Future Players
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| Posted by Anne Marie
When I was younger, we all wondered which of us would keep dancing. I had a very close group of friends when I was about 14, and out of the 6 of us I’m the only one who ended up dancing professionally. Who really knows why, that’s just the way the cards played out….
Periodically my husband and I talk about the friends we’ve danced with and wonder years down the road which ones will be Artistic Directors, Ballet Masters, and Choreographers … who are the future players? I think we’ve started to get our answers…
Coming up on a year ago our fellow Ballet Austin dancer, Orlando Julius Canova, became the Artistic Director of the Ballet Conservatory of South Texas, in San Antonio, Texas. Orlando all season has been driving down after his day at Ballet Austin, the hour plus drive at least 4-5 days a week to teach, coach and rehearse his dancers.
This past weekend we got to see them in action and seen the vast improvement of his dancers and overall production quality of BCSTX’s performance in “Turning Pointe”. I had seen them perform in November, only months after Orlando had been there, and let me tell you… this is a different group of dancers.
Here’s Orlando with BCSTX Board President and Vice-President, Susanne Cooper and Susan Arnim
Since now there’s an obvious relationship between Ballet Austin and the Ballet Conservatory, Orlando took it a step further and mixed his program with guest performances by Ballet Austin II directed by Michelle Martin. I’ll talk more about that aspect of the performance in another post…
Orlando has also integrated other BA dancers into the lineup: Ballet Mistress, Jaime Lynn Witts and Resident Choreographer, Reginald Harris. Ballet Austin Trainee, Donald Hicks, also choreographed a piece for the group integrating some of the BA’s male apprentices. This gave Orlando’s students a chance to work on their partnering skills, which some of you know at a small pre-professional school it’s a challenging task to get boys into the ballet studio.
Here’s a photo from Reginald Harris’ “Ella” featuring BCSTX dancer Beth Huddleston and guest artist, BA II dancer Chris Butler:
A photo of Orlando Julius Canova’s “Unstable Dependency” featuring BCSTX dancer Bryn Schiele and BA Trainee Donald Hicks:
One from Donald Hick’s “Adrenaline” featuring BCSTX dancer Analisa Rodriguez and guest artist, Ballet Austin dancer Matthew Cotter.
And here’s a couple from “Paquita” staged and rehearsed by Jaime Lynn Witts lovingly nicknamed by her Ballet Austin co-workers as “Rules and Structure”, which in my opinion makes her the perfect Ballet Mistress.
Erin Galvan in her variation:
Analisa Rodriguez in her variation:
And Elizabeth Arnim and Charlotte Cooper in Paquita:
Orlando, his students and all the parents and volunteers should be really proud of how far they’ve come in a year, and I’m really looking forward to watching them continue to grow.
