On the Amazing Task of Ballet Parents and My Mum

I was extremely young when I manifested for the first time that I wanted to become a classical ballerina.  I would dance for hours in all open spaces and to all the classical music I could find.  I do not come from a family of dancers, rather I come from a family of academics.  Yet, my parents took my desire to heart and decided to support my quest.  From early on my mother began researching for the best dance schools and actively participating in my formative process.

By the time I was ten we were living in Mexico and my mother would take me to dance class from Monday to Friday.   I was the oldest child, my mother had to balance all her other obligations with the rest of the family and many daily activities, and she still managed to take me to and from countless hours of lessons. 

When I turned twelve Raul Bustabad and Denia Hernandez from the Cuban Ballet defected to Mexico.  They both were extremely famous professors who had personally worked with and developed numerous professional dancers contracted by companies around the world.  My mother drove me out across Mexico City all the way out to Coyoacan every day for me to enjoy a summer camp with these extraordinary professors.  At the end of the Summer programme my mother spoke to Raul and asked him if he would take me on as a full-time student.  My classmates were sixteen or older and I was only twelve.  I was not a technically strong student, but already demonstrated great artistry and stage presence.  Raul decided to take me on...what happened next was the greatest act of sacrifice and love my mum would do for me.  Despite having a good dance school close to home, I started dancing at the Cuban Ballet School.  Mum would drive me across town for an hour and a half in a car with my siblings to get to class, and the drive back was often longer due to traffic.  She would wait for a full two hours or more while I took class and went to rehearsal, and then the driving would begin.  Mexico City is a hectic city, the drive was both dangerous and exhausting.

With my Cuban professors I danced all the classical ballets, my first solos and pas de deux.  With their ensemble I toured for the first time.  I was very young and had access to the world´s finest training.  Five years after that I would be dancing onstage at the Kennedy Centre with Placido Domingo in Washington DC with a paid professional contract by the Washington Opera.  

Had I never received training with my beloved Cuban professors, I would not have developed into a ballerina on time.  The training decisions made for me of where to train, with whom and how intensively enabled my life as a ballerina.  

Reflecting upon this, it awes me.  My mother was about my age now, she loved to read, exercise like an athlete, watch classic movies...plenty of things to fill her time other than driving me all the way out to classes and back.  My siblings too, spent hours on the road finishing their homework and dinner in the car, all so I could dance.  (My siblings are all adults now, extraordinary human beings of whom I am extremely proud of with great intellectual and artistic sensibility- but that is a story for another day).  

I would not be a dancer today 

had my mother not made the correct decisions 

and the extraordinary sacrifices she made 

at the exact moment she made them.

The importance and role of parents and caretakers in the young classical ballet dancer´s life cannot be underestimated.  This is different from other dance genres in its developmental timeline: classical dancers are expected to attain a professional dance level while still in their teenage years and become a professional in their late teens or early twenties.  The technique and fluidity of the classical ballerina requires many hours of studio work when they are young and learn with ease.  Other dance genres allow that students begin as late as college and university in their early or late twenties, and still develop into magnificent dancers.  Classical ballet rarely gives such an opportunity.

Impact from caregivers on ballet education is absolute.  All decisions befall on the parent regarding finding the optimal dance school and training and subsequent decisions.  The dance student needs support from her parents to dedicate the great number of hours needed to dance.  Family and social time becomes greatly reduced in quantity, and it is up to the parents to make sure that the quality of this time remains strong.

The inclusion and education of dance parents in the dance process is extremely important.  Topics such as nutrition, injury prevention, rest, school-dance balance and social-dance balance need to be addressed.  As ballet teachers we need to learn adequate communication skills with parents.  Proper assessments from a defined philosophical dance base need to be formative and constructive for the parents.  Access to mental health therapy for dancers and their families need to be readily available and accessible.  Parents need to be recognised, congratulated and thanked.  Most likely it will take teenage ballerinas years to even comprehend the great sacrifices made on their behalf.

Mum and I 

Photo taken by my Dad while living in Mexico