Adults Evening Classes - Tight-wire / Wire-walking
All Levels
Category: Equilibristics > Tight-wireMain Tutor:
JACKIE WELBOURNE
About this course:
The Art of Balance! A superb challenge that's a brilliant way to gently improve your posture, body awareness (and back health!) whilst having brilliant fun.
Learn techniques to walk, run, dance and perform tricks on a wire that's only @12mm thick!
Everyone starts at low height on tight-wires 0.5m high to start with to ensure safety, (we have 3 of these). As you improve we have wires we can set up at 1.0m, 1.5m & 2m high.
There are no prerequisites for this course, in fact this fabulous activity is suitable across all ages!
For a bit of fun as an introduction to wire-walking:
Click on "Try Tight-wire" below to see a little animation made by Sam Welbourne of Palava Arts
Levels:
All levels Beginners to Advanced, including absolute Beginners, are welcome.
Beginners learn the correct footwork for walking the wire, about good posture, good body alignment, and balance techniques.
Improvers learn to Run, Dance, & Perform Tricks on a wire!
Advanced students progress onto more difficult tricks e.g. How to 'bourree en pointe' on the wire.
About the Tutor:
Jacqueline Welbourne
Jacqueline starred as an Aerialist with the world famous 'Cirque du Soleil' & won major prizes at both the 'Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain', Paris; and a 'Clown' at the 'Festival International du Cirque de Monte-Carlo' (the 'Oscars' of the circus world).
As a keen dancer: Ballet, Modern, Jazz, Tap, Tango etc. it was no surprise that at her first opportunity to 'try' the tight-wire she became addicted to testing out dancing all different styles on it, including walking in ballet shoes 'en pointe' across the wire.
Benefits:
Tight-wire is brilliant for improving your quality of posture, body alignment and balance.
It is a lovely skill to learn, and the sensation of being 'well-balanced' on the wire when you achieve it can become quite addictive!
It is also a brilliantly fun Postnatal activity for mums needing to adjust back into a good posture after pregrancy, thus helping to avoid back problems.
For keen dancers Tight-wire is a particularly a favourite challenge, dancing on the Tight-wire is a real art, and you can have a great deal of fun trying out lots of different styles of dance.
For ballet dancers there is the ultimate challenge: learning to walk the Tight-wire 'en pointe'.
General Information:
Beginners start out on Tight-wires that are 0.5 metres high and will need to accomplish a series of basic exercises before moving up to a higher Tight-wire. This ensures that all our students learning these activities progress safely.
Circus Maniacs owns 3 x tight-wires at 0.5 meters; 1 x 1.0 meter; 1 x 1.5 metres; and 1 x 2.0 metres; enabling steady height progression. However most of the time the training we do is at 0.5 metres and 1.0 metres high, as these are good heights for learning and solidifing your techniques.
Appropriate footwear for tight-wire is soft shoes that have a full sole made of suede. If you have shoes like these please bring them to class. If not, Circus Maniacs has some basic workshop shoes that you can use which work fine if you are at Beginners level.
Costs:
Term Fees: £80 [£60 conc.] + Annual membership of £20
Enrolment:
To see information regarding Enrolment click on 'How to Enrol'.
For an Adults Envening Classes Enrolment Form click on 'Enrolment Forms'.
Other Ideas & Links:
- Weekly Tight-wire Classes for Children.
- We also offer Private Tight-wire Classes.
- Book a Tight-wire Workshop at our space, or we can travel to you with our 2 portable 0.5metre high Tight-wires.
N.B. We are often used as the preferred training school for the Musical 'Barnum' - For inspiration: Check out Professional Wire-walkers on the Circus Maniacs Agency Site.
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