My First Class in KNT's New Studios

 

Yesterday I attended Karren Lester Sant's  Pre-Intermediate Class in her new studios at 114 Chapel Street for the first time and was very impressed.  The studio was easy to find with ample parking just across the street.  It has been fitted out with everything that a dance student could possibly need including a well-sprung floor, travelling barres and excellent acoustics. Best of all many of the dear friends and acquaintances that I have met in Karen's classes over the last 9 years were at the barre.  It was a great experience.

I set off from Holmfirth much later than I would normally do because a previous commitment had overrun. I messaged Karen to say that I was running late and asked whether I could do the advanced class barre.   As it happened I did not need to do that because Chapel Street is much easier to reach from Yorkshire than Oxford Road and there are masses of parking spaces. I came in during glissés. I did a quick warm-up of tendus and pliés and took my place at the barre in time for ronds de jambe.  

Thereafter we did all my favourite exercises. frappés at the barre, an enchantment that included tendus in the centre, grands battements and soutenus, balancés and pirouettes, posés pirouettes or "pirate peglegs" as another dear teacher calls them, glissades and assemblés finishing off with joyous temps levés.  Karen chose some lovely music for us.  I recognized "Getting to Know You" from  "The King and I" and I think also Piazzolla?  Definitely Argentine tango.

The only drawback to the evening is that I was forced to acknowledge just how far I have fallen below my previous level of ability.   I can't raise my leg to the barre for a stretch,  My balance was completely AWOL. I was slow and quite out of puff by the time I was halfway across the floor.  I can no longer stand on demi-pointe on my right foot.   Some of it is a loss of fitness which I can recover in the gym.  Some of it will be age-related.  I shall be 75 next birthday.  Some of it will be the result of the broken tibia that I suffered last year.  Happily, I can still do something in ballet and as it is nearly 55 years since I learnt my first plié at St Andrews I really can't grumble,

Anyone thinking of joining one of KNT's classes will find the schedule here.  There is lots of choice at many different levels.  On 22 July 2023, there will be a Special Guest Tracher Day with Emily-Joy Smith which looks like a lot of fun.  I have attended similar events in the past and can strongly recommend this one.

Back to the Studio with KNT

Manchester Quay Street

Author Mikey Licence CC BY 2.0 Source Wikimedia Commons

Throughout this pandemic, Karen Sant of KNT Danceworks has kept north country dancers moving and motivated. Frst by transferring her regular classes online. More recently by holding some of those classes in the open air in Castlefield near the Roman fort where Manchester began.  While nothing beats alfresco dancing on a warm summer evening our city is better known for precipitation than sunshine.   On a particularly inclement evening, Karen announced a new venue in the ABC Buildings on Quay Street.  I rolled up there for my regular pre-intermediate ballet class with Karen yesterday.

 As Quay Street was my old stamping ground when I practised in Manchester I had no difficulty in finding the building.  It is located near Cobden House which housed the Manchester District Registry and County Court offices for many years and is now occupied by a set of barristers into which my former chambers merged.  It is a few hundred yards from Spingingfields car park and there is usually some metered street parking nearby if you care to look for it.  It is very close to Deansgate which is the main shopping street of Manchester.  Also, a moderate walk from the nearest tram stop by the Town Hall or Victoria and Piccadilly mainline railway stations.    

One hazard for dancers coming by car is the roadworks in Quay Street and approaches.   The congestion caused by those excavations was horrendous.   The journey from the intersection of the Oldham Road and Swan Street to Spiningfields - which can't be much more than a mile - took almost as long as the 25 miles from Holmfirth to that intersection.  Next time I shall park on the outskirts of the city centre and finish my journey on foot.

The class took place at the top of what I believe to be the B Building of the ABC complex. It was not easy to find because there is no signage. The reception desk was unoccupied and the staff in the cinema bar hadn't a clue though they did their best to point me in the right direction.  Happily, I ran into two other wandering souls.  After eliminating between us just about every landing and staircase in the building we caught a peel of tinkly music that eventually led us to Karen.   Newcomers to the class should enter the building by the first set of doors if coming from Deansgate or the last if coming from Spiningfields, walk down a long corridor to the lifts, take a lift to the top floor and climb the stairs to what appears to have been the penthouse.

Although probably not intended to be a dance studio, that space is an improvement on Studio 2 of the Dancehouse in several respects.  For a start, it has windows along both main walls.  Two doors open onto a balcony with views of central Manchester. The doors also provide good ventilation.  On the other hand, the floor is unfinished, there is no sound system and we have to use the window structures as a barre.  However, the amenity of the space more than made up for its limitations.

Because I was badly delayed by traffic and could not immediately find the class I arrived in the middle of pliés.  Karen took us through all the usual barre exercises except grands battements which she combined with tendus and pirouette practice in the centre.  She also taught us a delightful adagio which we performed in two groups.  We had warm-up jumps and joyful temps leves at the end.

It was a delightful class.   It was good to see so many familiar faces and of course Karen.  Everyone I could see had grins from ear to ear.   At £6.50 this class was a bargain.   To sign up or future ones, register or log on to the KNT Class Manager site and follow the simple directions.  There are also other classes at different levels of several genres on most days of the week,

Mabgate Mill Revisited

As the transmission of the Royal's Ballet's performance of Jewels will clash with my usual class at KNT I attended Dance Studio Leeds's improvers class last night instead. I had previously written about it in  Dance Studio Leeds Beginners' Ballet Class on 22 Oct 2015 and Another Class at Dance Studio Leeds 18 July 2016.

Quite a few changes seem to have occurred since my last class at these studios the most important of which is that Dance Studio Leeds has acquired more space.  We danced in a rather more spacious studio where there was definitely room to swing a cat or possibly even a young leopard if one were so cruel or imprudent. More importantly, there was more than enough space to get airborne in the last exercise of the evening.

Yesterday's class was taken by Katie Geddes who had taught me last year. I am used to her teaching and respond to it well. There's a quality in her voice that encourages me to dig deep even when muscles begins to ache and I feel I can go no further. We did all the usual barre exercises: pliés, tendus, glissés, fondus, ronds de jambe, developpés, grands battements and échappés facing the barre.

We put away the travelling barres and after another glissés exercise in the centre we practised an expressive port de bras and then an enchainment involving a chassé, attitude and a rather tricky turn. I did not find it at all easy though I am sure everyone else did and I was definitely flagging towards the end of the class, but Katie rehearsed us several times until she was satisfied that we had taken it as far as we could.

The last exercise was jumping which I like. We started with simple sautés in first and second, then échappés and changements and finally petits jetés. We continued with glissades and jetés.  Finally, grands jetés across the studio. The bit I like best.

There were several new faces in class last night but also some familiar ones including a member of my evening class at Northern Ballet. It is a very friendly studio and I was made very welcome. I wish I could attend this class more frequently.

The studios are located in Mabgate Mill just outside Leeds town centre. Classes still cost £6.50. Some parking space has been sacrificed for boxes containing flower beds in the centre of the mill courtyard but it is still easy to park in the evenings. All other details are on the Terpsichore Yorkshire page

Dance Studio Leeds Beginners' Ballet Class

Embedded under a standard YouTube Licence

This video for Dance Studio Leeds shows every style of dance except ballet but the Dance Studio Leeds actually does offer adult ballet. Katie teaches beginners on Monday morning and evening and Nathalie  the advanced class on Friday evenings.  As I  am trying to compile a guide to all the adult ballet classes in and around Holmfirth I turned up to Katie's evening class last Monday.

Dance Studio Leeds is in Mill 6 of a converted mill complex just north of Leeds city centre known as Mabgate Mills. It is not very far from Quarry Hill but it is not easy to find at night. I circumnavigated the block twice before I found the entrance to a courtyard surrounded by 19th century buildings.  One of the advantages of that studio is that you can park in the courtyard free of charge whereas you have to fork out at least £2 to park anywhere else in central Leeds between 18:00 and 22:00.

The studios are on the first floor and compared to many other dance studios that I have visited in my time it is the lap of luxury. It is bright, well decorated and comfortably furnished and there is more than enough room to swing a cheetah never mind a cat in the changing room. My friend, Beverley, who attends the advanced class on Friday tells me that there is complimentary tea and coffee on offer but I did not discover that on Monday.

I arrived at the Studios after listening to The Archers in my motor and sat down on an easy chair near one of the studios. A dance class was taking place and students seemed to be having a lot of fun.  A lady entered shortly the waiting area afterwards and asked me whether I was waiting for ballet. I said I was and she asked me whether this was my first class.  I replied that it was but I added that I had done two years ballet with Northern Ballet's Over 55 class and that I had also had a lot of classes with a teacher in Huddersfield who had danced with the Queensland Ballet. The lady welcomed me to the class, showed me the changing area and told me that our fellow students were a very friendly, welcoming group which I found out to be the case.

Katie arrived a few minutes later and introduced herself to me and some other new students. She asked me whether I had done any ballet before and I said that I had.  At 19:45 we entered the studio and took our places by the barre. The room had a mirror at front and was very well lit and ventilated. It was also quite warm which was hardly surprising given the energy that must have been discharged in the dance class. There was room for 3 on each side of each travelling barre. Katie placed me and the other newbies between experienced students.

We started with a gentle warm-up facing the barre followed by pliés and tendus.  We skipped glissés but I soon found out why. Katie got us to do échappés facing the barre which of course incorporate that movement. Katie had several other exercises which were new to me including a fondu combined with a plié which I found very difficult. Katie had a word for everybody - encouragement here, a correction there - almost like a private lesson.

We had a few minutes to catch our breath and take a swig of water and then we started on the adagio. Katie concentrated on arms movements first and then some simple steps and turns. The movement was quite lovely.

Pirouettes followed for which Katie divided us into three groups.  One group which included me practised our retirés en plat. Another group did the same exercise on demi. A few of us tried full turns.  As we found our balance and got more confidence we tried complete turns. Even I managed one or two.

The next session included jumps of various kinds - simple sautés to start, then échappés and changements - then a variation if the temps levés in groups of three and finally a hop on one leg with the other extended.  As you can imagine I got into one hell of a pickle.

Before we knew it it was 21:30. The class was advertised to end at 21:15 but Katie gave us an extra 15 minutes because we were enjoying ourselves so much.  At the end of the class she gave us a very thorough cool down. Almost as through as the ones that Jane Tucker gave us at the end of a day's dancing in The Swan Lake intensive. There was no reverance as such because we were on the floor but Katie wished us all a very pleasant evening and we clapped her enthusiastically. I thanked Katie for the class as I always do, She was pleased I enjoyed it and invited me to come again which I  certainly will.

There were a lot of pluses about this class. Obviously a good teacher and a very civilized environment, easy parking and a friendly crowd. The only minuses were that the rooms were not very large - two temps levés  and we were almost across the studio - there was no pianist and we had to use travelling barres. Minor niggles really.

I wouldn't dare risk the advanced class but Beverley says that's good too, There is a good spread of classes and I shall try some of the other genres by and by.

Fusion

No - not that kind of fusion

On Monday evenings I normally take Fiona Noonan's ballet class at Hype in Sheffield. This week my friend in Bradford said she would like to join me. As Sheffield is a bit of a trek from Bradford we decided to look for a class a little nearer home. We called Northern Ballet and they offered us fusion,

Now fusion to me is a process by which two or more atoms collide at very high speed to create a new atom and unleash a lot of energy. It is how the sun or for that matter a hydrogen bomb works. Somehow I didn't think that was what we would do at Quarry Hill this evening.

It was only a partial misdescription, however, for we certainly released a lot of energy. Maybe not quite as much as the sun or even an H-bomb but quite enough all the same.

We were shepherded up to the 4th floor which is part of the building usually occupied by Phoenix Dance Theatre and ushered into one of the studios. Our class consisted of about 20 women nearly all of whom were a great deal younger and fitter than me. We had a good instructor who walked us through each of the exercises before she played the music.

The class seemed to be very like Fiona Noonan's ballercise: that is to say a combination of aerobics, pilates and ballet.  We started off with a warm up beginning with running on the spot, bending our legs, skipping, then lunging to the right and lunging to the left.  She followed that up with some cardio exercises which included deep pliés in parallel, first and second, side bends and various other sequences and required quite a bit of concentration. Then we went to the barre where we tried several relevés, fondus and ronds de jambe. Afterwards we returned to the centre for some jumping which is always the best bit of a dance class for me. Then some tendus using resistance bands to build up our strength and improve our balance. Finally some floor work which I am sorry to say I couldn't quite finish. Some deep stretches and then it was time to go home.

I enjoyed the class very much and my friend did too.   She is 19 years younger and could keep up with the pace much better.   I was quite stiff at the end of the class but nothing like as stiff as I had been after my first contemporary class.   And also much less bruised.  I am still sporting shiners on both knees and elbows from rolling about on the floor.  it's great to try other styles of dance and other classes.  Maybe jazz next.

More than just Hype - Beginners and Improvers Classes in Sheffield

Sheffield Town Hall                                                                    Photo  Wikipedia

For the last year and a bit I have been taking Fiona Noonan's adult ballet classes at The Base Studios and Team Hud in Huddersfield (see "The Base Studios, Huddersfield"  2 March 2013 and "Team Hud Adult Ballet Class" 22 Jan 2014).  Recently she has been engaged to teach advanced, intermediate and pointe classes at Hype Dance Academy in Sheffield while the regular teacher is on maternity leave. For the next three weeks she will be covering Hype's beginners and improvers classes too.  Yesterday I followed her to Sheffield to take her classes at Hype.

The first thing to say is that Hype is not easy to find. I lived a mile from Hampton Court Palace between 1955 and 1982 so I know all about mazes but not even that labyrinth had prepared me for Sheffield's one way traffic system. I suspect it was devised in the days when Sheffield City Council was said to be slightly to the left of Fidel Castro and it was the local local authority's policy to drive motorists off the roads and onto the excellent trams.  Hype's address is 67 Earl Street, Sheffield, S1 4PY which my satellite navigation seemed to think was on planet Zog. The first time I tried to find it I missed the class altogether as I crawled around the city centre from one traffic jam to the next as the minutes ticked by. There are directions on the "contact page" of Hype's web site but these are not much help unless you know Sheffield well. It is no good calling the studio for directions because the switchboard is not covered for the whole of the day.

If you are a motorist the trick is as follows:

• get on the A61 (inner city ring road in the clockwise direction) which you can join at the Park Square roundabout from the Parkway which connects with the M1 (watch the cameras they are super-sensitive after the 50 mph sign), 
• follow the ring road past the station which should be on your left, 
• make a sharp right onto St Mary's Road, 
• then another into Matilda Street, 
• carry on down Matilda Road past the UTC college which should be on your right, 
• then a left into Sydney Street, 
• a sharp right on Arundel and 
• then left on Earl.

To say you can't miss the studio would not be true because it is a very undistinguished two storey brick building which must have been a warehouse or other light industrial building in its heyday.  There is signage for the observant pedestrian and no doubt aspirant taxi driver if they have anything like The Knowledge in Sheffield but it is easy to miss.

One good point about the location is that there is plenty of street parking which costs £1 after 18:00.  Don't be fooled into using pay by phone because the app tried to charge me £2.40. Another is there are some very good Chinese restaurants and a grocery within a few hundred yards of the dance school. My favourite is the Wong Ting where I celebrated my 60th birthday.

Once you find Hype and get inside it is very nice. There appear to be two studios and Fiona's class was in Studio 1.  That is a long narrow room with barres along the right hand side and a mirror at the front. The walls are decorated with posters and playbills and Victorian schoolroom style exhortations such as dance is 20% talent and 80% labour. Yeah!

There must have been between 15 and 20 people in the beginners' class, mainly women nearly all of whom were in their twenties.   We filled the fixed barre and 4 of us spilled on to a travelling barre. They were a friendly crowd and most of them were well kitted out in leotards and soft toed ballet shoes.

Fiona introduced herself to the class and told us a little bit about her training in Australia and her career as a dancer and teacher. She then asked the students what they had learned from their regular teacher and how she had taught them. The answers suggested that her method was very much like Fiona's.

We had a warm up exercise in the centre for toes and legs.  I was dismayed to find that my balance was well below the class's because I had to let my feet touch the floor once or twice. We then sidled off to the barre for the usual exercises.

Fiona is a good teacher but I have never seen her teach better than she did yesterday. She likes a big class of enthusiastic students and she found them at Hype. Through the barre exercises she focussed on technique particularly on basics such as weight distribution and the use of abdominals and abductors. She has an eye for detail and I think we all had a correction to make. Once she was happy with our pliés, tendus and glissés we moved on to fondus and développés which do not come easily to this old lady but nevertheless have to be done.

In the centre we followed a port de bras exercise that I had already attempted several times in Huddersfield which consists of chassés starting on the right, then left and en croix, a lunge, a pivot, arabesque which is substantially repeated on the left.  Annemarie in Leeds has a similar exercise for us old ladies except that we soutenu rather than pivot and cut out the arabesque.  We marked it without and then with music and then tried it for ourselves.  To my joy I found that I could just about hold my pivot - at least for the first time.  The second was a bit of a dog's breakfast.

Fiona asked the class about travelling steps and two of the students set off with something that looked very much like temps levés to me.   That is certainly what we ended up with.  The long narrow room gave us plenty of space for building up some momentum.  We did that exercise in groups of three and loved it.  In the last few minutes we did a few sautés and jetés again making good use of the room's length.

All too soon the class was over. Fiona explained that another teacher would be taking over from her in a few weeks' time. That announcement elicited a few sighs showing how much everyone had enjoyed the class.

A few of us stayed on for the improvers' class which started immediately afterwards.  One of the students in that class was Mel with whom I had driven down to Lincoln the previous Friday (see "Chantry Dance Company's Sandman and Dream Dance" 10 May 2014). Mel is a good dancer and I had feared that I would find myself out of my depth.  Although she and all the other students were in a different league to me they were also friendly.  Everyone was keen to learn.   The barre and centre exercises were similar to those that we had done in the beginners' class but they were done by my fellow students even more slickly and elegantly.

The final class of the evening was beginners' pointe for which I did not stay. I doubt that I shall ever reach that standard because try as I might my ankles are weak and my core is jelly but you never know.  When I started ballet again just over year ago I couldn't do any of the centre work.   Now I am at least having a jolly good bash.

Before coming to Sheffield I had done two classes in Leeds and I had expected the Sheffield classes to be a bit of a slog but they weren't. They were a lot of fun and I could have carried on for more.  I have not met the other teachers but judging by the standard I found at Hype they must be good.  I have no hesitation in recommending that dance school.

No Holds Barred

I have got even greater respect for the kids of Mathare whom I mentioned in my article "What can be achieved by a good teacher" (3 March 2013). Like them I have had a class without a barre.  You have to concentrate much harder just to keep your balance let alone perform an exercise correctly. On the other hand you do learn something about weight distribution particularly with glissés and tendus.   

On the subject of Africa I am pleased to see that Michaela dePrince, who was born in Sierra Leone, is now in Europe. She is with the Junior Company of the National Ballet of the Netherlands. As I mentioned in my article, Ms de Prince appears to have exceptional talent and I was saving my pennies to see her in New York.  Thanks to budget airlines the Netherlands is a lot of cheaper and easier to reach than the USA. This is the Junior Company's schedule for the next 6 months.

I have a lot of connections with Sierra Leone through marriage and through looking after another young woman whose family was displaced by the civil war. I visited the country and travelled around it in 2007.   When I was there the scars of the conflict were still very visible.  Watch this short video in which de Prince tells her story.

Louis Smith  Source Wikipedia

Also impressive in another way is our British Olympic medallist Louis Smith who was challenged to learn ballet. A short film "Louis Learns Ballet" on the Royal Academy of Dance's website shows that he had some natural aptitude for the art for he seems to have made quite remarkable progress.

Also on the new website is an article by Jennifer MacFarlane the RAD's manager in Scotland on the Genée which was held in Glasgow this year (Some Thoughts from Scotland on Genée 2013).  Most of the article is about fund raising but there is a beautiful picture of medallist Natasha Watson from Ballet West with her award.  I mentioned this young dancer's success in
"Yet More Good News from Ballet West - Natasha Watson's Medal in the Genée" on 30 Sept and the article seems to have gone viral. Ms. Watson is another outstanding dancer I look forward to seeing on the stage.

Although I try to keep the ballet separate from the law my chambers have provisionally booked the boardroom of Northern Ballet's premises for a 3 hour seminar on recent developments in intellectual property on 11 Dec 2013 for local solicitors and patent and trade mark attorneys.  Attendees will be asked to donate to Northern Ballet's "Sponsor a Dancer" and the Yorkshire Ballet Summer School Appeals.

Postscript

In "Engaging Generation Y in ballet – thoughts and ideas" whose blog I featured in "Fantastic New Blog: Dave Tries Ballet" mentions another sportsman who incorporates ballet into his training schedule:

"British Olympic swimmer Liam Tancock uses ballet seriously within his training. I think one of the best things about Tancock is that he’s so “matter of fact” about doing ballet. Being interviewed by the BBC (BBC Article) he points out the benefits of ballet and how it’s impacted his performance. "

He also refers to a conversation between a rugby player and a dancer. The context of those observations was a discussion on engaging young adults in opera and dance.  Dave had been approached by RESEO (the European Network for Opera and Dance Education) to contribute to the Network's Autumn conference on "GENERATION Y: Engaging young adults in opera and dance".  I agree with his view that often the most effective way to connect with his (or indeed any other) generation is by not 'trying too hard and that "the easiest way to make ballet accessible is by making it seem 'normal.'”  However, rather than comment on that article in detail I invite you to read it for yourselves.