“I wanna be a dancer” was my answer when grandparents asked what I wanted to be when I grew up.
Then as I started training, I wanted to be in the musical CATS (meow!). Next ambition was to dance for Ballet Rambert. It changed with age but was always a simple clear aim. Well, it was simple until I started dancing professionally and realised what all of those options looked like in reality.
No doubt you had a similar dream to maybe dance on stage at the Royal Opera House or star in a West End show? Whatever it was I am fascinated to know if it has stayed the same or changed as you grew older, and are you actually living it now?
Despite critics telling you dance is a short career, you can fit loads into it and even make your performance career last for longer than you could imagine (dancers in their forties are also in demand by choreographers).
1. Your career is a journey
A career is a journey, you start out from college with hot technique, expand your skills, learn how to work with others, build contacts and network, all the while creating a toolkit of experiences and expertise to aim for the next dream job.
Let’s take a look at that dream job. In reality do you really want to dance the same steps every day for the next 15 years of your dancing life? Probably not but you will have a fantastic time doing it for a while.
Let Survive in Dance mentoring help you on the journey
2. Planning your perfect life
So the game changer is to plan your perfect life rather than your perfect dance career. When you are old and creaky (well your joints might be!!), what do you want to look back on and have achieved? Will you wish you:
- Had travelled the world?
- Bought a house?
- Had children?
- Had a foreign holiday every year with the family?
- Lived nearer family?
- Danced in CATS?
- Had the guts to audition and work for a dance company abroad?
- Found time to go on meditation retreats?
- Live in the city?
- Kept chickens?!
Having a rough idea of what will make you happy and what your perfect life involves, helps you have clear focus when starting out. You will be constantly making choices (and compromises) and to begin maybe, working in less than ideal circumstances but clear focus helps you move closer to the end game.
3. Turning aspirations into jobs choices
You might be wondering how can knowing what I want out of life help me plan my perfect career?
Say you want to own your own flat as soon as possible to get some stability. An idea could be to dance on a cruise ship for a year or two where you don’t necessarily pay tax in the UK, you save on accommodation costs and don’t have much opportunity to spend money. That could leave you with money towards a deposit and if you buy before leaving the job it could prove steady income on a mortgage application before you enter the freelance world.
Another example could be you want to start a family by the time you are 30. That gives you a set period of time to experience working away from home and touring, getting in as much performance work as you can before you have to be home for bedtimes (or have a partner with a more flexible job). As you head towards your aim you may wish to boost your teaching skills or go to work for a company that does a lot of work at base. It may be as simple as keeping the international touring going but moving closer to family members who can support your ambitions.
4. It is still ‘who you know’
Connections are key. Despite open auditions, being known by the right people is still essential. Knowing that you want to be based permanently in London rather than touring could mean that you aim for a job in a West End show such as Lion King. So finding out about key staff such as the choreographer, and rehearsal director and looking where they might be teaching or hiring for other commercial jobs might get you known to them.
The choreographer for that boring trade show might also be the choreographer of your favourite musical. A small movement role in an opera could lead to a permanent contract with a top contemporary choreographer. You may not dream of dancing in a skin suit at Disneyworld but hey, a year of earning money living in the sunshine in America before you move back nearer family or go to on to better jobs in different countries abroad would work. As you can see another job or smaller project could open up exciting opportunities to fulfil your perfect career.
5. Is it a compromise or step on the journey?
A less glamorous example, but if you know your dream company is holding auditions next month, rather than taking an ok dance job immediately, you might choose to gamble and work in a restaurant so you are free to audition and take the contract with your dream company if you are successful.
It is not a compromise if it is a step on the right path of the journey. Very few people leave training straight into their dream job and the larger employers will want experience, often before you are even invited to an audition. TV shows like X Factor and So You Think You Can Dance? give the impression that talent always shines through but what if you are squashed into a small studio with hundreds of others. It is time to make your own luck.
A dance career holds loads of potential, frustration, excitement and aches and pains!
6. Get planning
I’ve no idea how your brain works but I prefer to get a big bit of A3 paper and mindmap / sketch my ideas. Have a think how it works best for you? It may be that you like to get started, pin it up then mull over it for a couple of days. It might be a quick process where you go quickly with the flow?
Get a large piece of paper and write or sketch what you feel you want in your life. You can do a mind map of an exact time in say 5 and10 year’s time or you can look at 2-5 year intervals.
Location: Consider where you want to be living in the world or UK?
Family: Living near them or just visiting occasionally? Starting your own family?
Interests: Time to do a particular hobby? Maybe a developing side line such as pilates training or photography?
Skills: Which skills or knowledge do you want to be using at work? Partnering, choreographic?
Money: How much does that mean you have to earn?
On a separate piece of paper list your top 3 jobs in the dance world you think you would like. Score it out of 10 for how close it gets to the following areas above.
For example lets take Lion King again:
Location: If you had said London it would score 10 (unless the touring show!)
Family: If they are in London it would be a 10 but if they are far away and you are doing shows every night it will be harder to spend time with them.
Interests: Does it free you up during the day to go out taking photos or do a course?
You get the idea now….
So looking at it this way can open up other possibilities, give you ideas for stepping stone jobs on the way to your dream job and also give you an understanding of what compromises your dream job might entail. Like I said before, it might not change your dream job but it might give you an idea of when you need to achieve it by or how long to aim to do it. If you ultimately want to move to the country and keep chickens then a West End Show is not the best long-term plan but for a couple of years could be fantastic.
Finally, leave it a day or two to see if anything else comes up. It might make you think about opportunities differently.
Still unclear? then work with us to find prepare your journey
7. Get doing!
I said in the beginning ‘perfect career’ not ‘perfect job’ so this is about planning the journey.
What skills does that job need? Do you have them all, where might you get them- on-the-job, from a course?
Who do you know now that could help you get nearer your goal? Who needs to know you to make it easier?
Where do people related to that job inhabit? Do you need to be doing class at Independent Dance in London regularly, or attending a particular choreographer’s class at Pineapple?
When you are training, networking or just seeing shows do you look like you could be working in that scene? Do you have a look or style that is individual, but reflects the work you want?
You should now have the bare bones of an action plan of places to train and visit, contacts to try and approach, skills to learn. When interim or resting jobs come up it may help you to choose what to apply for. Like this example:
Say you want to be a contemporary dance choreographer showing work at Sadlers Wells? Then you could take a job with a smaller dance company to see first-hand what it is like to manage, direct and choreograph at the same time. It will also give you an idea of what platforms and presenting opportunities there are.
Having trouble working through the next steps Survive in Dance mentoring can help?
8. Don’t deny your nature
If you really hate kids then teaching for a term is going to feel like infinity regardless of the income. If you are an early bird that finds it hard to stay up late, then dancing for some quick cash in a club is going to kill you! Be true to yourself, or make the compromise less challenging.
9. Pull it all together and be proud of what you are achieving
You have fought hard both physically and mentally to get through your training and enter the profession. You now have the plan to see your way through the tough times making decisions and choosing your path. Believe it or not the dance world is a lot more friendly than you think so make friends not enemies. Celebrate every small achievement and the glory (and pay!) should follow soon.
