Floor Barre® Online classes starting 5/28!
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
  Learn the technique that will give you those long lines and pointed feet on the dance floor. Great for flexibility and core strength. Now is the time to add Floor Barre® to your ballroom arsenal! Classes starting on Zoom Thursday May 28th from 5-6 pm $12.00.  This is a weekly class. Sign up here: After you sign up, you will receive a Zoom meeting link.  Click on that link and you will be taken to the meeting.  Please log in 10 minutes before start time and you will be admitted to the class. Can’t wait to share this amazing technique with you!!   ..read more
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Happy Holidays! Resolve to care for your body in 2020!
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Discover the amazing benefits of working out on the floor. Bette teaching floor barre in NYC. Created for dancers by Zena Rommett over 50 years ago, floor barre is a proven system of exercises, done with your back on the floor with knees bent,  sitting up,  and on your side, The exercises lengthen the legs, arms and back.  Allowing the support of the floor, the back lengthens naturally while attention is paid to the pelvis maintaining its correct alignment with the legs and torso. Read how Floor Barre® saved me from early retirement and rehabilitated me during injury: I injured myself first ..read more
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Before, During, and After
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
  Full disclosure……I’m injured. Over the last month I’ve reflected on how this happened before, during and now after the injury has subsided. It is common knowledge that often those who can direct others to do the thoughtful, the efficient,  and wisdom inspired thing can forget to walk the talk themselves.  Even with all that I have learned, I have the knack of overriding the cues/warnings/red flags that my body is sending me. Mostly though, I am unrelentingly hopeful that I am indestructible and able to work through physical (and mental) stress as I once did.  Being a professional ballet danc ..read more
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Happy 2019!!
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Hi Dancers, Wishing you all a very Happy New Year! And above all much enjoyment in your dancing this coming year. I wish you well in your showcases and competitions and an awareness in the moment in all that you do. (I’ll talk more about this below) But first – on Saturday January 25th, I’m excited to attend the FADS Team Match in New Jersey where I will be sharing my work and giving free mini lessons. I will offer you a tool for turning around habits of tension that can interfere with your dancing. You will enjoy moving with ease, while having a solid connection with your partner ..read more
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Your Feet!
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
3 Tips to flexible, strong ankles and beautiful feet. In every style of  dance, feet are both the extension of the leg line and an important articulator of rhythm and modulator of both speed and stillness.  In Latin and Rhythm, Smooth and Standard, the use of your feet is the key to driving your movement from point A to B. Feet  are used to punctuate changes of rhythm. And women, in particular are graded on the use of their arches and the pliability of the ball of the foot and heel.  Aside from the aesthetic advantage of a beautiful arch, feet distribute weight either first through the heel le ..read more
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A New ‘Twist’ on Alignment
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Many years ago, as a professional ballet dancer, I loved moving in a big, round, spacious manner.  For the most part, this worked for me.  But it was that other part that, at times, stymied my movements.  I often lost my organization and alignment to the  unchecked, wild enjoyment of my approach.  This was not helpful especially n the corps de ballet where we all were required to move as one. It reminds me of the adage “learn the rules, then break the rules”. I seem to remember that this was often applied to abstract painters who may have been encouraged to learn to paint figures before splatt ..read more
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Our own climate change
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Hi Everyone – After a break, I’ve resurfaced!  My back injury is healing slowly and I am excited to resume writing!  Hope you are all having a great hot summer.  Stay tuned for my next blog,  “Your Feet” It is a brutally hot summer.  I can’t go out most days after 8:30am. If I think that I can dilly-dally and wait until 9:30 am, the temperature has already risen 5 to 10 degrees. I can’t. Heat is intrusive and  the brain and body resists  adapting to the onslaught. Our weather is different now.  There has been a distinct  major upwards change in in temperature in the last 50 years.   Startin ..read more
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Student Reflections
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Check out what my dancers, singers, musicians and yoga practitioners are saying about our work together!   This is the only thing that I have done for body awareness, health and efficiency that I could call upon without having to go to someone else to fix me so it was really freeing in that I didn’t need to spend the money and time on massages especially with our busy lives, traveling dancing and everything that we do.  With Bette, I was still able to use this practice in my daily life, my dancing and in my teaching. Erin Marie Aiken – Professional Ballroom Dancer/Teacher I began my study of ..read more
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Think, Do not Try
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Trying = habit and tension. What happens if you want to break a habit that you know is not working for you anymore. For example, if you want to modify your posture, do you try to change it? If you are trying, how are you trying?  Which of the  the mechanisms, processes, and physical conditions are being addressed in order to ‘try’ harder’? Could trying be filled with habit?  And tension?   You’re back to where you started. Think instead. Another example could be trying to stop a reaction, like getting angry or defensive when someone says something about you that you don’t like.  When tryin ..read more
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What is Occam’s razor? How can embracing it help our dancing?
Better Ballroom with Bette
by Bette Chamberlin
4y ago
Whenever I hear ‘keep it simple’, I know that IT feels complicated, hence the reason for stripping away the extraneous stuff that is contributing to the complication, overwhelm, distraction, frustration, whatever you want to call it. I have some feedback about this from my own ballroom teachers who have named me overthinking,  too scientific and complicated. I have no explanation for this except, being a professional ballet dancer instilled a drive for perfection, precision and flow, the three working cooperatively to create a pleasing aesthetic experience. Yet, there were times when the simp ..read more
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