The Arthropologist
Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose: Coaching is just as important in ballet asit is in football
Dawn Scannell teaching at Nashville BalletPhoto by Heather Thorn
Dawn Scannell and artists of the Houston Ballet in "Indigo," choreographed byStanton WelchPhoto by Jim Caldwell
Houston Ballet artist Karina Gonzalez in Indigo, choreographed by Stanton WelchPhoto by Amitava Sarkar
From In the Night choreographed by Jerome Robbins, artists Connor Walsh and SaraWebb of the Houston BalletPhoto by Amitava Sarkar
In addition to coaching, Barbara Bears makes the transition from Giselle to therole of Berthe, Giselle's mother, in Houston Ballet's upcoming production.Photo by Drew Donovan
The word "coaching" might conjure Coach Taylor from Friday Night Lights with his "clear eyes, full hearts" manifesto. It means something different on Planet Ballet — or does it?
Ballet coaching is a distinct process from setting a work. With the steps and spacing already in place, it's the coach who passes on the lived experience of the piece, holding its soul sacred.
Think ballet whisperer.
Sure, there are DVDs and various dance notation transcriptions of most ballets, yet, what's truly astonishing about this tradition is that, in most cases, there is a steady lineage of ballets learned in the presence of those who danced them. Nothing can replace the kinesthetic intelligence from inside the dancing body.
Johnny Eliason shaped Stanton Welch's dancing in his early years with The Australian Ballet. "He worked with me on his own time, every day for two and a half years," remembers Welch. "It changed me forever."
Ballet coaching is a distinct process from setting a work. With the steps and spacing already in place, it's the coach who passes on the lived experience of the piece, holding its soul sacred.
He was also coached by none other than Jiri Kylian, while setting Forgotten Land on The Australian Ballet. Both Kylian and his ballet would become profoundly significant to Houston Ballet's history. "For me, coaching is a natural evolution," says Welch. "That level of self analysis enriches you as a dancer."
Former ballerina turned coach Barbara Bears looks at home at the front of a room full of principals rehearsing Robbins' romantic ballet In the Night, which ran on the Wortham stage this weekend as part of the Return of the Masters program. "The cake is baked, now we add the frosting," quips Bears, in her usual no nonsense demeanor. "It's really about fine-tuning. My job is to keep the simplicity of Robbins' work. It's not a melodramatic ballet, so it's important to not go overboard. The choreography tells the story."
Bears returns to the stage next week as Berte, Giselle's mother, so she's back in the role of coachee with Russian legend Ai-Gul Gaisina. "I'm just soaking it up," adds Bears.
Welch set his exotic ballet Indigo on former principals Bears, Dawn Scannell and current principal Ian Casady in 1997, well before he took the helm in 2003. All three are all coaching Indigo, which shares the bill with Giselle, which opens Thursday and runs through Sept. 29.
"They were all in the room when I created the ballet," recalls Welch. "It's amazing how much each remembers about the experience and the things I said, yet each came away with something different." Collectively, the team has carried Indigo's legacy to the next generation of dancers.
Scannell danced with Houston Ballet from 1985-2001, and returned as a ballet mistress 2006-2009. Now, a busy teacher, coach and mother, she returns when needed. It's no wonder Bears and Scannell make ideal coaches, as they both trained with Victoria Lee, who believed every dancer should also know how to teach.
"I knew I wanted to be a ballet mistress at the beginning of my career," says Scannell. "I was told early on that I had a keen eye for rehearsing. It was as if I could hear a choreographer thinking."
Indigo contains Welch's tricky idiosyncratic signature, which unfurls with offkilter head flourishes, folkish footwork and twisting arm gestures. "When I watch the DVD, Stanton's words flood my mind. It's so important to recreate what the choreographer wanted for the piece to stay intact."
Indigo contains Welch's tricky idiosyncratic signature, which unfurls with offkilter head flourishes, folkish footwork and twisting arm gestures. "It's such a precise ballet, and so musical," Scannell says. "When I watch the DVD, Stanton's words flood my mind. It's so important to recreate what the choreographer wanted for the piece to stay intact."
Casady is enjoying his first go running a rehearsal. "I do get a little nervous, but I'm becoming more comfortable with each experience. I've had so many great coaching experiences as a dancer, yet it's the accumulation of all these experiences that has had an impact on me," says Casady. "Coaching challenges me to reanalyze and then communicate what I know as clearly as possible. Dancers get used to letting our minds and bodies do the work without much verbalization. You have to translate what your body knows into words; it's a lot harder than it seems."
Scannell, Bears, Casady and Welch are of one mind that the emotional tone of any ballet is carried from dancer to dancer through a coaching process. Each spoke passionately about how important it is to respond to the dancer in front of you.
"I appreciate a coach who takes care with the details, not just in the actual steps, but in the music and feeling of the piece as a whole," says Casady. "I love feeling that a coach recognizes me, or any dancer, as having unique qualities, and works with me to bring out those qualities within the framework of the ballet."
See what I mean, it's not such a stretch from "clear eyes, full hearts" after all.
Watch Connor Walsh and Sara Webb put you under a spell in Jerome Robbins' In the Night
