trying to work, too…and that has to come first at this point. Sorry.

ABT Summer Intensive Takes Its Toll on My Boy

Okay, well, I guess the New York Times article I read about the boy who went to the American Ballet Theatre summer intensive and suffered from shin splints and such painted a correct picture…or we’ve just hit some bad luck and made some bad choices. Julian is a week and a half into the ABT summer intensive himself and on Monday he slightly injured his left foot and tonight he has an upset stomach.

The slightly injured foot definitely comes from overuse and his tendency to pronate. (Remember, boys, think about this!) The chiropractor here in New York, George Russell, is a former dancer, and after he watched Julian do a few things, like plie, he saw exactly how Julian was straining his foot. Of course, he also has jammed his heel with jumps. I’ve been taught to adjust the heel, and that is helping, as is icing.

As for mistakes…well…First, we went off to a tap class with Jared Grimes at Broadway Dance Center last night knowing that Julian’s foot was not 100 percent. Also, he’d just danced 7 hours. He took a tap class at Broadway Dance Center last week, but it was nowhere near as strenuous. So, we didn’t help the foot, nor did we help Julian’s general state of fatigue.

And he is fatigued, let me tell you. He’s better this week, but last Friday after his first full week was over, he couldn’t lift his arms and he could hardly walk up the subway steps. His shoulders were sore to the touch!

The, second mistake, Julian didn’t drink enough water today. The studios are extremely hot, he says, and after lunch he began to feel nautious. He didn’t tell me this, however, and came home to eat some things he shouldn’t have eaten. And then he ate his salad at dinner but nothing else — which didn’t really help, even though it was healthy. Needless to say, not long afterwards he began throwing up. I hope it is a simple case of heat stroke and he’ll feel better in the morning and won’t have to miss classes.

I guess we won’t be doing any dancing this weekend…I think we’ll take it easy and go see some dance instead.

We didn’t get tickets to the ABT performance last weekend, because it conflicted with a trip to see his grandmother, who lives an hour outside of Manhattan. He failed to get the student tickets for Swan Lake, which opened this week, but I might just buy some.

We did go see In The Heights last Friday. It was awesome if you like hip hop and rap music. The dancing was really tremendous. The best of the dancers, a really classic hip hopper, told Julian it was great he was attending ABT. He said, “I went to Ailey and it changed my life.”

We met one of the young Simba’s from The Lion King while at Broadway Dance Center last week. He was sweet and polite and humble. He thought Julian’s tapping was awesome; he had just finished taking a beginner tap class. We saw Kiril Kulish leaving the theater after a performance, although we haven’t yet seen Billy Elliott. And Julian met David Alvarez at ABT, where he is taking some of the summer intensive classes but not all. Julian refrained from talking to him about Billy Elliott, since everyone else was doing so.

All in all, with the exception of the hurt foot and the upset tummy, it’s been a pretty good almost-two-weeks for Julian. He loves the ABT program. He’s made some friends with the guys both in blue and green levels as well as in yellow. He enjoys all his classes. He loves the partnering class and the boys class. He enjoys the teachers. He’s enormously glad he came, and he’s learned a ton in less than two weeks.

It’s been pretty good for me too (as long as I leave out some some details, like stopped up sinks, no TV reception which prevents us from watching So You Think You Can Dance, and me falling down the stairs to the apartment and twisting my knee and ankle).

Next time: How Julian feels about his level, info on his classes, his relationship with the boys, and what exactly is wrong with his foot!

Article on Trends in Training Male Dancers

The current issue of Dance Magazine (June 2009) has an interesting article written by Joseph Carman about new trends in training male dancers. You might want to pick up a copy and read it.  It discusses all-male classes that offer technical skills for men that often get overlooked in co-ed classes–beats, turns, double tour en l’air, revoltades, and barrel turns–and cross training–doing obstacle courses, runnign stairs and playing flag football. The story includes interviews with Peter boal of Pacific Northwest ballet, Carl Flink of the University of Minnesota, an dEthan Stiefel of the North Carolina School of the Arts. Check it out before it’s off the stands!

Gearing Up For End-of-the-Year Concert

This is it! The end-of-the-year concert happens this weekend. Julian finished up Los Gatos Ballet’s Copellia last weekend only to start right in on technical rehearsals for Teen Dance Company’s 10th anniversary concert on Monday. Here it is Friday already, and he’s been at the Mexican Heritage Theatre in San Jose since 4 p.m. (it’s now 9 p.m.). Tomorrow, he’ll be there all afternoon rehearsing before the evening show. Then he’ll perform in a second show on Sunday.  Then we are done until next year. (Well, classes continue all summer, and they are actually open to the public from June through August.)

If you live in the Bay Area, CA, please come watch! There are still tickets, and you can purchase them at the door or go to www.teendancecompany.org and order them on line. Be sure to email me at NinaAmirLacey@aol.com to let me know you are coming. I’d love to meet you!

I’m so excited to see all the pieces. I’ve never seen two of the numbers Julian is in, a tap piece by Carol Jones and a contemporary piece by Jen Hechtle Bradford. I’ve seen parts of Mark Foehringer’s contemporary number, but I haven’t seen it from start to finish with the additional choreography that was added. (Julian thought he was going to get to do a love duet, but Mark didn’t end up adding it. Julian was bummed.) And, I’ve never seen the number choreographed by Heather Cooper, which Julian is not in, or the alumni piece, which was choreographed by Jason Parsons. So, I’m pretty exciting!

Julian is a bit upset about one costume: a very see-through shirt that basically is a maternity shirt.  Well…no wonder he is upset. He was going to pose a revolt tonight and see if he could get out of wearing it. I’ll find out later if he had any success. 

And when this weekend is over, we’ve got to finish shopping for dance clothes for American Ballet Theatre’s summer intensive. Plus, Julian has to study for finals. (His grades have come up some, I am very happy to report.) While he is preparing for finals, though, he has to stay in shape and, actually, increase his level of exercise. He’s going to run a few days a week with a friend and start taking some extra jazz and ballet classes. Last weekend he jumped rope. He’s also using a theraband and a ball to do some of the exercises I’ve written about for Dance Teacher magazine. 

I’m trying to get someone to write a post about how to prepare for a summer ballet intensive, so keep your eyes peeled. It’s a bit late, but I’ve had no success yet. The people at ABT wouldn’t do it; the only information I could get from them was in the material they sent out. Basically, it just said that the kids should be in good physical shape and be taking three to four ballet classes per week. 

I’m not too worried about Julian. He dances way more than that. Plus, I talked with the mother of a boy who was there last year, and he had plenty of energy to go to tap classes at Broadway Dance Center twice a week, plus take other classes on Saturdays and Sundays. I hope Julian will feel he can do the same. Although, I really think one day off will be a good thing; six weeks without a break can lead to injury. We plan to take at least a whole weekend off to visit my mother in upstate New York (about an hour and a half north of the city), and I want to go out to Long Island to the beach! We’ve also scheduled an extra week at the end of the program just for taking dance classes in New York.

Happy Mother’s Day Dance Mom’s!

This is just a short post to convey my best wishes to all those dance mom’s who read my blog. All of you do an enormous amount to help your sons become successful dancers – and successful people.

A couple of years ago, my son gave me a cute shirt on Mother’s Day. It said, “I’m a…rhinestone gluein’…taxi drivin’…hair spraying’…makeup totin’…costume sewin’…shoe tyin’…tear wipin’…cheer leadin’…trophy displayin…Dance Mom!” Other than the rhinestone glueing, since boys don’t tend to have too many rhinestone’s on their costumes, it’s pretty true. That’s who I am a lot of the time.  And so are you. 

So, I commend all of you! And I hope that with this blog I’ll be able to help you feel like you aren’t along in your “job” and offer you some useful information as well.

I hope you had a good Mother’s Day. I put my son, as well as my daughter and husband to work for me for once. They helped me weed my garden, which is huge and totally overgrown, and do a bunch of other odd jobs. This Thursday is tech for Copelia and then on Friday Julian’s Copellia performance, and then he goes into tech week for the Teen Dance Company concert. I get to do the synchronized swimming mom thing on Friday through Sunday. I’m missing Copellia…the first dance event I’ve missed in a long time. Luckily it’s being video taped, and I can watched the technical rehearsal on Thursday.

Hopefully, I’ll get the last Duncan Cooper interview posted in the next few days, so keep your eyes open for it.