Dear Sanna - teachers...

Maybe ballet masters do forget what it was like to dance. They can be so cruel and unforgiving, screaming at us and undermining our confidence just before a show. And sometimes I think they stuck in the past, feeling nobody can dance the role as good as they once did. One of our ballet masters constantly tells us we need to do it exactly the way she did it, even if artistically it could be done different ways and still be beautiful or right. She gets so caught up in correcting us and showing it how it should be done, she doesn't even watch when we try to fix something or understand. It is so frustrating, and people are really starting to ignore what she says, even though sometimes what she says could be useful.

We are now doing our biggest production of the year, in a huge opera house with guest soloists. We rarely perform in such a big theater with such impressive sets and costumes. It is interesting, because I feel smaller and less important even though the production is more like that of a bigger, more important company. But it's still fun. I think I could enjoy being a small dancer in a large company as well as how I enjoy dancing here as a (sort of) bigger dancer in a small company.

The music for the piece we are dancing is really beautiful, and I am just having a good time dancing in such a great theater and watching the soloists and dancing a little myself. It's been a good week.

Janie