So I've been back to work for about a week now, and as you can probably tell by the huge bruise on my leg it hasn't been easy!!  Getting used to being back to work while learning two new ballets has been lots of hard work, but also so much fun!  In Dracula I'm understudying a dance for 3 vampire women, which is the first dance from Dracula that I've learned.  In the dance the girls crawl on the floor, jump up on a table and try to attack one of the other characters.  So when we were in rehearsal last week I tried to execute all of the vampire's moves, which are not necessarily steps already in a dancers vocabulary.  I ran over to the table, jumped up, and jumped into the table instead of onto it! I don't think I looked much like a vampire, but at least I ended up with a great bruise to show for my efforts!  Luckily we have a few more weeks until the shows, and when you come to the performances we'll all have it down!

    Next we changed gears and started dancing Serenade.  This is a gorgeous ballet with some of my favorite music and choreography.  Tonight was our first Inside the Director's Studio and we all had a great time!  The flowing, luxurious choreography feels amazing to dance, almost like it comes second nature.  We were lucky enough to have John Clifford, a representative from the Balanchine Trust, here to speak to the audience and give them a behind the scenes look at Serenade, with stories about its history and well-known ballerinas who danced the ballet before us.  Since these Inside the Director's Studio performances happen right in our rehearsal space, the audience gets a very up close and personal view of the dancers as we showed excerpts of the ballet.  Its a wonderful experience for dancers and audience members alike, so I hope you all come and check out our next in-studio preview next month!

-Lauren B.