Issues and Ideas

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What Every Dancer Needs To Know by Rob Bettmann

It seems that most teachers tell you what you need to know. But do we all need the same thing? Sure, you are more marketable with certain strengths. Do we all have the same best road toward those strengths?

Roudolf Kharatian on Ballet

Roudolf Kharatian discusses the source and core of Ballet as an art form, including how the physical and the spiritual combine in training and performance. Reprinted from Bourgeon Vol. 1 #1, July 2005.

The DC Improvisation Festival Present, and Past by Maida Withers

Maida Withers, founder of the DC Improvisation Festival writes about the festival's past, and present, and shares a video with excerpts from the recent performances.

Michael Bjerknes

"Michael Bjerknes, a former Washington Ballet dancer and ballet master and co-founder of the American Dance Institute in Rockville, died April 14 of colon cancer at the Washington Home and Community Hospice. He was 51. After Mr. Bjerknes stopped dancing, he became a teacher and ballet master at the Washington Ballet and the Universal Ballet in Seoul. He was an influential creative force in the Washington area for the past two decades.

Why are there no Black Ballerinas?

A quote from an article in The Guardian (UK) about the absence of Black Women in the ballet world

Video: Local Dance History Interviews II

Local dance history interviews with Sue Green, Alvin Mayes, Barbara Drazin, and Michelle Ava

Rima Faber on Pola Nirenska

Rima Faber writes about Pola Nirenska, one of the founders of the dance community in Washington, D.C.

Jonathan Morris on The Low End

My music frequently functions like chamber music. But my music is often amplified, so while it is ‘classical’, it is also electronic.

Video: Local Dance History Interviews

Video interviews of local dance history: recollections from Judith Judson and Marcia Freeman

A College Degree: What is it Good For? by Gesel Mason

Choreographer, Dancer, and Teacher Gesel Mason considers the purpose of a college dance degree for aspiring dancers - learning to master Fear.

Must-read

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Three Poems By Kate Powell Shine 

EXHAUST FOUND HERSELF INSIDE AN EMPTY SNAIL SHELL A private spiral, whiff of yuck bit off her trail of pummel slick. The shell was cold,...