American Repertory Ballet and ARB's Princeton Ballet School are proud to offer the Summer Intensive, a program of serious study in a warm and companionable atmosphere. An exceptional faculty, led by Artistic Director Graham Lustig, provides caring and careful instruction conducive to technical and artistic progress. In seeking to maintain a feeling of community, ARB's Princeton Ballet School purposely limits the number of students in class.

Students experience the opportunity to:

• grow technically through two or three hours daily in ballet class, plus additional classes in pointe and partnering
• expand their dance background through classes in modern dance and theater dance
• deepen their understanding of important concepts in injury prevention, such as proper alignment and rotation
• exercise their creativity in choreography workshops
• sample a taste of professional life in a full day (9:30-5:00pm) dance experience, including rehearsals for a final performance
• strengthen their personal goals, discipline, and focus
• develop group communication and leadership skills when choreographing with their peers, while establishing friendships with equally committed young dancers
• interact with dedicated professionals, including the teaching staff and ARB's professional company members who participate in the workshop

American Repertory Ballet

The American Repertory Ballet is nationally recognized for the quality of its work; its powerful, classically trained dancers; and its vigorous, youthful style. American Repertory Ballet performs a wide variety of repertory ranging from the classics to daring new works by today's innovators.

Faculty

Graham Lustig, Artistic Director of American Repertory Ballet, leads the outstanding faculty. The teachers work with the whole dancer, not just the technical side. Small classes provide plenty of attention and personal help. Please see insert for biographies of this year's faculty.
Click Here for the biographies of this year's faculty.

Classes

Summer Intensive focuses on ballet, with most days having two technique classes and pointe. Other course work includes variations, partnering, modern dance, theatre dance, and choreographic workshops. Workshop faculty place students in appropriate class levels on the first day.

Additional lectures emphasize important topics for a dancer's education, such as nutrition. Sessions in bodywork give the dancer the opportunity to identify and resolve personal technique problems - focusing on abdominal and back strength, turnout, breathing, and flexibility. The sessions use a combination of bodywork images and techniques to increase the sophistication with which a dancer approaches technique class.

The Studios

ARB's Princeton Ballet School is located in an air-conditioned facility with four large studios featuring high ceilings and sprung dance floors. Live music accompanies all ballet and modern dance classes. The facility includes a dance library and is adjacent to numerous shops and restaurants, with generous open space, picnic tables, and gardens.

Further Opportunities

Workshop students are eligible for traineeships with American Repertory Ballet. Trainees take classes, rehearse and perform with the company and have a full one-year scholarship to ARB's Princeton Ballet School. They receive a stipend and pointe shoe allowance, and tour with the company as casting demands. Recent ballets incorporating trainees include Graham Lustig's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Cinderella and The Nutcracker.

Housing

Dormitory accommodations are on the Princeton University campus. The University campus defines downtown Princeton, a small town of great charm. The dormitories are a few minutes walk from the Palmer Square shopping area, with its many ice cream shops, coffee houses, and stores.

Thirteen-year-old students are not housed in the dormitories, but they may attend as day students. Students fourteen through seventeen are under the care of Residence Assistants. They are given a curfew and other safety restrictions.

Transportation to the studios is provided. The University meal plan serves breakfast and dinner six days a week, with brunch and dinner on Sunday. There are a variety of small restaurants and a grocery store next to the studio for purchasing lunch.

Enrichment

The Summer Intensive provides a varied palette of cultural events for students. These events are part of the package for all dorm students and are available to day students on a space-available basis. All students may participate in the optional bus trip to New York City's Lincoln Center.

The Performance

Students are given a choice of performing a ballet staged or choreographed by a faculty member (ranging from Swan Lake excerpts to contemporary works) or of participating in a choreographic workshop with fellow students. These works are presented to the Summer Intensive families at a final performance.

To Audition

Enclosed you will find this year's audition calendar. Please bring two photos of yourself - one in first arabesque, one headshot - for the auditioner's files. The audition fee is $25.00. All dancers will be kept throughout the entire 90-minute audition.

If you are unable to attend an audition, you may send us:
1. a videotape
2. an audition application
3. $35 audition by mail fee
4. a letter of recommendation from your current teacher

The videotape should be a VHS format and no longer than 10 minutes. Applicants should be dressed in simple leotard and tights. The video should show some barre work (your choice) and center work as follows: adagio, a pirouette combination or two, petit and grand allegro. Ladies should do at least one of these combinations on pointe. Variations may be added. If you cannot make a videotape, or if you are applying from overseas, please contact Ms. Bellis to make other arrangements.

Scholarships

A limited number of meritbased tuition scholarships are available. Some work scholarships will also be available for dancers 21 and over who can serve as Residence Assistants.

Age Qualifications

Summer Intensive is for advanced students ages 13 and over. Only students 14 and over will be accepted into the dorms.

For More Information

Carol Bellis, Summer Intensive Coordinator
ARB's Princeton Ballet School
301 North Harrison Street
Princeton, NJ 08540
Telephone: 609-921-7758, ext. 14
Fax: 609-921-3249
Web site: www.arballet.org

Graham Lustig

Artistic Director of the American Repertory Ballet and ARB's Princeton Ballet School

Graham Lustig was born in London and received his dance training at the Royal Ballet School. After graduation, he danced and choreographed for the Dutch National Ballet in Amsterdam and the Sadler's Wells Royal Ballet in London. Upon retiring as a performer, the Washington Ballet chose him as its Choreographer-in-Residence. In June of 1999, Mr. Lustig was named Artistic Director of the American Repertory Ballet and ARB's Princeton Ballet School.

Mr. Lustig has commissioned numerous new works for ARB including twelve pieces specially created for Dancing Through the Ceiling, a program that serves as a platform for women choreographers. He has set fifteen of his own works, including most recently Beauty and the Beast... a Gothic Romance, and Dialogues, created with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.

In 2003, Mr. Lustig was invited to become a charter member of the Artists Council for Americans for the Arts in Washington, DC. He currently serves of the Board of Directors of the American Repertory Ballet, the Choo-San Goh and H. Robert McGee Foundation, and on the Advisory Boards of the Princeton Festival and the Terpsichore Theatre of Dance. He has served as panelist for the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation and twice for the National Endowment for the Arts. Upcoming commissions include new ballets for Louisville Ballet and American Repertory Ballet plus West Side Story that he will be directing and choreographing for Boheme Opera of New Jersey in April, 2008.

Mary Pat Robertson

Director of ARB's Princeton Ballet School

A native of Tulsa, Oklahoma, she received her early training with June Runyon and danced with Tulsa Ballet Theatre. After graduation from Stanford University, Ms. Robertson performed and taught in New York, where she studied with Merce Cunningham, Douglas Wassell, and David Howard. She has taught ballet at Princeton University, New York University, and Mason Gross School of the Arts. Ms. Robertson was a founding director of Teamwork Dance, and has received a Choreographic Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. Choreographic projects include Carmina Burana for Princeton Pro Musica and Laud to the Nativity for VOICES. Robertson choreographed numerous operas for Opera Festival of New Jersey including The Merry Widow, The Magic Flute, La Traviata, Vanessa, The Marriage of Figaro, Postcard from Morocco, and Orfeo ed Euridice. She recently choreographed Romeo et Juliette for New Jersey Opera, and is looking forward to Merry Widow and La Traviata in summer of 2008. She has also been a consultant for the New York State Council on the Arts and NJPAC's Outreach Program. Ms. Robertson has been teaching at Princeton Ballet School since 1980, and became Director of the School in 1986. During these years she developed the syllabus with faculty input, inaugurated the Professional Training Program and PLUS programs, and oversaw the moves into the new Princeton and Cranbury facilities. In March, 2007, the United States Congress cited Ms. Robertson for her twenty years of leadership of Princeton Ballet School, and for its evolution into “one of the most acclaimed (dance schools) in the country.