I watched 'Swan Lake' by Bolshoi on video yesterday and I noticed something about the female dancers when they did their posse turns(on pointe). I have learned that after you do the turn, you are supposed to plie-with the leg that was up-and then go on pointe again. But the women at the video didn't plie, they stepped on demi-pointe and then got on to pointe again to turn. It looked strange. Is it right?

Annie - were these posé (and some people call them piqué turns) en dehors or en dedans? <P>In either case when you come down flat, it is supposed to be in a plié. <P>What I see many times is when dancers do a posé/piqué turn on pointe, en dehors (some people call these lame ducks lol), you are supposed to come fully down onto the flat foot, heel in contact with the floor, plié. Many dancers I see on the stage only come down to demi-pointe. That looks strange too. Maybe that is what you saw.<P><BR><p>[This message has been edited by Basheva (edited May 22, 2001).]

I was talking about this very issue in pointe class an hour ago. We were doing "lame ducks" and remembering how they were executed at ABT last week. If done with any speed, the dancers did not come down completely in between. I don't know if this is "new ballet" or what; I was taught to come down in plie between turns.

Speaking of the piqué/posé turns en dehors...<P>I saw the Paris Opera Ballet just a couple of weeks ago in "La Bayadere" and the ballerina only came down to demi-pointe - it was no accident, the turns were not being done very fast. She was very explicit about only coming down to demi-pointe, and of course, then there would be no plié.<P>In fact now that I think about it - I believe this has been going on for years, I can't picture anywhere I have seen - on stage - where this turn is done correctly. It seems it is being taught one way and performed another way.<P>Perhaps because it is seen as too much of a "plop"? Truly lame-duckish to do it the correct way?

Hmm..I was always trained to come down into plie and I just tried it the other way and nearly fell over. I don't recommend skipping the plie.

sounds to me ike a mix between a stylistic thing and a technical requirement of the choreograhy, if you just can't do turns that fast and plie, then don't i guess. To me it seems strange... i just tried it and by a stroke of luck did not fall over but could almost feel my tendon getting shorter by the second. it doesn't sound like a good idea. <BR> I have been taught to always make a deep plie before the thrust of the pique so as to travel more and show the extreme down then stretched up towards the ceiling. <BR> in the end of the coda of the Grand adagio in the Balanchine nutcracker, there are some very fast pique turns, ditto for Tchaicovsky (sp?) pas.. and i have heard our director admonish a girl cheating out on the pique turns in the latter by not plieing.. i dunno<P>------------------<BR>Much Luv!<p>[This message has been edited by Balletgirl (edited May 24, 2001).]