The Heart of Dance LINES Ballet School’s Summer Pre-Professional Program
At LINES Ballet School, a unique philosophy prevails: that young dancers deserve to develop a sense of themselves as creative artists. During the summer Pre-Professional Program, dancers on the thresholds of their careers discover their potential and learn to trust their own inspiration. "The art is within the artist," Alonzo King declares to the Program's students, asking the young dancers to look inside themselves for an authentic and original source of creative self-expression. The emphasis of the summer intensive sessions is on guiding students as they take artistic risks, educating them about caring for their bodies, and cultivating their individuality. "It's really about transformation," says Marina Hotchkiss, senior faculty and LINES Ballet alumni. "That transformation from looking at dance and technique as something outside yourself, a mold to aspire to, to discovering it as your own voice, your own language."
The 4-week sessions of the summer program at LINES Ballet School provides dancers at intermediate, advanced, and Pre-Professional levels with the training and vision they will need to evolve creatively. A wide variety of small classes--focused on ballet, pointe, modern and GYROTONIC‚, and enriched with improvisation, jazz, music, metaphor, Afro-Brazilian, Flamenco, dance history, and Feldenkrais‚--offer students highly individualized attention. Each week offers students a chance to study selected works from the repertory of Alonzo King, which means collaborating with many of the dancers on whom these works were originally created. With the high faculty-to-student ratio, young dancers are nurtured as well as challenged, given the structure and the freedom that encourages artistic growth.
The successful summer 2005 program, energized by its new director Layla Amis, drew students from across the US and abroad. Acclaimed choreographers were commissioned to set pieces on each level of students, and the resulting performances were received by full houses at the Cowell Theater. "My experience there was amazing," said David King, a summer 2005 student from LA. "I learned so much, not just about dance, but about myself as an artist, a person... It means the world." Constance Vadepied, a 14-year-old from Perpignan, France, flew to the US for the first time in order to attend the LBS summer program. Having seen the LINES Ballet Company perform in Lyon, France, last October, Constance was determined to come and study at the LINES Ballet School. By the first week of the session, her love of dance had been renewed. "I'm like a little girl who is discovering a new thing!" Constance exclaimed. "It's magic!" Gail Nelson of Sacramento, whose daughter Natalie attended the program this year, also expressed her gratitude to the faculty who "restored the love of dance in my daughter." She was impressed in particular by seeing Natalie change from being "discouraged and bored" to being enthusiastic and inspired. "In the eleven years of watching her study ballet," Gail Nelson concluded, "I have never heard her so excited about dancing."
In 2006, Session 1 is scheduled from June 11- July 8, with Cowell Theater performances on July 7-8. Session 2 will take place from July 16- August 12, with performances at the Cowell on August 11-12. On the first day of each session, students are placed into the class level that will provide them with a high quality and individualized educational experience. Students at the Pre-Professional level will find that the Lines Ballet School offers them a rigorous and inspiring approach to the discipline of dance--one that encourages them to dance with integrity, courage, and curiosity. "Students undergo such journeys in four weeks!" Marina Hotchkiss says. "They get so much to chew on from Alonzo and the rest of the faculty that it can take awhile to digest. I think we are really giving students something for the future, something that will nourish their dancing for a long time."
Auditions for the upcoming summer program will be held in January (in Seattle, San Francisco, Orlando, Chicago, Minneapolis, San Diego and Atlanta); in February (Tucson, Santa Fe, Phoenix, LA, Austin, Boston, and NYC); and in March, in San Francisco. Audition dates in Europe will be announced soon, and updated, detailed information is available on the website. Video auditions are also accepted. Students ranging from ages 13 through 25 are eligible for the summer program, which will allow them to explore their own voices and experiment with the possibilities for transformation. In conjunction with classes in different forms of dance, the faculty will teach students to care for their bodies throughout their careers, using the GYROTONIC‚ system as a basis for conditioning and balance.
The LINES Ballet School faculty brings together dancers and choreographers from a number of renowned companies, from the Bay Area as well as nationally and internationally. Choreographers for the 2005 sessions included: Alonzo King, Arturo Fernandez, Janice Garrett, Charles Moulton, Robert Moses, Robert Henry Johnson, Yannis Adoniou, and Brian Carey Chung. Other members of the teaching faculty include:, Layla Amis, Mary Carbonara, Gregory Dawson, Marina Hotchkiss, Maurya Kerr, Debra Rose, Shirin Rose, Carmen Rozestraten, Katherine Warner, Elana Anderson, Kara Davis, Viktor Kabaniaev, Bliss Kohlmeyer, Jim Santi Owen, Stacey Printz, Amy Raymond, Sam Watson, and Tania Santiago. LINES Ballet School also offers a year-round program for students from 3-16 years old, as well as a respected Pre-Professional training program.
For further information or to pre-register for an audition, see the LINES Ballet School website (www.linesballet.org) or contact Administrative Manager Robin Luu at 415.863.3040 ext 248. Videos may be mailed to LINES Ballet School PPP, c/o Layla Amis, 26th Seventh Street, San Francisco CA 94103.