In my case, my season -like most ballet seasons in America- is really short. We finish around April and we start back in September. This makes me have a terribly long summer vacation in which, unless I have some plans made, I feel like I'm going to lose all my technique.
How do we deal with this?
This summer, I have to admit that I have been really smart and I have planned ahead for a summer filled with dancing in lots of different parts of the world. This keeps my body active and if I'm careful, free of injury.
I know that you might be thinking that my body needs a rest, and as a matter of fact, it does. But two or three weeks would have been perfectly enough.
So from here I send a message to all ballet companies in the world that have a short season: Your dancers need more dancing. More weeks, so first of all they can keep earning money and living without thinking that they're not going to be able to pay rent next month and second of all so we don't lose our technique and we keep improving.
Call me crazy, but I love dancing with all my heart and I feel like I am losing my time when I'm not dancing.
But here is the big problem: What happens when we simply can't afford to spend money to travel, we don't have guestings, there's nowhere to take class and we are too old for summer intensives?
My humble answer, and what has been working for me is:
- I go to yoga first thing after waking up. Yoga helps me keep my flexibility without losing strength as passive stretching does. It also helps me relax at the same time as I'm having an intense workout.
- Gym. Even though I am not a big fan of working out, I think is necessary, specially as a male dancer. I usually just work out my upper body and maybe some stamina.
- I would randomly do a simple barre at home just to keep my muscle memory active, but I might do this maybe once every two weeks or something like that.
Anyway, I would love a longer season but reality is reality and there is no way my words are going to change it.
