Expert: Connie - 1/20/2009

Question
QUESTION: Helooo! I'm Becky I'm 16 and i have been doing ballet for three years and am on grade 6 (RAD syllabus) my devlopes and fine to the front and to second but when i extend my leg to the back, the height of my leg is fine but as i extend it just looks like my thigh is not in the right place! It's really hard to explain but my thigh sort of looks like it's not turned out enough and is hanging to low, and i can't seem to change this. Is there any specific exercises i can do to help improve this??
Thank you very much for your time.
Becky

ANSWER: Hmm, I'm not quite sure what you mean.  You should know that arabesque does sometimes just look funny.  Take a look at pictures of famous dancers in arabesque to get an idea of what it should look like.  Also, ask your teacher if she thinks there's a problem and if she has any advice.  Sometimes to work on my arabesque I bend my leg like it's in attitude and grab my knee with my hand.  Then I lift the leg up and try to straighten it.  Then I let go and try to hold it there for a few counts.  This might help.  Good luck!

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: God I'm so sorry i completely missed out the most important thing about my question which was that  my leg looks like that when I'm trying to to attitude, i don't have a problem with a normal arabesque it's just my attitude position i just can't get it turned out right, but i have no other problems with my turn out for other things. Any advice for this?
Sorry to waste your time the first time, I'm so silly!!
Thanks, Becky

Answer
that's fine!  attitude is tough.  you want to make sure that you are thinking of your knee being above your foot so it doesn't look turned in.  this may mean that you have to work with your leg lower for a while.  the exercise above still might help to get an idea of how you really want your attitude to look.  

it's impossible to keep your knee above your foot when you get past ninety degress.  when your leg is really high your attitude will look like this: http://www.maestrogosta.com/images/SmallPhoto-GwinnettBalletTheatre-Ballerinas.j
however, you still want to think of the knee above the foot to guard against getting a funny, turned in look.  here the attitude is lower and the knee is even with the foot: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NataliaDudinskaja.jpg