There are about five classes daily Monday through Friday and one or two on Saturday morning. This adds up to about forty hours of instruction per week. You have the option of participating in one or two week sessions. The degree of participation in all of the classes is up to the individual. Participants are housed in one-bedroom condominiums. Each condo has quaint decorations and have jacuzzis in each building. Most rooms have at least a phone, TV, VCR, microwave, and refrigerator.
A few group activities are usually set up, plus there is plenty of free time for activities of your own choosing. These activities can include sightseeing and shopping, galleries and museums, Santa Fe and Taos, Santa Fe Opera and Ballet, barn dances, mineral springs and baths, the Chamber Music Festival, Taos Pueblo, picnics, hiking, chair lift, and white water rafting.
Our day began with a stretch class taught by Stephanie, followed by a two hour technique class with Jillana. The stretch was a nice gentle wake-up for our bodies. Technique class was, if anything, quite intensive. Just the barre was an exhausting event. Normally barre would last about an hour, followed by a half hour of center work, then a half hour of traveling combinations across the floor. The class proceeded at a brisk pace and combinations were fairly advanced, but Jillana usually modified the combinations for the less advanced dancers.
After a lunch break, we had a class in pointe, variations, and repertory. We started with pointe, beginning with a full barre, including many foot and ankle strengthening exercises. Then, we proceeded to center and across the floor work. Once again, the exercises were graded for all levels of pointe dancers. We continued into variations, where some people continued en pointe, and others in technique shoes. We were taught variations from ballets such as Western Symphony. Following was repertory, in which we worked on excerpts from Serenade. The total class time was two hours.
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