Ballet Help Desk

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Lily Peta and Emma Wheeler did everything the traditional ballet path asks of young dancers and still found themselves waiting for the right job to come along. Then, they stopped waiting. This past summer they launched Midsommardans, an outdoor ballet festival on Grinda, an island in the Stockholm archipelago.

Lily and Emma tell us how two dancers with no background in fundraising or production pulled it off, from convincing the archipelago foundation to take a chance on them to hand-building a sprung stage floor with their families. Along the way, making their own opportunity changed how they see the ballet job market. Be sure to listen to the end to hear the exciting news they have to share about the future of Midsommardans.

You can find Midsommardans on Instagram at @midsommar.dans.

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We sit down with Ayisha McMillan Cravotta and Alicia Delgadillo of Charlotte Ballet to talk about what the road from trainee to professional looks like there. Alicia recently became associate director of CB2, the second company.

The pre-professional trainee program is small, capped at 30 dancers, and starts at age 15, though the group skews older. Charlotte Ballet doesn't provide housing, which Ayisha says helps shape who enrolls.

Once dancers move up to CB2, the focus shifts to preparing them for the job itself. Alicia explains how she mentors this small group of dancers, and why half of this year's new hires come from college programs. Both guests talk plainly about the job market and how they help dancers plan for it.

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We're back with part 2 of our conversation with former New York City Ballet and Miami City Ballet soloist Kathryn Morgan. This half covers what happens behind the scenes of judging, including why some score sheets come back without comments and what judges actually talk about when they're not watching dancers.

Kathryn also talks about why most company directors steer clear of hiring dancers with a big social media following, and the toll that chasing a following and a certain body image can take on young dancers. She ends with her take on why ballet companies are struggling to hold onto talent and audiences, and why she doesn't think the repertoire is the problem.

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In part one of this two-part episode, we're joined by former New York City Ballet and Miami City Ballet soloist Kathryn Morgan for an honest conversation about what really goes on inside ballet competitions. She talks about how scoring and judging works, why she believes the real evaluation at YAGP finals comes from the scholarship classes rather than the stage, and how social media has reshaped what young dancers think a ballet career looks like.

We also posed some of the questions parents keep asking us, including whether independent dancers are treated differently than school-affiliated ones, what people mean by "connected schools," and how much influence a school's relationship with a competition really carries. Kathryn answers honestly, including moments where she's clearly thinking it through in real time rather than giving a rehearsed take, and she's upfront about where she does and doesn't have a clear answer.

As competition season is about to get into full swing, this conversation is worth a listen.

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We're back for part 2 of our parent panel. Stephanie Lombardo, Jen Petersen-Hull, and Lisa Lecamu get specific about what it's like sending your American kid abroad for full-time ballet training. Drop-off day was harder than any of them expected. Lisa now wishes she'd stayed a few extra days to help her son settle into independent living in London, and Stephanie wasn't able to make the trip at all, so she switched to German time by phone instead, making sure she was the first and last person her daughter talked to each day. Once the kids were settled, these parents heard a lot less from the schools than they would have in the US, and mid-year evaluations meant classmates could be cut without warning. The competition among students was intense, especially among the girls, and each mom navigated a different version of that pressure with her own kids.

They also talk through the moments that made it worthwhile: an unplanned donor performance in Stuttgart, choreography training at Princesse Grace, lead roles at English National Ballet School. And they get real about the things they wish they'd known going in, from navigating local laws to figuring out how to actually talk to your kid once they're an ocean away.

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Did you ever wonder what it's like to send your dancer off to full-time training? Now, ask yourself what it's like to send them to another continent. In part one of this two-part series, we sat down with three parents who, collectively, had four kids attend ballet programs in Europe. One went to Academie Princesse Grace in Monaco. Two headed to London - one to the Royal Ballet School and the other to English National Ballet School. The fourth went to John Cranko in Germany.

Tune in to hear how each family ultimately made the decision to send their child overseas, how the opportunities first presented themselves and what they each saw as some unexpected ups and downs during the time they were there.

If you've been curious about the pros and cons of European ballet training, tune in!

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As we all know, the ballet job market is incredibly competitive. But, not all ballet careers involve signing a year-long contract with a company. Some dancers choose other paths and we sat down with Linnea Swarting to hear from a dancer who traded the security of a company contract to pursue a freelance career.

She talked about how she made the decision to walk away from company life and how she got her first freelance gig. We also discussed what kinds of jobs are actually available to freelancers and then variety is pretty surprising! Think everything from corporate parties to full international tours performing Swan Lake.

We also discussed what touring companies really are, how Linnea finds jobs, what she looks for in contracts and how to negotiate before agreeing to join the project.

Interested in learning more about the freelance life? You can find Linnea on her website or Instagram at @lswarting.

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Fran is back for a conversation about respect in the ballet studio.

We get into the mechanics of a real ballet class. A teacher giving thirty corrections in ninety minutes doesn't have room to let one go unanswered, and Fran talks about why trying a correction immediately signals something different than thinking it over first. We also press him on how a teacher decides who earns individual attention in a crowded room, and how he tells the difference between a student asking a genuine question and a student who's simply refusing to try what they were asked. Fran turns some of that scrutiny on teachers too. He admits egos flare up at the front of the room as much as anywhere else, and draws a line between authority that's been earned and authority that's being misused.

We also discuss how a dancer's reputation travels through what we know is a small industry, and why character can matter as much as talent when a director decides whom to hire again. We close the conversation with Fran making the case for why the studio itself deserves to be treated seriously, calling it "sacred ground."

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Ever wonder what it actually takes to move up through the ranks at a major ballet company's school, and what happens once your dancer gets there? We sat down with Adam Sklute, artistic director of Ballet West, and Evelyn Cisneros-Legate, who runs Ballet West Academy, to find out.

They walk us through how the academy trains dancers from age three all the way up, and how the trainee program Sklute built actually works day to day. We also get into mentorship: how the school handles those honest, sometimes hard conversations with dancers about where they stand before contract decisions come down.

Then the conversation opens up to the bigger picture. Ballet has a postgrad math problem: way more dancers than paid contracts. Sklute and Cisneros-Legate talk candidly about that gap, the idea of getting artistic directors more direct access to watch dancers across schools, and the case for rethinking what counts as success at the postgrad level.

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We sit down with Carter Alexander, Chair of the Division of Dance at Southern Methodist University, to find out what sets the program apart from the more ballet-specific schools. Carter walks us through the conservatory-within-a-liberal-arts structure: required training in ballet, modern, and jazz, a newly added Afro modern component, and how the school's BFA program allows roughly 60% of students double major in fields like mechanical engineering, psychology, and business.

We discuss admissions and auditions, how merit scholarships get awarded, and why the program has struggled to attract male dancers in recent years. Carter also weighs in on the trainee-versus-college debate, and how he sees the trade-offs given today's job market.

Finally, he covers how SMU prepares these young adults for the job market by coaching all students on how to network effectively and explains how much SMU relies on their alumni mentorship network.

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