Jessicas Ballet Life: June 2013

Thursday, 27 June 2013

Thank you!

I have been back for a couple of days and had 2 days of rehearsals. I still feel pretty tired. I really wanted to thank all of you that donated towards the most wonderful experience of my life! I really can not thank you enough! I will still continue with this blog with any other exciting things that happen in my dancing career. I have been offerd to go to the St Petersburg Summer Intensive from 20 July - 4 August. It is going to cost $4000!!! Lets hope that I can possibly receive a discount otherwise I need to do some more fund raising and raise this amount in 2 WEEKS!!

Thank you everyone for your, love, support and positivity. Thank you from the bottom of my heart!
Lots of love from me
xx

Thank you!

Saturday, 22 June 2013

Gala pictures

This is who I shared a change room with for the first 2 days.

OK, this is the Latvian National Opera. This is the view from the stage. Did you know that Baryshnikov is originally from Latvia and has performed on this very same stage.

These are pictures of us with Marina, the organiser of the competition. She is beautiful isn't she..

The Gala

After hearing who the winners were, I found out that the judges wanted myself and Luisito to perform Satenella in the Gala concert at the Latvian National Opera! WHAT!!! My dream came true!

So the day of the Gala, we got up and took the tram with the other dancers to the theatre. I was taken to my dressing room, which I shared with Marita Weinrack (Estonia) who was the 2nd place winner in the Pre-professional group. We all went to the master class. Remember the picture I posted of the studio that Elza took us to, well I got to dance there. Class was great and some of the judges were watching, gulp...

After class I spoke to the one judge, Jekaterina Scelkanova and gave me her card and invited me to the Summer Intensive program in St. Petersburg from 20 July-4 August! You have to go through an audition process to be allowed to go to this program that is help at the Vaganova academy. It cost about $4000. Guess I have to do some quick fundraising again. I really hope that I will be able to go! The Vaganova method is the best in the world and I world learn so much and would be able to bring that knowledge back to South Africa.

So after my excitement, we had to go place Satenella on the BEAUTIFUL stage. This time the stage was slightly raked... After placing, we learned our sequence in which we would do the curtain calls. Now it was time for lunch so now the 4 for of us(Miles being the 4th) went to have lunch. Then it was time to get ready for the performance.

This time, I could sit back and watch the other dancers without feeling intimidated, but not when I had Annija Kopstale (2nd place winner) doing 5 pirouettes right before we had to go on. When I took my first step onto that stage, I was stunned for a split second. Reason being, I was actually living my dream by being on this AMAZING WORLD CLASS STAGE! I looked out to the audience and all the seats were full. This was THE best experience in my entire life. It brings a tear to my eye right now, just thinking of the few minutes that I actually got to perform on that stage. The audience clapped to the music during the coda while we were dancing. Wow! This was extreme!!!

During the curtain call some of the students from the Riga Choreography School came onto stage and gave us flowers. After the performance we stayed on stage and took a few pictures with the dancers and the judges. I was shocked when a few of the judges told me that I did a really good performance! These are people who work with outstanding dancers everyday...

After we had gotten dressed, we went to the dinner for the competition where we could all chat and get emails of the friends that we made. So sad that the most amazing experience I my whole life has come to an end. I made so many good friends that I feel like I have known for years, but we only have known each other for a couple of days. I have learnt so much about ballet and most of all about myself! Thank you EVERYONE who has donated, sponsored and supported me before and during the competition. This really has been THE BEST EXPERIENCE IN MY LIFE! I have no words to explain how thankful I am. I am truly grateful and love you all!

Pictures at the finals

This is the beautiful Satenella tutu that I got to perform in. It's stunning isn't it?

Luisito and myself on stage together after the performance.

Luisito with some of the other finalists.

From left to right. Mile Gilliver(3rd), Me, Veronoka Ignatyeva (from The Bolshoi, Finalist), Daria Elmakova and her non-competing partner Anton (1st)

This is a picture of myself and 2 of the finalist from the Pre-professional category.

From left to right. Riina (coach of Paulina), Paulina Pakarinen (Finland), Me, Luisito, Miles Gilliver and James. Miles and James became really good friends.

Myself and Miles. Really is an awesome guy and an amazing dancer. We all had a few laughs together and will have many great memories.

Another picture of us backstage at the Finals.

This is a picture of me with, I'm sure, the World's 2 next greatest dancers. What an honour to not only be standing next to them, but to have been able to be in the finals with them.

FINALS!!!

There was no ways that I could believe that I made it to the Finals! That morning I woke up really tired as we had had # really hectic days of non stop dancing. we got up and went to class at 9 am. There were only 4 of us that decided to do class; myself, Luisito, Miles and Paulina. Was pretty cool to have a small class with Anton Boytsov. After class we picked up our costumes and went straight to the Dailes Theatre to place Satenella. Immediately when you walked into the theatre you could feel the pressure!!! We placed Satenella and practised a few things that we needed to practice. By this time it was about 13:30 and we were starving. So James and Luisito went to Hesburger (like Mac Donalds but WAY better) and bought take away. We sitting in the waiting area eating our burgers and all the dancers would look at us really weird and others would laugh, some people actually took pictures of us! I guess ballet dancers don't eat burgers here, that's probably why they are SO thin!

I went to rest for a bit and then had to go to the very intense change room to do my hair and make-up. Thank goodness I have and I-pod!!! So when I was ready, I went to go warm up quickly as they were running 30 minutes early. Put on my point shoes and then my beautiful tutu that Alice kindly let me use! She is a lovely dancer from the our Academy back in South Africa. Her mom is the fantastic lady that made all my costumes.

So as always I had to wait back stage, hear variation after variation, hear the audience go wild and keep calm. It was truly difficult and I think I let the nerves get to me this time. Well now it was my turn, they announce "and from South Africa, number 41, Jessica Overton and Luis Javier performing Satenella". Wow I really felt like I was about to be ill... The music started and then it began. I really enjoyed it, but a few things went wrong, which I'm sure were due to the nerves and being really tired. But I just carried on like nothing happened and carried on giving it my best. The audience seemed to enjoyed it.

After the performance we went back to the hotel and showered and relaxed. Luisito came rushing into the room and told us the results were downstairs. The list was up and I placed 6th, which I was happy with considering the competition was very high. Luisito got a special prize, which was the audience favourite! Well done! With all that energy the people right at the back o the theatre can feel his energy (",).

3rd place was shared between Miles Gilliver (England) and Jolanta Lubeja (Latvia), 2nd went to Annja Kostale (Latvia) and first place went to....... Daria Elmakova (RUSSIA). Wow these dancers are amazing! Miles is going to the Birmingham Royal Ballet in August, Jolanta is a soloist at the Latvian National Opera, Annja could do 5 pirouettes and when we congratulated her on her pirouettes she said "oh thank you, but they were ok" and we asked her why she wasn't happy with them and she told us that on a good day she does 8 pirouettes! WHAT!!! Then the winner, Daria she performed the Black Swan pas de deux in the Final round, the only word I can use to describe it is... W O W!!!

It was such an amazing honour to be a part of the finals. The judges only choose the top 30% of the best dancers. I was up against people who are going to be the worlds next great dancers! The one girl Veronika Ignatyeva (the one I mentioned that was so flexible), well James didn't want to tell me during the competition, but she is at the BOLSHOI Ballet!!! That is one of the best companies in the entire world!!! I can believe I really did dance with dancers who are members and soloists of the best companies in the world! I really can't believe it! I honestly proved something to myself... I am a good dancer, I never ever thought I was.

Some pictures from classes and the competition

This was when I was warming up. You have to be really warm for a Russian class. The studio was very raked so I also had to adjust my weight and try and get used to it.

The warm up exercise was almost 10 minutes long... I was already dripping with sweat, just from the first exercise! The class was taken by Zane Lieldidzha-Kolbina/Lolita Soifere. Wow I have NEVER seen such extreme sway backed legs ever! You can sort of see the teachers legs is in this photo.

This was the grand battement exercise. Now, if you notice the girl on the far right... You will notice that she is pretty flexible! When we were warming up, she went to the chair, put her foot on it and went into the splits. I have seen this before so I was thinking ok... Then she turned into the middle splits and was STILL flat (her hips were touching the floor), then she turned all the way around so that her leg that was front on the chair was now at the back and she was STILL flat!!! I was like, WOW!!! As you can probably guess, she is Russian.

This was just another exercise in the centre.

This is me and the awesome teacher! The class was amazing! Was really difficult, but I feel like I improved so much just from that one class.

This is the pianist and Paulina (the girl from Finland that I made friends with). They don't use CD players, even for rehearsals, they only use a pianist and this is just the school.

This is the flower that I picked and I got number 41. This was not so nice when it came to the competition as it meant that I was always at the end of the program and it was really difficult to calm my nerves.

This was on the day that we had to do our placing for Round 2. I was so tired, but had to keep on going...

Luisito with all his energy!!!

This was the 2nd master class with Anton Boytsov. Behind me is Miles Gilliver who we made such good friends with.

These are the other dancers: Paulina (Finland), Veronika (Russia) and Artem Markov (Russia)

Myself and Luisito with Anton Boytsov. He loved Luisito!!!

This was myself and Luisito preparing for the actual performance of Round 2. As you will notice, we were both really nervous...

Me all dressed and ready to perform Flower Festival for Round 2.

Striking a creative pose after the contemporary in Round 2.

This is me with Anna Romenkova, one of the helpers at the competition. We also made really good friends with her. She is so sweet and helpful, really going to miss her.

This is James with Anna.

Friday, 21 June 2013

Some pictures of my experience at the competition

This is me on the first day before class, you can notice the terror on my face...

Tuesday, 18 June 2013

Tuesday 17 June

Today was the day I had been waiting for, ROUND 2!
I was up at 7am so that I could get ready, have breakfast and make it to my 2nd master class by 9am, Wow that's early for me! This time the class was with Ped. Anton Boystov from the Mariinsky. He reminded me so much of Alexy Illin. He gave us a whole speak in Russian before the class began and he looked at all of us like we knew what he was saying, um... So the lady that was there, translated. He just said that he knew it was a big day and that we can take it easy and do what we can. James filmed some of the class and hopefully we can post it sometime.
After another amazing Russian class, we went back to the hotel to rest till the performance. Well there was no ways that I was going to be sleeping... My heart was pounding the WHOLE day, I have never, ever felt so nervous in my life! Eventually it was time to leave, so I took 1 cataflam and a my 2nd biral of the day (herbal calming pill) and off we went, this time we knew where we were going and didn't have to walk forever.

So we arrive at the Dailes Theatre and I arrive at my dressing room and guess what, there is no spot for me... Luckily the one Russian girl was not there yet so I could quickly whip out my MAC make-up (hehe) and put on my make-up. I had to listen to my I-pod as the tension in that room was extreme! Luckily I was with Paulina from Finland in the dressing room. The Latvian girls, the girl from Belarus and the Russian(who can't speak a word of English) are not as friendly. So as soon as I was done with my make-up and hair, I was out of there to go warm up. Luisto and myself took our time to warm up and James was very helpful at keeping me calm and stretching my arabesque :). So finally the time had come for me to put on my pointe shoes and costume and get ready to perform.
I am number 41. On the very first day that we had class we had to go onto stage and pick a flower from one of the five girls on stage and each flower had a number and mine was 41. So obviously, I would be 3rd last to perform and I had to wait for 13 contestants to perform. The stress was killing me. So finally they announce my number, play the music and Luisito and myself walk onto stage. I was SO scared! The whole time that we were on stage it felt like it was a dream and my body was controlling itself. When we were finished it was the most amazing feeling! But I had to rush off and change for the contemporary. Most of the contemporary pieces are very balletic and were all on pointe. I had so much fun in the contemporary! When we came off stage all the contestants in the wings were clapping for us! Thank you Angela Maree for an amazing piece!

So now was the time to see who made it to the finals... Oh my word, I just wanted to know! At about 22:45, Marina ( competition organiser) arrived at the hotel with the paper in her hands... She showed it to me and.... I'M IN THE FINALS!!!! They took 8 of us! I'm number 6 out of the 8. The other competitors in the finals are: Darja Elmakova (Russia), Veronika Ignatjeva (Russia), Miles Gillver (England), Alexey Minkin (Russia), Jekaterina Gusarova (Russia), Annija Kopstale (Latvia) and Jolanta Lubeja (Latvia).

So tomorrow I have class at 9am again, then off to the theatre for a placing of Satenella and then we perform! Please keep me in your thoughts and send me all your positivity. I'm just going to continue having fun and just do my best! Thank you all for your support xxx.

Round 2 at teh 1st International Baltic Ballet Competition

Monday 17 June
So sorry that I have not updated in 2 days, it has just been really hectic and busy. On Monday the 17th, we had our first master class with Zane Lieldidzha-Kolbina/Lolita Soifere. This was a ladies class. Wow, it was intense. The warm up exercise was literally 10 mins long... I worked REALLY hard in that class, but I loved it! After the 2 hour Russian class, we went off to the Riga School's canteen, mmmmm the food was good. I finally managed to make 2 friends Miles Gilliver from England and Paulina Pakarinen from Finland. Finally 2 friendly people! Miles has actually received a full time contract with the Birmingham Royal Ballet and Paulina is a member of the Finnish National Ballet.
So, after lunch we went upstairs ( feels like a million stairs) to studio 8 for our 45 min rehearsal for Round 2. After that we had to rush off to the Dailes Theatre for our stage rehearsal. Oh my word... Did we get lost! We walked for about 5mins to the bus stop, took the correct bus but we got off at the wrong stop and our bus tickets were only enough for a to and from trip. Well, we managed to find out where the theatre was but we had to walk there. It was about 5/6 blocks away!!! Luisito and myself complained the entire way, poor James... Once we arrive, we had to get ready for placing. It was exhausting! We ran Flower Festival and the Contemporary for the 2nd time in one day AND after walking for miles... When we got home, we were all finished and went to bed.

Sunday, 16 June 2013

Update on The Competition

The pictures that you have seen will be the last few of Riga itself for a little while. We have officially registered today. I saw most of the dancers wondering around and waiting to register. I wont lie, I felt a bit intimidated by all theses dancers. The dancers from Belarus arrived this morning and they are all tall, skinny and sway backed(the shape of their legs). They not too friendly, but I will keep working on them, I really want to make some friends here.

As far as I know, there are only 2 or 3 other participants entering as a pas de deux and I didn't see anyone that has chosen the same dances as me, lets hope that we are the only ones doing Flower Festival and Satenella...

The judges for the competition are:
Aivars Leimanis: Artistic Director of the Latvian National Ballet and Chairman of the jury of the 1st International Baltic Ballet Competition
Viktors Barikins: Awarded artist of Russian Federation and Ballet Master of the Bolshoi Theatre Moscow
Irina Cistjakova: Repetiteur of the Mariinsky Opera and Ballet Theatre St. Petersburg
Ekaterina Shchelkanova: Soloist of the Leningrad Kirov Theatre and American Ballet Theatre President of the International Charity Foundation " Open World"
Cyrille Atanassoff: Premier of National Theatre "L'Opera de Paris" - ballet star, professor National Order of Merit in Arts Winner of the Nizhinsky prize in 1965 and President of the International Ballet Competition Paris

There are 18 competitors in my category, including myself and the countries they come from are: 3 from Belarus, 7 from Croatia, 2 from Japan, 2 from Latvia, 1 from England, 1 from Ukraine, 1 from Somija(in Latvian) and ME from South Africa :). There are 14 girls (including myself) and 4 men. I suddenly realised that this is a VERY Russian competition!!!!!!!

Tomorrow I will have my first master class with Anton Boicov who is a soloist of the Mariinsky Opera and Ballet Theatre St. Petersburg as well as an Executive of the International Charity Ballet Foundation "Open World".

I am slightly nervous to do this class, but at the same time excited. We will be doing class at 13:00-15:00. Then I have my 45 min rehearsal at the Riga Choreography School from 17:15-18:00. Then at 19:00 we go to the Dailes Theatre where each pas de deux couple has 15 mins to rehearse/place on stage.

Tomorrow is quite a big day but I am looking forward to it. I will post again when the day is done. I'm not going to watch the other dancers practise their pieces as I don't want to intimidate myself ;)...Wish me luck xx

Riga

This is where you enter into the Theatre. There was an Opera while we were walking around.

This is another picture of inside the beautiful theatre.

This was one of the signs for the ballet. They have their own wardrobe on the premises as well as their OWN sauna!!!

We then had a tour of the lovely streets of Riga. These pictures were taken between 21:00-22:00.

This is one of the monuments in Riga.

This is an original tram from the 1800's.

The Cathedral of Riga.

This building, they have turned into a Medieval restaurant, but was built in the 1500's, wow that's pretty old... They have a fireplace that they used for a while, but it created way too much smoke and the businesses around complained, so they no longer use it.

The clothes rack

This is the clothes rack in the foyer of the theatre, in winter it can get up -30, sheesh that's freezing!

Inside the Theatre

Elza Gave us tour of inside the Latvian National Opera. Thsi is the texture of the walls...

exciting days in beautiful Lativa

Last night on the way to finding dinner we found this lovely Little bakery. Mmmmm was so delicious…

We decided that we would try some pizza. It was really difficult trying to order as the woman could not speak a word of English, but thank goodness there was a lady that is a regular at the restaurant and she helped us order. We even took down her name and she wants to meet with us before we leave. Our first Latvian friend that we made!

After we had breakfast this morning, we wanted to get an early start to rehearsing. So we went to the Riga Choreography School and warmed up in the small studio. After warming up I put on my Flower Festival costume, got comfortable and we rehearsed. How stunning is my costume? Thank you to Louise for the donation towards the costumes and to Alta to making these incredible creations! After Flower Festival we rehearsed Satenella. Luisito felt like he had lots of energy, but I was feeling pretty tired and sore, must have been the contemporary rehearsal the day before… The variation is pretty challenging, specially hopping on pointe on a raked floor! By the end of rehearsal I was getting used to the raked floor.

After running my Santanella variation a few times, I was exhausted and my toenail was killing me. no wonder! we had been rehearsing for 3 hours straight.
how pretty is that tutu?