Teaching Artistry in Ballet: 9 Simple Ways to Transform Your Barre Work

I once had a fascinating conversation with a teacher I admire about when to teach artistry. She believed it belonged in advanced levels, while I think it should be integrated throughout training. As we talked, her real concern became clear: she didn't have simple ways to teach artistry to beginning and intermediate dancers, and she didn't have time to invent them.

Since I've spent the last dozen years researching and experimenting with teaching artistry in ballet, integrating these elements into all levels has become second nature to me. Today I'm sharing some quick starting places with you—pick the one that sounds most fun!

Plié + Breath

• Why this pairing works: Breathing should be rhythmic and constant, just like plié. You don't want dancers to stop at the bottom as if descending and ascending were separate steps, or pause between plié and the next jump in petit allegro. Plié has the same ebb and flow as breathing—like the ocean, in and out, down and up.

• What to say in class: "Inhale as you descend, exhale as you rise." Then reverse it—most dancers have a preference but won't know until they try both. Next, remove the music: "Let your breath cycle determine the timing." If the exercise usually takes 2 minutes, set a timer and tell them it's fine to restart if they finish early.

• Watch out for: Some dancers will breathe intentionally loudly. While fine for yoga, we don't breathe this way on stage, so we shouldn't practice it in class. Keep the breath cycle as natural as possible while matching movement to breath.

Tendu + Line

• Why this pairing works: Tendu draws a line on the floor while the leg creates a line in space—it's literally line-making practice. Both lines are equally important. Where the toe goes on the ground matters just as much as how straight the leg stayed while it got there.

• What to say in class: "Your leg line and your floor line should be equally beautiful. Don't sacrifice one for the other." I love this phrase because you can build on it throughout class and levels—just like ballet vocabulary builds on tendu.

• Watch out for: The word "line" can be charged for some people. Unfortunately, some teachers have used "line" to bully dancers of color and dancers with larger bodies. When teaching line, make sure you're presenting it as an artistry element that all your students can master.

Dégagé + Dynamics

• Why this pairing works: Mushy dégagés are way less useful than ones with strong, brisk dynamics. Soft dynamics waste a major opportunity to build the strength and habits dancers need for beautiful allegro.

• What to say in class: "I should be able to tell if it's going to be a quick tendu or a dégagé before you reach demi-point on the ground." Ever since I started holding students accountable to this standard, I've seen huge improvement in pointed feet during jumps.

• Watch out for: Make sure dancers focus their attention and energy in their feet. Otherwise, they'll use quad muscles to approximate the motion and miss out on effective movement pattern training.

This precision in dynamics becomes the foundation for advanced dynamics work in Level 7, where students learn to create dramatic contrast and musical interpretation through

intentional movement quality.

Rond de jambe + 3D space

• Why this pairing works: Rond de jambe literally carves out space in three dimensions—devant, à la seconde, and derrière—while requiring dancers to understand where their leg is in relation to their body at every moment of the circle. It's spatial awareness training doubling as technique.

• What to say in class: "Your toe is tracing a perfect arc along the floor. Make sure there are no dips or wobbles in the line." If a student's rond de jambe consistently wiggles in the same spot, they're probably disengaging and re-engaging their turnout.

• Watch out for: Students often neglect the finishing touches. Going en dehors, they don't quite finish to the back; going en dedans, they cut short in the front. When this happens, I joke they're using "2.5D space instead of 3D." It's easy to fix but hard for students to notice.

Frappé + Somatic awareness

• Why this pairing works: I teach frappé brushing the bottom of the toes on the ground (unlike traditions that don't touch the floor). This is critical—if dancers brush the tops of their toes, it carries over into big jumps like saut de chat, and if they need to stop suddenly, they can break their foot. I've seen it happen, thus creating my most dramatic "jumped in mid-show as understudy" moment.

• What to say in class: "Imagine you're a cat swatting at a toy. If the kitty doesn't touch the toy, it doesn't move—boring game. Too much pressure breaks the toy." And cats only swat with the bottom of their paws, so that solves the top-of-the-foot worry.

• Watch out for: Beyond protecting the tops of toes, some students jam their feet into the floor with way more force than they'll ever use in allegro. We're brushing along the floor, not denting it.

Fondu + Body carriage

• Why this pairing works: Fondu requires significant strength and control. When students first learn it, alignment often suffers. Re-framing alignment as an artistry element rather than a correction can connect with students in a new way.

• What to say in class: "Think of your spine like a pirate's telescope. As your body goes down, your spine grows taller and your shoulders stay soft and elegant."

• Watch out for: Overly rigid torsos. We want engaged cores and lifted posture, but not dancers who are stiff as a board.

Most teachers treat alignment as a correction to fix rather than an artistry element to

develop. This reframe transforms how students approach their training and is exactly

where systematic artistry education begins in Level 1 of my curriculum.

Petit battement + musicality

• Why this pairing works: Petit battement is all about quick, precise timing and rhythmic control. The sharp, articulated movement naturally demands musical awareness—dancers have to stay exactly with the beat while maintaining clean technique. When it's done really well, it's hard to tell whether the dancer is staying with the music or the music is staying with the dancer!

• What to say in class: "Think of your foot as a tiny drummer keeping perfect time." This analogy works no matter how complicated, fast, or syncopated the movement gets.

• Watch out for: Students getting tense as the movement gets faster. Just like percussionists, dancers need to relax into the challenge so that the necessary muscle groups don't get frozen out by the tense ones.

Adagio + Eye-line

• Why this pairing works: Eye-line is my favorite trick to make adagio look easier than it is! When dancers coordinate their eye-line with their movement, it makes their dancing look bigger. This is especially helpful for shorter dancers who need to fill the music without making their développés look squat. Match the developing toe to the eye-line and enjoy the difference!

• What to say in class: "Match your leg movement to your eye-line." Students usually do it backwards—they let their leg set the eye-line. But since eye-line is theoretically infinite, it works better to challenge your body to keep up.

• Watch out for: Raised shoulders. It's the eye-line doing the work, not the shoulders. I don't know why this is such a common issue, but it happens constantly.

Grand battement + Acting

• Why this pairing works: Grand battement (and the grand jeté it helps create) is essential for so many roles. Whether you're embodying Conrad from Le Corsaire or Des Grieux from Manon, you need grand battement—but you definitely can't expect the same grand battement to work for both characters!

• What to say in class: "What character are you dancing today?" This leaves the door wide open for students to explore different qualities—fierce, playful, noble, mysterious—and discover how character choice transforms the same movement.

• Watch out for: Students always choosing the same character type. While Kitri, Esmeralda, and Balanchine's Rubies might all suit a dancer, they have a lot in common. Challenge students to try characters that are a harder fit—maybe a sylph or a wili?

  
  

  Most teachers save acting for advanced students, but I've found starting with character work creates fearless, expressive dancers from day one. This foundation approach is the cornerstone of my Beginning Division curriculum.

The beauty of integrating artistry into barre work is that it doesn't require extra time—just intentional choices. Start with whichever pairing resonates most with you, then gradually add others as they become second nature. Ready to go deeper? My technique curriculum takes this systematic approach to the next level - each level focuses on one artistry element with detailed progressions and assessment strategies. No more guessing what comes next or wondering if you're on the right track!

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Looking for comprehensive guidance? Check out "Artistry Inside Ballet Technique, Volume 1" on Amazon →