Principal dancer !!?

Question:

Principal dancer !!?

My daughter is 11 and has just started ballet how can she become a principal dancer ?? or is it too late honest and real answers only please.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: It is certainly not too late for your daughter to start preparing for a professional career as a dancer. However, it is too early for you, as her mother, to be asking this particular question, given that she has just started training and has no idea what she is in for.

The dance profession might seem glamorous, but let me tell you, only sadistic or totally ignorant parents would ever deliberately steer their child towards being a dancer when the child isn't the one begging to fill every free hour with dance classes year after year. (You can't get any more "honest and real" than that.) The pursuit of dance to the most advanced levels is full of all kinds of pain - from physical (tendonitis, bleeding blisters, toe nails falling off, and being dropped in a lift) to emotional (competition and rejections, organizational politics, having to keep dancing even when you're bone tired, to the constant threat of injury and terrible job security).

Parents of DETERMINED young dancers must walk a very fine line. Part of your job is to see whether your child will consider pursuing any other interest area (meaning, THEIR interest area), so be as eager to sign them up for music lessons or programs about animals as you are to enroll them in dance class. Those other pursuits will help your child be well-rounded. But if your child keeps talking about being a professional dancer, then your job is also to find the best training available by attempting to stay one step ahead of your child. Find teachers who have danced professionally. And if your child is topping out at a particular studio, find another program with more advanced classes. If your home studio does not offer classes in the summer for students over 12 years old, then your daughter will need to start attending "summer intensives." However, if your daughter ever expresses the feeling that she'd like to do less with dance - perhaps only do it for fun - then please, support that desire whole-heartedly.

I highly recommend that you become a part of the "Ballet Talk for Dancers" message board:
http://dancers.invisionzone.com/index.ph...
That's where Everything You Wanted To Know About Becoming A Ballet Dancer for Fun or Meager Wages can be found.

P.S. Juilliard (spelled with 2 i's) only has a COLLEGE dance program, which sponsors a summer intensive for high school-aged students. Their female graduates mostly pursue modern dance, not ballet, as the surest route to becoming a professional ballet dancer is through the best pre-professional (company-affiliated) dance schools (i.e., not colleges).

P.P.S. Only about 1% of all advanced female ballet students will find paid positions in a ballet company. So they are lucky if they make it as a CORPS dancer, much less a principal. And only about 20 ballet companies in the U.S. pay a living wage with health benefits. Most professional dancers need second jobs to make ends meet.