Ballet4Life Talks Dance

Dear Dance Lovers and Ballet4lifers, I am pleased to share the news that our 2nd "Loyal Variety Performance" held on 27.09.19 at POSK in Hammersmith, London was a resounding triumph! We raised, with the help of all artists, assistants, benefactors, volunteers, trustees, over £3,000 for our charity Move into Wellbeing ! We had a full and appreciative house, great prizes for the draw, and a diverse and colourful programme from Comedy to Contemporary Dance, to Classical music to Quirky Ballet! All for a good cause. Please see a few snapshots below from backstage and on stage! All rights reserved. All images property of Ballet$Life. If you missed out and wish to donate, you can always visit our page on fee-free Wonderful.org and make a donation!   https://wonderful.org/charity/moveintowellbeing . Thanks! Our Autumn Term is now in full swing! We have the new, and proving to be popular, Wednesday evening class that is a mix of Lyrical Jazz and Contemporary Da...

I am pleased to present our Guest Blog from our teacher Johanna Saarinen! Tomb é  pas de bourre é  away , Jo! SUMMER DANCE INTENSIVE 2019 This summer I had the privilege of leading Ballet4life’s ‘ballet leg’ of the summer intensive week, including a six day long ballet repertoire course. Having had a long break from teaching Repertoire myself, I noticed I was approaching the challenge with surprisingly mixed feelings. I was excited to be tipping my dancing toes in the good old classics again; refreshing hours of material and narrowing it down to suitable variations and corps de ballet pieces for our students, however, I was faced with the smallest mental dilemma of how, as a choreographer, I could stay as true to the original choreography as possible, yet make it accessible and joyous to perform for all the dancers from such multitudes of abilities and backgrounds. It turned out we had an incredibly productive week! Each piece wa...

Hello dance lovers!  We came "Back to School!" Exciting! We got off to a wonderful start of the Autumn Term complete with many new faces, new classes, old favourites, and are regular classes are back at Arts Ed. Everything feels good and is balancing out nicely for this autumn. I wanted to day hello and to welcome you all and to welcome our new dancing friends. I have a guest blog from Johanna Saarinen " Jo" to post next about the beautiful experiences that were had this summer on the Dance Intensive  Week. If you want to try something new this term please do not rule out the following: Monday at 12.35pm- Gentle Yoga & Stretch - great for injury prevention, over well-being, perfect to take after Mark's Ballet class! I can tell you that as a former dancer with a reconstructed knee, arthritic hips, and basic wear and tear pains finding Chihiro's method of teaching is like finding a pot of golden longevity! After her class my body is ...

Recollection on the 7th July, 2019 Showcase Four themes played out to me at our Annual Dance Showcase which is a fundraiser for charity Move into Wellbeing®. Mothers and daughters. Fathers. Belief. Thanks. Mothers and Daughters Firstly, we had the stunning duo, mother/ daughter team of V and M take to stage in the contemporary dance piece. How moving is that, that a mum and daughter can train vocationally in dance together, and then perform together with us? I just adore all aspects of this and would like to encourage other mother /daughter teams to do the same! On the same day, as I was unloading goods for the show, a lovely client walked by with her mum. She said they were reminiscing about how her mum used to take her to ballet lessons and now much later in life her mum has dropped her off for our rehearsal and was going to watch he show and see her adult daughter dance. Beautiful! They were having touching recollections and enjoying sharing this element o...

Greetings all on this blustery gloomy, rainy, June Friday in London! I hope this finds you well and that you had an enjoyable week of dancing in our classes! We decided to shift gears here and reinvent ourselves in a broader way to allow for more comments, blogs, and interaction. We have developed ourselves from S & J Talk Ballet , to Ballet4Life Talks Dance! We certainly hope you enjoy reading many more new bloggers' thoughts, tips, and anecdotes! I'd like to start by saying a big thanks to Susan & Julia for their previous blogs. Happy dancing to all! Now I wish to talk about dance in schools. We were invited again to work with Nonesuch Orchestra  https://nonesuchorchestra.wordpress.com/ and the Belmont Primary School, W4  https://www.belmontprimaryschool.org.uk/  on a dance and music fusion project for their arts enrichment weeks. We had only one day to work with over 120 children to teach our choreography of four dance pieces, to rehearse, and th...

J of S & J talk ballet is back with her thoughts and feedback about our special Wednesday Workshops during March with our Founder & Director Donna Take it away J as in Julia! Wonderful Spring Workshop Donna Schoenherr, International Artist and Founder of Ballet4life is holding a special ballet workshop, in which clients, in small groups, are given an individual course of tuition each Wednesday from 12.35 - 1.15 until March 27th. This is being held at St. Peter's Hall, Bespoke Dance Studio, Southfield Road, W4 1BB in beautiful leafy Chiswick. Donna's selfless dedication and love for teaching ballet is well known and greatly appreciated by her many clients! Today we enjoyed a ballet feast studying the variety of walks, upper body movement and that tricky one, ( well definitely in my case),... PIROUETTES!  But all was positive, as Donna instilled a calm influence over us, and with a little perseverance, our self-confidence kicked in and we twirled so...

Busy bloggers! Here is Susan of S & J Talk Ballet with her latest thoughts Pointe Class It was good to restart Pointe Class for this term at Arts Ed and to welcome some new dancers to this class. We began our exercises in the centre and moved to the barre later. In the centre, we concentrated on undertaking the exercises on demi-pointe to develop our technique.  At the barre, we worked on pointe if we wanted to. Though there were new members the class is still quite small compared to the class beforehand, so there is plenty of room for more people to join this very fulfilling class. Pointe shoes are not a necessity as the class can be taken in flat shoes and is not painful as some might think due to the makeup of Pointe shoes today! Spectators are welcome if you want to have an idea of what the class is like before trying it. Ballet shoes I have a pair of leather split sole ballet shoes and a pair of canvas split sole shoes. The problem I am finding is that the ...

Happy February! Here is J as in Julia of S & J Talk Ballet New at St. Peter's Hall, exclusive studio, W4 A Happy New Year to all dancers out there! Director Donna is at present trialling two new exciting classes, which will hopefully be added to her already extensive Ballet4life portfolio! These are Yoga for dancers and Pilates for dancers. There are SO many possibilities to choose from in the exciting collection of classes at Ballet4life, that it puts me in mind of the variety of flavours found in a scrummy box of chocolates!! I took to the Yoga mat for the first time last Wednesday, along with ten others at our spacious Ballet4life studio, and must admit I was a little apprehensive at first, but Chihiro our teacher was very attentive to our needs, and realising I had a slight back injury, produced a yoga support for me to sit on. My favourite moves so far were Downward Dog and Resting Dog , the latter reminding me of a certain Swan Lak e pose!... ...

Happy 1st of February! Susan the S of S & J Talk Ballet is back with her interesting feedback on January  Pirouette   Workshop! Please have a read and feel free to add your comments. #balletforall #balletforadults #ballet4life #danceforall #danceforhealth #danceforhappiness Susan says I hope everyone has settled into the new term now that Christmas is a very distant memory. It has been lovely to share classes with people I have met before and meet new fellow dancers. Last Thursday was the first time that I had been able to attend the 11.30am Beginner Follow-On class and we were very fortunate to have the opportunity to be taught by Donna. It was a great class taken at a pleasant pace with a focus on technique all to the accompaniment of the excellent music. I know I am not the only one that found it very enjoyable. Thank you, Donna! Since the beginning of the term, there has been a 30-minute Pirouette Workshop run by our teacher Mark Kel...

Guest Blog with Donna Schoenherr- Founder & Director of Ballet4life-pioneers in adult dance tuition and performance January Joy! Happy New Year Everyone! With this new year, we also celebrate our 15th Anniversary! It is truly an amazing accomplishment and one that I am so very proud of. Thousands of adults dancers have studied, trained, and danced with us since our first class was held at the Rambert Dance Company's former Chiswick headquarters in January 2004! Photo from our popular Monday morning class at the former studios in Chiswick of the RDC Photo credit: Simone Ghera We have initiated ballet courses, workshops, master classes, and special outings. We have held annual performances with innovative and unique choreography created for our adult dancers. We have had classical ballet repertory workshops and also met and worked with a Rota of  International Teachers in Ballet, Contemporary, Feldenkreis, Character Dance...