Training Like a Pro
Whether you are a professional dancer, want to become a professional dancer, or just want to look like a professional dancer, there are many different ways to keep yourself in the best condition possible. Along with practicing and polishing your dance, you will need to maintain a level of cardiovascular endurance, strength, and flexibility. Much of this is an ongoing process and vital to both great dancing and physical wellness.
Cardiovascular exercise is a crucial part of professional dancing success. Many professional dancers support themselves by regular performances at night clubs or restaurants, along with teaching classes. I hear many comments about these performances being a great way to keep in shape. In many ways that is true, but in order to always put your best foot forward, it is important to keep your cardiovascular endurance higher than what is required for your gig. Even dancing for long periods of time on a regular basis is not enough to keep you at your best. Your greatest success will come from training with some form of exercise that requires cardiovascular endurance beyond the amount of endurance necessary for your regular shows. This will help you dance with energy all the way through your set, without being tired at the end. Cardiovascular training will also help your recovery heart rate. This means that your heart will recover from its higher exercise pace to its regular resting pace quicker. This is particularly important if you dance many sets back-to-back. A quicker recovery rate will help you get greater benefit from the time you have to rest and relax between shows.
Strength training is an equally important part of professional dancing. Keeping your body strong will not only help you execute your dance with easier, cleaner, and better movement, it is also an important part of injury prevention. Many dancers have previous injuries, and week knees, ankles, or hips are simply an injury waiting to happen. Regular strength training can help strengthen the weakened joints and prevent new injuries. A key part of strength training is sports-specific exercise. This concept is used in athletics, and states that athletes may use exercises that are not recommended for the general population, but are necessary and specific to their sport. This is important for the dancer as well. You need to train your body in the way that you will be using it in dance. For example, squats are important for building initial strength and injury prevention, but are not as useful on stage when you need to lower yourself gracefully to the ground. This type of movement is specific to dance and needs to be done repeatedly in a safe and controlled environment, so that when the dancer executes it on stage, it is done safely and with grace and strength. You will find many other movements that need to be practiced and drilled regularly in order to execute athletic movements on stage safely.
Flexibility is another important component of training, so regular stretching is vital for dancers. It is important to keep the body flexible for many of the same reasons you want to keep it strong. Stiff and inflexible muscles have a high likelihood of suffering injury. Taking a yoga class or stretching before and after practices will not only help avoid injury, but will also help your dance become more fluid and graceful.
Polishing your dance in regular practice may seem like an obvious idea, but many aspects of this concept are often ignored. It is not enough simply to clean up new moves that you may be working on. First, going back to basics is imperative for every dancer. It is easy for a professional to forget how important dance basics are, and the basics get lost in the overload of combinations and choreography. The greatest combinations in the world are useless if you are unable to implement them well in the dance! Many advanced and intermediate dancers find that reviewing the basics can help them find subtleties in the movement that they could not grasp in the awkwardness of the beginner class. Falling back on basic concepts can also help you be more creative in the implementation of your combinations and higher-level moves. Next, it is important to be always working on new material. It is easy to slip into the trap of using the same movements or combinations over and over again. Continually push yourself to create new combinations or to add new layers to existing movement. This will keep you from becoming stagnant as a dancer. Finally, listen to music. Many times this last component of practice gets forgotten. In order to really dance with the music, you must be able to pick out subtle nuances in the music as well as the phrasing, melody, and rhythm. The only way to anticipate music changes and accents is to listen to your music over and over again. If you are performing regularly, you should know the classics by heart and be up-to-date on modern popular music so you can be prepared for requests.
Of course, each dancer should tailor an exercise routine to meet her specific needs. Amateur dancers or professionals who do not perform regularly may find that they need less cardiovascular and strength training, but may want to focus more on the actual dance practice to keep their skills up. Professional dancers who dance weekly may discover they need to focus more cardiovascular, strength, and flexibility training to keep them in the best shape possible. Remember that all these aspects are important not only for a good, clean dance, but also for overall health and safety. This routine of cardiovascular exercise, strength training, flexibility training, and polishing your dance may take a lot of dedication, but is important to keep your body safe and healthy so that you can continue dancing like a professional for many years to come.