Jazz

     Jazz is a type of dance that is very well known around the world today.  It is usually a fast paced type of dance.  This style of dance is a North American tradition developed from a mixture of African and European dances.  Today jazz is used in many musicals.  It is often referred to as show, or commercial dance.  Jazz dance is lively and fun and full of color and rhythm.

Tap

     Like Jazz, tap is an American art that has its roots in slavery.  The African slaves mixed their traditional dances with the jigs and clog dances of the European Americans.  So was born a new tapping, swinging style of dance that is performed throughout the world.  To be a good tap dancer you will need to move quickly and rhythmically.  It is also important that you understand where your center of balance is.  When you are tapping you don't just use your feet, you use your whole body.

Modern

     Modern is a very old type of dance.  It started with an American modern dancer Isadora Duncan and Loi'e Fuller.  They devised what they felt was a freer and more natural form of expressive dance.  Later on it developed specific traditions with their own technique, style and training.  In modern you can be inventive with the use of movements on the floor.  The movements in modern are expressive and supple.  Modern dancers often dance barefoot.  The gestures in modern is emotionally evocative.

Ballet

     Ballet began in the Halien courts of the fifteenth century.  Ballet grew as a separate dance form and set steps and professional ballet dancers began to appear in the seventeenth century.  France became the first center of the ballet world, establishing French as the language of ballet to this day.  Ballet is an art that is beautifully expressive and dramatic.  A ballet dancer needs strength, delicacy, grace and skill.  Ballet can bring every emotion from humor to sorrow alive.  You must dance ballet with feeling and expression.

Lyrical

     Lyrical is a more modern type of dance.  It can be fast paced or slow.  It is a combination of ballet and jazz dance.  Lyrical is similar to modern dance in that no shoes are usually worn.  Being a lyrical dancer takes hard concentration and strict training.  Though it is not as well known as the other types of dance, it is practiced throughout the world.  Lyrical dance is needed to be dances with the heart.

Pointe

     Ballerinas first danced on the tips of their toes in the nineteenth century.  It made them appear weightless and fragile, and this became an important and admired quality of ballet in the 1830's and 1840's.  Good Pointe work looks effortless and expressive, but it actually is the result of very hard work.  You should not attempt to dance on Pointe until your feet and legs are sufficiently strong.  Pointe is used in all ballets and is usually dances with a male partner.  Boys do no to on Pointe, but they partner the girls and help them turn and do many other things.