What am I doing in THIS class?

Today I intended to take an Advanced Beginner ballet class with Tamás Krizsa. I've really been looking forward to seeing what his teaching style is like.

I always like to get changed and ready at least 15 minutes before class to have the time to do some solo stretching. Shortly after arriving I overheard one of the other students comment that Tamás was not teaching today; Brittany Bailey would be substituting instead. This annoyed me. I'm on the monthly plan at MYB (I can take as many classes as I want during the month for a fixed price), where as I pay per-class at TWSB. I could have taken a class this morning at MYB and saved myself $20. But I was already there and it was too late to cancel my registration. Maybe I might like Brittany's class?

There have been times I've taken an unfamiliar class and found myself asking "WTF am I doing here??" For example, the Tuesday noon Advanced Beginner class at MYB apparently is unofficially known as the "faculty class" because many of the instructors take it. The result is that it is far more challenging than any of the other Advanced Beginner classes.

It turns out that Brittany is a nice teacher, who gives very clear instructions and demonstrations, and takes time to give feedback to her students. However, the class she taught was not an Advanced Beginner level class. Maybe that's because she's really good at reading the room, as many of the better students I noted from last week weren't present; I can't tell. But I'd put the level of difficulty somewhere between an MYB Beginner 1 and Beginner 2 class.

I have no complains about her barre, but the centre exercises weren't what I've come to expect at this level. During adagio she waffled about whether to include a penché, finally deciding to include it while telling us to just go for it. We did a jump warm-up, then a simple petit allegro that included assemblé front and back but didn't have any moving steps (no glissades or jetés). In place of a pirouette combination we did piqué turns across the floor. The grand allegro combination was a waltz turn, two piqué turns, a tombé, pas de bourrée, a couple of steps and a "big jump" (I did a saut de chat, some others did pas de chat).

In my experience this would have been a good, challenging Beginner 1 or 2 class. Frankly, and I say this without malice, I think this class was well targeted for many of the students who attended today. But for an Advanced Beginner class I expected more.

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I am rather proud of myself for two things. The first is the piqué turns. Laurice often offers piqué turn practice in her classes. At first I'd had trouble doing these at all, probably for lack of practice. More recently I've been doing reasonably well to the right, but still wobbly to the left. Today, however, I did quite well both directions, which really made me feel good.

The second thing I'm proud of is resisting the urge to offer suggestions after class to one of the other men in the class. He really belongs in a Beginner 1 class, as he don't seem to understand how to do some basic steps. You don't plié during a penché or piqué turn. A soutenu turn does not include a jumping changement. Don't tilt your whole body to the side in an attempt to get your leg higher a la seconde.  And that just starts the list. Instead, I just smiled politely and wished him a good weekend.

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Next weekend is TWSB's Adult Open House. I'm registered to take their free 30-minute "Advanced Beginner / Intermediate" demo class, hoping to find out whether I'd fit into their intermediate-level Adult Program Concert. What I should do is just take one of their Intermediate 1 classes, which I could do next week, and see how it feels. I guess I want to hear what the instructors say, which is part of the demo class program.