Classical Ballet provides a great way to improve overall fitness, muscle tone and flexibility as well as improving posture. The classes will take you from the gentle warm up at the barre, to more challenging strengthening and limbering exercises.  Once in the centre, you will progress from gentle exercises to fast paced jumps, turns and travelling exercises. Take this class, and you will be walking tall and gracefully before you know it!

Ballet   is a form of dancing performed for theatre audiences. Like other
dance forms, ballet may tell a story, express a mood, or simply reflect the music. But a ballet dancer's technique (way of performing) and special skills differ greatly from those of other dancers. Ballet dancers perform many movements that are unnatural for the body. But when these movements are well executed, they look natural.

Ballet dancers seem to ignore the law of gravity as they float through the air in long, slow leaps. They keep perfect balance while they spin like tops without becoming dizzy. During certain steps, their feet move so rapidly that the eye can hardly follow the movements. The women often dance on the tips of their toes, and the men lift them high overhead as if they were as light as feathers.

The dancers take joy in controlling their bodies, and ballet audiences share their feelings. The spectators can feel as though they are gliding and spinning with the dancers. Simply by using their bodies, ballet dancers are able to express many emotions, such as anger, fear, jealousy, joy, and sadness. The lines of the dancers' bodies form beautiful, harmonious designs. Ballet technique is called classical because it stresses this purity and harmony of design.

In addition to the dance form called ballet, an individual dance work or performance using classical ballet technique is called a ballet. Any dance work involving a group of dancers may also be called a ballet even though it may not use classical ballet technique. For example, works of modern dance, musical comedy, and dance on television programmes may or may not include this technique, but many of them are called ballets. Classical ballet technique originally developed in France during the 1600's. Today, French words are used in all parts of the world for the various steps and positions of classical ballet.

Ballets are staged and performed by ballet companies. The artistic director of a company is in charge of staging a ballet. In some companies, he or she is also the choreographer, who arranges a ballet's dance movements and teaches them to the dancers. After a company decides to perform a ballet, the artistic director tries to produce a harmonious work of art by blending all the parts of the ballet. These parts include the dancing, music, scenery, and costumes--all based on the ballet's story or mood. A ballet can be performed without music, scenery, or costumes. But most ballets use all three parts.

The choreographer, composer, and scenery and costume designer work together as a team. But the dancing is the most important part of a ballet. The designer must plan scenery and costumes that allow the dancers space and freedom of movement.

Different ballet styles have developed in various countries. For example, the style that developed in the United States tends to be energetic and fast. Ballet in Russia is often forceful and showy, and French ballet is generally pretty and decorative. Ballet dancers travel throughout the world and adopt different features of foreign styles. As a result of these international influences, all ballet is continually being broadened and enriched.