Just got back from one of my grandkid’s dance recital (with another to come in the afternoon.) Was tempted to post a thread asking whether anyone enjoyed these things, but I saw some curmudgeon had posted a similar thread 20 years ago!
I kept hearing people say, “They are adorable!” Yeah, but you spend - what - $100 or so just to have the kid look cute? And these lessons were through the park district.
Except for the oldest kids, in each group fewer than a quarter of the kids knew a quarter of the steps. I’d far prefer if, at the end of a session, they had the class put on a demonstration for their parents, in their classroom and wearing their basic leotard/skirt, showing the parents what they learned.
It’s a waste of time for those other kids but daughter is a ballerina and the parents of all those other kids are lucky to see her wondrous ability! I don’t have a daughter, but I’m sure that would be the case if I did.
Well, my grandkid made the mistake of looking at t he kid on her left - who knew less of the routine than she. If she had turned the other way, she might have batted .500.
I generally think, even with little kids, the investment and hullabaloo ought to be somewhat proportionate to the effort invested and ability displayed. So if your kid is playing tee-ball - maybe have the team wear matching T-shirts and caps. But hold off a while before buying spikes and stirrups.
Some of the cutesy Dance “schools” are like this. It’s a profitable enterprise for the owner/former dancer/teacher.
Parents are wont to display their children in these ways.
Yep. Costumes are ridiculously priced. The Dance instructor adds a substantial mark up. I’ve seen the catalogs. If they are custom made well, forget about it. Could cost anything.
The last dance costume I bought was for the Lil’wrekker in her failure as a first year toddler dancer. Cost in the hundreds. For a toddler!! She sat down on stage and played with the over price bow on her overpriced size 10, baby tap shoe.
No more for us, after that.
I danced for many years. I have little memory of the cost of my early costumes. I remember them being our regular class leotard and a new tutu. For a long time. My Daddy was no fool. He wouldn’t have shelled out a whole lot before balking.
When I was a senior dancer we were provided costumes. Occasionally re-tailored to fit from the Dance Troupes stock. Showcase dances we might have new.
The Prima dancers had custom costumes, of course.
The Dance recital and the “Dance” schools are a racket. Far and wide. Squeeze the parent.
Let’s not even get into the dancer “photo” scam. Or the Recital program, you buy pages, half pages or maybe sell ads for. And then plop down $10 at the door for. No freebies. If you’re a real dummy and get talked into doing it.
There are good, real dance schools. They require lots of work and studio time for the youngster. Very few stick with it. Takes all the kids free time. No cheerleading, sports, hanging out. Trips out of town during school vacations? Nope. You’ll be in the studio extra.
Real dance is not for the weak.
(If your child is placed in a competition class in their dance “school” run fast. It’s a horrible experience, and not cheap)
And there are very few things less interesting than the mother of a dancer, especially one in multiple disciplines, at recital time. You’d think their kids were auditioning for the Rockettes or something.
My kids did dance, theater, and sports (soccer, cross-country and softball, mostly). In order of what I think they got out of each activity (and not coincidentally the order in which I enjoyed watching them) it was theater first, sports second, dance a very distant third. They did dance for a blessedly short period of time, when they were small. Everything @Dinsdale says about the recitals is absolutely true. I know there are kids who get a lot more out of dance class than mine did, but boy.
As for what @Beckdawrek says about dance competition teams, here’s my story: The competition team parents at my kids’ dance studio decide to raise some money by selling hoodies labeled with the dance studio name. They put up a big sign in the studio with a mockup and everything. Ok so far. But then some parents whose kids weren’t on the competition team expressed interest in buying one and were told they couldn’t, the hoodies were for competition team members only. The director eventually told them that this really didn’t make any sense, so they reluctantly sold the hoodies to any kids who wanted them, but the competition team kids now had COMPETITION TEAM embroidered on the front. Sigh.
My 2 kids quickly switched to Irish Dance. The school they were in didn’t have recitals (well, some kids did competition - with uber-pricey dresses, but mine never did.) Instead, they did performances at assisted living centers, festivals, parades, etc. Parents were welcome to stand in back and watch. They taught the kids they were “on stage” the moment they stepped out of their cars. And if they didn’t know the steps, they didn’t perform.
I couldn’t even imagine why so many folk were recording these things on their phones. We took a couple photos of the girls. But when I see folk recording these sorts of things, I wonder how often they watch them.
My daughter said, in addition to the cost dissuading her from re-enroling her kids for future sessions, she was discouraged at how the older classes displayed similar poor technique, or identical choreography. Suggesting to her that the caliber of teaching was not great.
A couple of the older girls did solo dances and I admit they were not at all horrible. And some of the girls were in several different classes. Made me kinda wonder how many days their parents hauled them to classes, and how much they spent. As I recall, in addition to music instruments, and at times scouting, we required our kids to be in ONE other activity of their choosing. (Now that I write that, that’s 3 things per kid, so not really different from one kid taking 3 different dance classes.)
I was wondering if many of the girls in these lessons would later be on their HS dance squads.
That I can answer, for the same reason my parents record stuff. We almost never watched them–save for if I was showing a relative or something.
But now that I’m older, I very much do like to go back and rewatch, same as I might some pics. I suspect these parents are thinking “I wish I could go back and watch my old stuff.”
I do get your point about everything else, but I do get the desire to record these things. It’s why I’m currently trying to source a VCR that works (or fix the one I have).
Phones definitely make the recording process better. When my kids were young, I had one of those big, on-your-shoulder cameras. I can recall one day I was walking into a pumpkin patch with the thing on my shoulder and my eye to the eyepiece. I saw all these other dads doing the same and a switch flipped. I wondered why I was trying to record the event rather than experiencing it. For better or worse, that perception has affected me to this day, with the result that I take far fewer movies and photos than perhaps I ought to.
Even tho we still have a functioning VCR (my wife uses for some old workout vids), a while back, one of our kids had all of our family movies on VCR transferred to DVD. Was really nice (tho we still rarely watch them.)
If I remember, probably not so good. The Lil’wrekkers one and only dance recital, we were discouraged from taking our own video or photos on recital night. We could on dress rehearsal night. Which I did. She actually did some of the cute little “tap your toe, this makes one…” routine. The student teacher helper was on stage with them hollering out the steps. That helped.
I don’t think I’ve ever rewatched it. May have to break that out.
When I think “dance recital” the first thing that comes to mind is Jeff Lebowski’s landlord. The Dude wasn’t particularly enthused about seeing the performance, but he did attend…out of a sense of friendship, or maybe to make up for being late with the rent?
My high school put on a ‘Dance Show’ in 1972 or so - dirt-cheap admission in the gym, homemade costumes, anyone who wanted to could participate - but were assigned roles consonant with their ability [I got to move scenery…].
We made friendships across cliques that remain strong to this day, and my father NEVER stopped remembering 2 dozen teen girls in leotards swaying to ‘This is the dawn of the age of Aquarius’. Oh, and we painted the captain of the football team gold to be Apollo, and didn’t QUITE kill him. Good times. YMMV.
Of course my kids did dance, a mix of tap ballet and hip hop as wee little ones. Wooden shoes on stage, hyper in class. But they looked adorable! lol.
Recently discovered videos of this talented dancer Maria Rosario and her partner Antonio. They were paired together at ages 5&7 by their dance teacher. Now in their teens they’re still firing up the competition in Latin dancing.
Yeah - my wife and I get so tired of moving exclusively in the white tie set!
No, dance was just one of the things the girls did as kids. None of our kids were into sports, so they did quite a bit of dance, gymnastics, and - later - band. The 2 girls still do music. Eldest teaches toddlers music and youngest just joined a community orchestra (bassoon.)
Last one I went to was for a small town dance school, but it went on all afternoon. We got there 12:00 to be sure to get a seat, recital started at 1:00. By around 4:00 we had seen my niece dance and many more after her. We’d had enough and left to get ice cream. When we left the ice cream place and drove back by about 5:00 the recital was STILL going on.
I take a bit of issue with the gymnastics part. My daughter does gymnastics and it is very much a sport. And just is just coming off two months with a ruptured ligament…
