Backstage At The ballet

Another year over,

Another Nutcracker finished.

The Nutcracker is not one of my favourite ballets to perform,

and this year it seemed more hectic than ever.

I was dancing in the roles of,

Parents,

Soloist Snowflake,

Corps De Ballet Snowflake

Spanish

Arabian

Soloist Waltz of the Flowers

Okay, okay not all at the same time....

but having to juggle so many rehearsals and keep my stamina

(and sanity) was pretty hard work.

Especially seeing this is the time of the year when people get sick,

and if a dancer gets sick or injured,

all your thinking about is

Dang! what am i going to have to re-learn

in order to compensate for one missing person in the performance tonight!

Before one particular performance a girl came into work and quit her job.

Enough was enough.

And so we juggled around the cast,

and it was stressful,

because at the moment we dont have a lot of spare dancers....

and i went on stage dancing a role that i hadn't expected to.

Feeling exhausted and run down.

But,

as i sat on the Metro heading home that evening a girl came up to me

and asked if i had just been in the ballet.

She had her programme and wanted me to sign it.

She told me how much she had loved the ballet.

It was the first time that she had seen one in real life, and not just on tv.

How she thought it was so magical....

She was blown away.

And it made me realise that even though backstage

half the dancers are wanting to kill each other,

and are bodies are falling apart out of exhaustion.

The audience cant see that (thank goodness)

And although at times the magic gets a bit stale for me,

there are others out there who can still see it.

It's also nice to be on stage too.

Dancers spend a majority of our time in the studio

but when i'm on stage and it goes well....

Nothing Beats That.....

w