| Aerial in San Francisco |
|
Our latest exploration of the worlds circus schools led us to San Francisco and while enjoying the attractions of Alcatraz, Fisherman's Wharf and some excellent breakfasts we did knuckle down and do some training. The most well known school in the bay area is the Circus Center which has a long established aerial and acrobatic programme and some internationally reknown teachers. Charmaine and I managed to arrange a class with Elana Panova who is the head of their Professional Aerial Programme. She very kindly invited us to join her level 3 class solo trapeze class and put us through our paces, she was very strict on technique and taught us her main conditioning routine which she uses for all her students and told us that it has everything needed to support good basics - very hardcore! We went through some of our techniques with her and she gave us some help working on techniques like side planche and back balance rolls.
After our first lesson our second teacher Hélène Turcotte, the Director of the Aerial Arts department, came and introduced herself and allowed us to watch her advanced doubles class before our private lesson with her.  Hélène comes from Quebec and is a graduate of the National Circus School in Montreal. Together with her partner Luc Martin they created a very innovative trapeze duet, " Mouvance", which is choreographed as a passionate aerial tango. Their act received numerous international awards, including a Gold Medal at the Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain in Paris in 1989, and a Silver Clown at the International Circus Festival of Monte-Carlo in 1997. Hélène and Luc have been touring extensively in Europe, Canada, Australia, and the United States. She started teaching at Circus Center in 2002. Her advanced doubles class was good to watch and saw them working on a doubles spinning technique which we got her to teach us (still needs a lot of polish before we pull that off in a performance!) Hélène took us through some doubles on lunge and worked with us on polishing some of our existing techniques. Saturday and Sunday we swung (ha!) an invite to the flying trapeze classes. Scott Cameron a Director of Flying Trapeze invited us to join their intermediate class as we'd had some previous experience. Scott is from California and has a degree in Genetics. In 1986 he become a catcher on the flying trapeze at Club Med. He has since worked as a consultant, performer and teacher in eleven countries. In 1992 he joined the SFCC faculty where he designed the flying trapeze curriculum and served as head of the flying trapeze department before stepping down in 2001 to focus on his entertainment production company. Scott encouraged us to work on tricks as we were flying on a grand volante rig (a big trapeze! -very big!) and it would take longer than two days to work on the timing of beats and other standard basics. So we both learned something new.
Sunday evening we spent with Emily Park an Aerial teacher we had previously met at the Circus Space in London who had worked in the show at the Millenium Dome and knew Sarah Jean very well. We attended Emily's aerial conditioning class and got a great work out while picking up some great new techniques. After this we were taken for a burrito anda tour of some of the bay area circus schools (we think there are about 12!) We finished the evening with a couple of friends of Emily's including Sam Luckey who had trained at the Circus Space in London on the degree programme and had performed as an aerialaist for Ringling Brothers circus.
All in all San Francisco offers a very vibrant circus scene with some very friendly welcoming people who were of a very high standard.
|
Elana was born in Russia and is a graduate of Moscow’s Circus and Variety College. She won the Gold Medal at Paris’ Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain in 1987, and the Gold Medal at the 1988 All-Union Circus Artists Competition of the USSR for her ground breaking swinging trapeze routine. For twenty years she has performed in major circuses and variety shows all over the world including the Moscow Circus, Circus Knie, Paris’ Cirque d’Hiver-Bouglione, and the Big Apple Circus. Elena started teaching at Circus Center in 2004.