This is a beginning with many more to come. If you subscribe, you will be informed whenever new video segments are posted.
my youtube channel:
http://www.youtube.com/sunyalila 
link for the playlist for the instuctional videos:
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=FABF7E0F1EA1C7B5
 
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlUIwKuy8Kw



Warm-up barre before in-house summer workshop performance at Rozann-Zimmerman Ballet Center circa 1991-1992 -taught by Ellen Davis, owner-director at the time. This is a mix of several levels that each studied separately except for this pre-performance warm-up. Pianist - Michael Roberts. End of clip is part of another pre-xmas performance warmup barre circa 1989. www.yogaofballet.com

www.youtube.com/sunyalila  - the videos can be found here or you can search "Ellen Davis"

Lucia Lacarra

 

Tastes of some great dancers, choreographers and ballets

 

Irina Kolesnikova in pas de deux from Swan Lake

Irina Kolesnikova in Giselle (variation)

Irina Kolesnikova in Giselle (Pas de deux)

Swan Lake Pas de Deux - Lucia Lacarra & Cyril Pierre

Swan Lake Odette Variation (Svetlana Zakharova)

Svetlana Zakharova and Roberto Bolle dancing the White Swan Pas deux in Act 2  This is the third version of this pas de deux linked here.  Kolesnikova, Lacarra and Zakharova.  I love all three.

Svetlana Zakharova - Giselle Act 1

Svetlana Zakharova Giselle - Pas de Deux

Svetlana Zakhorava - Revelation

Polina Seminova!!!

Alessandra Ferri and Sting

Romeo & Juliet - Balcony- Alessandra Ferri and Wayne Eagling

Romeo & Juliet , Juliet's Bedroom Alessandra Ferri

Romeo & Juliet Final Scene: Alessandra Ferri Wayne Eagling

Natalia Osipova at 17, Esmeralda variation

Natalia Osipova - Le Corsaire variation and coda

Natalia Osipova (19, Bolshoi), as Kitri in Don Quixote

Marcia Haydee - Lady of the Camellias -choreographer John Neumeier  - this is part 1 and there are 3 other parts that you can find at this link on YouTube.

Marcia Haydée & Heinz Clauss Onegin by John Cranko part.6 - all of the other parts are there!

                  

Acteon Variation performed by Farukh Ruzimatov

Farukh Ruzimatov & Svetlana Zakharova - "Sheherazade"

Furukh Ruzimatov and Svetlana Zakharova - Scheherazade 2

"Carmen" Diana Vishneva & Ruzimatov

                                                                    Diana Visneva

(note: some of the photos do not exactly correspond to the videos linked - but they are either the same dancers or as in the case, below, the same company or choreographer)

Angel Corella - Le Corsaire

Jiri Kylian - Petite Mort (1st. part) Nederlands Dans Theater

Petit Mort Pas de Duex - Nederlands Dans Theatre - Jiri Kylian Choreographer

Jiri Kylian's "Sarabande"

Tar and Feathers by Jirí Kylián Nederlands Dans Theater

Jiri Kylian's Bella Figura [NDT 1] 

Shutters Shut by Lightfoot León Nederlands Dans Theater

Silent Screen by Ligthfoot León Nederlands Dans Theater

William Forsythe - In The Middle Not Quite Elevated - Frankfurt Ballet

William Forsythe - Bach Cello Sonata

Maryinski dances William Forsythe 1

Maryinski dances William Forsythe 2

A ballet student (not one of mine) writes:
"I am too muscular all over, but especially in the legs.  My arms, back and waist look very defined and sculpted, and I guess my legs do as well (years of soccer, track, hockey), but I would rather have a smaller, less muscular version of myself.  I don't really care about weight loss, I'm fine that way.  I just want to lose muscle... desperately.  Or at least look like I have.  I look too strong for a girl.  Can this be done?  I'm tired of people commenting on my muscles, especially in ballet where you can see every single one! :o"

He said, "I feel like I am God's echo"
and I replied:

"God's echo is silence as it sings its song throughout the universe
God's echo is your voice as it resonates throughout my body
God's echo is our finites playing their infinities
God's echo is its infinities playing through our finites
God's echo is your laughter tickling my own
God's echo is passionate cries for justice
God's echo is anger, fear and ignorance
God's echo is your acceptance of his many faces
God's echo is intolerance, bigotry and hypocrisy
God's echo is your yearning, your desire, your will
God's echo is your compassion and love
God's echo is creativity as it dances music on the stage of life
God's echo is creating limitation out of freedom
God's echo is creating freedom out of limitation
God's echo is your soul as it calls to my own
God's echo is the tear on your cheek
God's echo is my heart as it calls to yours
God's echo is seeing unity through division
God's echo is creating division out of unity
God's echo is fire as it sweeps across the brush
God's echo is water as it turns to ice and back again to water
God's echo is the poetry that pours out of you
God's echo is forgetting itself
God's echo is remembering itself
God's echo is when i hear you say i love you
God's echo is the hills, the lakes and the valleys
God's echo is the cry of lovers in the climax of their passions
God's echo is when the earth quakes
God's echo is the ocean, trees and flowers
God's echo is the clouds painting their mastery in the sky
God's echo is my heart breaking at the beauty
God's echo is beloved to the lover
God's echo is the rain nurturing the earth
God's echo is a baby crying
God's echo is the sun that shines down on us
God's echo is all living creatures
God's echo is your brilliant mind at service to what is beyond it
God's echo is playing for no reason
God's echo is finding all kinds of reasons (for no reason)
God's echo is time as it measures space and space as it measures time
God's echo is eternity where time has no meaning
God's echo is looking into your eyes and seeing mine seeing yours seeing mine seeing yours seeing mine as we plunge into our souls, dissolve and then ask what's for dinner
God's echo is the mystery that awaits us every moment

Indeed you are God's echo."

To ballet students last week:

In order to experience being in that special atmosphere where everything is one and connected,  (when you are feeling beautiful and inspired and the same weight as the air, and you carve lines of beauty through space with all of your movements), you have got to meet it with your imagination.  If you come in feeling out of it or in a certain mood that atmosphere will not be in your experience all of the time and the movements themselves will not be charged with that potency unless you meet that atmopshere by creating and weaving it with your imagination.

The difference between aspiring towards one's visions and attachment to expectations.

A frustrated student who started studying ballet as an adult wrote me:

"There is too much embarrassment, too much vaulting disappointment, too much dismissal by the 'dance community' in general and too much time lost all the way around etc etc etc to continue this. So - although I am enjoying the aesthetic effects that ballet has had on my body, I just can't take all the rest of it anymore. These feelings come up in all of my artistic endeavors and I am just done. I will take barre here and there to keep myself in shape, but this whole idea of trying to achieve anything of artistic value in classical dance beyond the age of 14 by anyone (including the adult student deluding themselves) is obviously a huge waste of energy and time."


I am sorry that you are unhappy and disappointed. I think that having the kind of expectations that you have for yourself or from the dance community is a set up for disappointment. You're very hard on yourself and my sense is that it is possibly sabotaging whatever enjoyment you could have through the process.... and therefore the energy and spirit of the process itself. You are so beautiful, and I know you really love it and care to do the best you can do. I wish you could let yourself go enough to enjoy the process and take it lighter. I know how delicate that balance is between caring to do the best you can do and taking it lightly enough so that you do not get into your own way ... but not so lightly that you lose your tenacity or care -- or the joy of being totally immersed in the art. Professional or not, I personally feel that there is no point if it is not enjoyable.

Please take what resonates of the following and leave whatever else is left.

Aspiring towards the highest that you can do is different from getting disappointed if you are not living up to your expectations of fulfilling some standard of 'artistic value.' Someone once said to me that enlightenment is not about doing the 'right thing' but loving whatever you do. I feel that this applies here and can be related to the courage and playful spirit that gives way to artistry. On 'perfectionist' terms, I have found that my perfectionism was imperfect if it did not include the possibility for mistakes, if it judged rather than observed, if it did not allow for what was here and instead argued with it, and if it did not create the space for process and exploring through unknowns and instead focused too much on results and knowns.

That does not mean being indiscriminate or deluded.... but it does mean relaxing your self-judgmental tyranny and pictures of where you should be enough so that you can allow yourself to enjoy where you are. Because you will never get to where you think you should be or be able to achieve your creative visions (even if you are under 14 years old) if you are not present with where you are. No one can function optimally under tyranny ... including self-tyranny. The creative spirit can especially be oppressed in such conditions.

In addition, there are many different vantage points with which to assess "artistic value" - In other words, it is extremely subjective. I realize that you have your own ideas and standards about that which you have to honor. In my book, there needs to be no reason to dance other than the pure joy of it, and artistic value can be very simple. It can have to do with an inspired moment ... whether on a beginning level child or adult. By my standards, I have seen more 'artistic value' or truly inspired and poetic moments from intermediate students of all ages than of some young or older professionals. It could have to do with a surrender to the creative will and allowing it to breathe you. It can have to do with a mastery of technique. It can have to do with unity consciousness, or a feeling a connection or oneness with the music or an integrality of the body, mind and spirit with the technique, choreography, music, moment and all, etc. Or it can have solely to do with unique expression, originality or a vision manifested that expands the art form or is transformative or that inspires an evolution of consciousness or an evolution of the art form itself.

Be careful of unrealistic expectations. Dreaming big is wonderful ... having a vision is part of being inspired. Keep pursuing for the joy of it, but without expecting to satisfy a judgmental mind or get something from anyone else. You will never be happy as long as you look at yourself through the lens of your expectations or judgments ... or as long as you are looking for approval from others. And, as I am sure you know, if you are looking for approval from others, they will never be able to give you enough to satisfy you until you're content and secure within yourself. As you see, it doesn't matter which artistic genre or relationship you are in, if you think it has to do with the genre or the person, it is always the same story.

I think one has to be willing to be a fool ... to make an ass of themselves ... to have the courage to step into the unknown and lose their cherished ideas of themselves to learn and move forward into something beyond where they are. If they're always protecting an idea of self, it makes it very difficult. And these 'cherished ideas' can get more and more insidious and subtle as they get uncovered and revealed. I think being "done" could be very healthy if what you are done with is judging yourself. "Giving up" can be very creative if you are giving up having unrealistic expectations or if what you having given up is seeking the approval of the artistic community. I think it is entirely appropriate and good news to be completely tired of that, of having enough, of being done. ;-)

But I do hope that you can let yourself dance and enjoy your beautiful self and what is positive. I see that all of this is coming up like this to the point where you want to throw in your towel and what has been your vested interests are not there clouding the view, as an opportunity to find out and gently and compassionately illuminate the thoughts and beliefs that get in the way of your ultimate and continued enjoyment of dance and anything you do.

In the spirit of an aspiration for truth, one of the things that we do in satsang and in the light and influence of the sage Sri Ramana Maharshi or his disciple Papaji, is called radical self-inquiry. We ask deeply and beyond what we have decided in the past, "Who am I?" We ask, "To whom does all this matter? "Who" is it that is disappointed? Who or what is it that is embarrassed? Many of the knots hidden through our self-concepts can unravel through this inquiry ... along with our self-concepts. With proper guidance, it is then easier to see the causal wounds at the psychological level and the illusions of separation that are at their core. But one must have a healthy sense of self before they can let that sense go and expand to what is beyond it (rather than dissociate or go mad). Byron Katie has a very wonderful technology "The Work" for inquiring into thoughts and beliefs that cause suffering. We ask if our assumptions are true. "Is it true that I should be other than I am?" "How does it feel to think that way?" "Who would I be if I didn't think that way?" "Is it true that he should not have done this or should be this way other than that way?" Looking at these questions without holding onto one's preconceived answers and assumptions can be very illuminating and freeing.

To your deepest fulfillment, joy, inspiration and unconditional freedom, no matter where your path leads you. To experiencing the dance in all of life,

All of my love,

Ellen