Transcript
Speaker: I'm Chris Farenthold, Director of Outreach at Madison Ballet, and this is at the Bar, your behind-the-scenes look at the ideas, stories, and creative processes shaping Madison Ballet's work.
Speaker: Each episode brings our community a little closer to the dancers, choreographers, and collaborators who are making ballet in Madison right now. Whether you're a seasoned ballet domain, current or former dancer, or simply curious about how dance gets made, we warmly invite you into the room where it happens.
Speaker: Welcome back to At The Bar with Madison Ballet. I'm Chris Farenthold, the Director of Outreach at Madison Ballet. And today's guest is my colleague, Caitlin Sloan, who is now, among other things, the Outreach Programs Coordinator at Madison Ballet.
Speaker: If you've been listening since last season, I know that may sound a little bit different. And our podcast cover looks a little different. And today's episode is both going to cover that as well as serve as a kickoff for what should be a very exciting 2026-27 season. It's Madison Ballet's 45th season and is called Coming Into View.
Speaker: So we'll get into the nuts and bolts of what's changing around here and what's not and what happened to Madison Ballet Special Projects. But before we do that, I wanted to welcome and catch up a bit with the other half of what's been our experiment in public ballet engagement, Caitlin Sloan.
Speaker: Thank you for joining me today, Caitlin. Yeah, thanks for having me, Chris. First of all, we did record one episode over the summer with Lauren Thompson about SummerSuite, and we'll talk a little bit about that. But it's been a while since the company was actually producing a main stage show. It was last May. So what happens to you in the off season? I know the dancers try to go guest or coach or teach or rest or travel. What did you get up to this summer?
Speaker: My summer looks a lot like that. i have two small kids, as you know, Chris, so summers can be a little bit crazy around our house. Lots of juggling different things. Every day looks a little bit different as far as the routine goes, but we did do a lot of family travel, and I got to teach a lot of different summer intensives. I taught at the School of Madison Ballet Summer Intensive, which was super fun. I taught ballet in points. And then we produced SummerSuite, which was a huge highlight of the summer and was super successful. We were so thrilled with how it turned out.
Speaker: We doubled our expected attendance, raised a great amount of money for the School of Madison Valley Scholarship Fund. And I think even more exciting for me was seeing how much our students who got to perform with the program really progressed through that experience and improved in their technique and their artistry and their courage.
Speaker: You know, it was a big deal to get out there and do a variation, a solo beside your teachers who are professional dancers. So for them, that was huge. And I love that we were able to give some of our company dancers an opportunity to work and perform during their layoff and do some rep we don't normally get to do in our company. So we were really excited about how that turned out, I would say.
Speaker: Absolutely. It was sort of the first venture into ah gala life that I've been around and that it was a one-off kind of fundraising performance.
Speaker: And it was really exciting to be a part of with both you and Lauren. I agree that giving... a range of expertise, a chance to shine on the same stage was also really exciting. I've been to the School of Madison Ballet's showcases, and those are wonderful, but I can't imagine how exciting it was for the students to then also you know see Lauren and Michaela and James and Ben and everyone else sharing the stage. So it was it was a real wonderful thing to be a part of. Sounds like you had a full summer.
Speaker: Yep. It was great. How was your summer? It was good. A lot of the same, some family travel and trying to get ready for the next season, which I know for a lot of the dancers means rest and then conditioning. And for us, it means spreadsheets and Word documents and stuff.
Speaker: strategy meetings and all leading up to changes like the one that we're capping off now as Madison Ballet Special Projects morphs into Madison Ballet Outreach, a division of the company itself. Yeah. So can you tell us what that means? What has changed and what hasn't from what we were before to what we are now as Madison Ballet Outreach?
Speaker: What will change? Not a lot in most ways. We still have our other jobs with the company. I'm still on the production staff as an assistant stage manager for all the main stage shows. And you are still on the faculty of the school as well as for the company. And so we will also still be visible at Madison Ballet performances and at events around libraries and schools and bookstores and spaces around town. And we will also still be producing content.
Speaker: That shares the beauty and intricacy of ballet through social media and this podcast. But I think being more integrated into the company. So what we were before was an initiative that worked in close collaboration with the ballet company. But now that we actually are on staff as outreach folks for the company, it allows us to expand on and amplify those things that we do well.
Speaker: So while we'll still be producing wonderful reels and stories and podcasts, those will also be on the Madison Ballet YouTube page, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, all those sorts of places.
Speaker: And we'll be able to serve even more libraries and schools with our story times and demonstrations because we'll take on more dates. When it was just you know you and i there was a finite amount of time and space that we could occupy. But now that we are able to draw upon other faculty at the school as well as company dancers and the trainees, which is also an exciting component of the season. We'll be able to expand you know our offerings around town. And then we'll also be able to be more, i think, intentional and coordinated with our programming.
Speaker: So we'll get to pick and choose what we are good at and strategically invest in that. And that coordination across the other departments of the company will also, i think, help us do what we do, which is convey to the public, the Madisonian public, what their ballet company is up to.
Speaker: So for example, something that we make could find its way into an e-newsletter that goes out to the school or the company. It's really, I would say, labels and location, really.
Speaker: We have slightly different titles and our Instagram colors and logo will change a little bit. And we moved into the building and onto the homepage. That was sort of the long and short of it. How do you feel about the move and what we've been doing? And what are you looking forward to this season that we've been thinking about?
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I'm super excited. i know we're both so passionate about this company and... I'm just feeling really honored to be officially on the team in this capacity and be able to work with all of the staff more closely. I'm really excited about the expansion of our trainee program this year. We have seven trainees who are from all over the U.S. dancing here in Madison. And for anyone who doesn't know, the trainee program, it's sort of the stepping stone into a professional company. You're kind of in between students and professional dancer. You're bridging that gap. And so these dancers are high level dancers who are coming here to start their foray into a professional career.
Speaker: I've gotten to teach them quite a bit this year and they're a really, really lovely group. I've gotten to choreograph on them as well, which has been such a fun experience for me. And so of the beauties of having this robust trainee group is that we are able to give them more opportunities to perform in the community through our outreach programs. And so you'll see them out in the community. We just had a performance at Eagle School where we did a demonstration of what it's like to be a professional dancer. We had a class, we had a performance, we did questions with the students, and we also had some of our school Madison Ballet students there as well.
Speaker: Coming up, you'll see the trainees at our story times, at other outreach events, Kids in Rotunda, that kind of thing. And so it's just a really exciting time for these dancers. I'm really passionate about dancers in this stage of their career and helping them make that jump to the next level. So I love being in this capacity.
Speaker: Part of what I've learned, you know, the more I get into ballet is that to have a truly successful company, you have to have the ability eventually to feed it from its school and its community. And to have a successful professional division, you have to have a successful pre-professional division. And trainees are a wonderful part of that process from student to an apprentice and Full company member. And it's been exciting to see when I visited your point class, like what exactly goes into that. They're not a student, but they're not full company yet. They're still learning. They're training. So can you tell us a little bit about what makes a trainee's experience different from, say, an upper division students?
Speaker: For our trainees, they are there the same amount of time that our company dancers are there. So our upper division students in the school, they come to classes and After school. For the trainees, they're there 9.30 to 5. And so part of the day, they're having classes that are just for them. Ballet class, a point class, variations, that kind of thing. And then part of the day, they're integrated into company rehearsals and being part of the show. So right now, they are part of Jekyll and Hyde coming up.
Speaker: they're rehearsing with the company for that. And so you're getting a little taste of both worlds because there's definitely things technically that we want to keep really honing and working on. And having those individual classes gives me as a teacher more time to work on those things and really dive deeper into the technique. But then you're also learning what it's like to be within a company setting and what a rehearsal process is like and kind of what your role is when you're an entry level dancer, you're kind of finding your footing.
Speaker: And so they get at the best of both worlds. And one thing that I've been really enjoying working on them with is this choreography. I've got the opportunity to choreograph on the trainees this year and I haven't choreographed.
Speaker: anything for dancers at this level for probably close to a decade. So I was pretty nervous going into it because I, of course, want to do a good job. And I know I'm capable, but just haven't done it in a while. And so when I thought about what kind of piece I wanted to give to the dancers. I kind of was between, should I do something more fun, something more edgy? Like, what should we dive into? And I decided I wanted to do a piece that was more fun and lighthearted that kind of came from, well, I host a podcast as well, the Brainy Ballerina podcast. And when I interview dancers who are maybe retired or at the end of their career,
Speaker: What so many of them say they wish they would have known or understood earlier was that you have to have fun and that it's going to fly so fast and you should enjoy all these moments. And so I wanted to give these dancers who are at that beginning stage their right to start. I wanted to give them something that encapsulated that, that let them have fun and enjoy and let them work really hard. It's still a hard piece. Like they're working really, really hard, but it's fun and they get to enjoy themselves and show their personal personality. So I wanted to have that opportunity for them to feel like they could just like come out and dance and have a good time and remember, even when it gets stressful, that
Speaker: It's ballet. It's fun. It's supposed to be enjoyable. And that's what we're doing it for. And so I wanted to have the opportunity to give them something that they could kind of come back to and like almost latch on to in times when it gets hard because it's going to get hard. And that's part of a ballet career.
Speaker: but it should still be fun. And I feel that way as a retired dancer. Like it goes by so, so fast. So you have to enjoy it. Yeah, and it made for a wonderful addition to that Eagle School demonstration to be able to show people who they've just seen a bar and center portion of class, they might think ballet is Swan Lake Sleeping Beauty, not Cracker. But no, you you use the movements and technique in a really fun way whenever that piece is performed, whether it's on... a bill with other works or as part of an outreach demonstration. I think that's a really good aspect to give to anyone who's coming to ballet. And I really like that you're giving the trainees themselves. Yeah, they started dancing because it was fun.
Speaker: So it's good remind them of that whenever you can. Yeah, for sure. What are you most excited for as we're moving into this new division? I mean, of course, the stability that comes from now being part of the company is the easiest thing to point to as an exciting thing that we have, because then from there, we can continue what worked from last year and double down and invest in kind of for the future things like the trainee program like you're doing. I like that model of building for the future.
Speaker: And being part of the company allows us to, through a collaborative process, bring in more people, and resources. Like I said, we were able to take in more dates because now we have folks who have seen what you and I were doing last year when we were kind of experimenting and throwing things against the wall and seeing what would stick.
Speaker: And now they want to join in. That allows us to expand our offerings. I'm also excited for the ability to sort of build more. And by that, I mean, Madison deserves to have a top flight concert dance company that is also an exponent of ballet and in both its classical and contemporary forms.
Speaker: But that sort of high culture product is always going to need some mediation, some context, and some marketing. And now I think we can be better used as a tool of that both marketing effort of getting people to come see the dancers that we have on stage, but also creating that that audience that the artistry that the company puts out deserves.
Speaker: I'm also excited, honestly, you know the further embedded i find myself in a ballet company, the more I learn. Being on the production staff was how I first came to find that I loved ballet because I saw people doing things that were amazing that I never would have seen if I just bought a ticket. You don't see them at the rosin box and doing all sorts of things with hammers on their pointe shoes and stuff like that until you're back there. Likewise, it's being able to see more of what happens at the school.
Speaker: and the trainee program that allow me to better explain what we do to the public. So the curious person in me is always happier for more access. That's obviously the big pro. So I'm excited for a lot of what we have coming up.
Speaker: One thing we've talked about that is exciting is just that this will become more of a legacy because, like you said, it's the 45th season of the company. And before it was just you and me going out into the community, just, you know, very grassroots. And now we're building programs that could live beyond us and that can be a part of the legacy of Madison Ballet and continue And I think that's one of the most exciting things is just being part of something so monumental that takes so many people to produce and feeling like you're just the small part of something so much bigger is really cool.
Speaker: It is kind of romantic when you're starting anything and our only limitations were what we could think of or afford or get away with or sell the public on. We've, I think, had a lot of wonderful ah successes. I really love are our Instagram presence and the podcast and those legacy building institutions that will you know outlast us. But for any anyone of a creative bent, there is that tension between, i would say, autonomy and community.
Speaker: I remember at SummerSuite mentioning to everyone that I think artists are you know incredibly generous people inherently because they want to put on a show for an audience.
Speaker: It also could sound a little needy that way, but they want to share what they've done with people. And so that tension between... self-expression, but also needing to be understood is something that we lived in real time last year with Madison Ballet Special Projects, where we could come up with ideas and they need to be interesting to people beyond just you and me.
Speaker: And that was also part of what I think is that wonderful learning process of learning how best to communicate the beauty of what we get to experience every day in the studio to the folks around us. So the Madison Ballet special projects period will live, I think, wholesale within what we do moving forward at Outreach, but it's just strengthened by being able to vet ideas through a staff meeting beforehand and make sure that we'll be on the email blast or you know that we are not scheduling something without having dancers available for it or something like that. So having everyone in the Madison Ballet community rowing in the same direction is really exciting. And us being just you know two more people in that boat is really part of the fun.
Speaker: So turning specifically to this fall, our next production is Jekyll and Hyde. That will be at the end of this month and through the first day of November. But in terms of our outreach, what do we have coming up that comes first on the calendar?
Speaker: Yeah, so Kids in the Rotunda will be the Saturday after this episode releases, October 10th. That's a free event for kids to come out to with their family and see some beautiful dancing at the Overture Center in the Rotunda. We do three performances there, so that's going to be a great opportunity to come see our trainees and some of our School of Madison Valley students perform and learn more about ballet.
Speaker: and then we're going to be starting our story times in November. So we're doing the Nutcracker Storytime again. We have 11 libraries we're going to in the Madison area this year. we are super excited to bring that program back again this year. It was so much fun last year. we had awesome feedback and really full houses.
Speaker: And i just love the opportunity to bring a program to where our people already are. Because I know when you have small kids, trying to bring them to the Nutcracker may not always work. for your family or for your life. And so while of course we encourage everyone to come see the full length production of The Nutcracker, at the very least, we're getting to see kiddos in the libraries and getting to share the beauty of ballet and the magic of the story with them right where they already are.
Speaker: Yeah. And I think our storytimes are really the earliest bit of programming we have because you can be three years old and be learning what plies, tendus, and more importantly, their parents are learning what plies, tendus, releve, sauté are.
Speaker: And hopefully we've created a few more pathways for our dancers to come in through those storytimes. So I'm excited to get back out there for Nutcracker. And then we'll be developing another one for the spring. We'll see what exactly that ends up being as it gets a little closer. But I think that will be fun to hopefully get beyond 11 then. i know we've got a lot of places we could be.
Speaker: And it's a matter of, again, time and staffing. And those are things that, i mean, we can't make more of time. But I think we can find more places this fall to get in and share ballet.
Speaker: Yeah, and it can be challenging scheduling the Nutcracker story times just because of the holidays and how many performances we're doing of this production. There's just limited dates, but as we head into the spring story time, we do have a little bit more wiggle room with getting some more dates in there. And so hopefully we'll be able to go to even more libraries and locations, but We're super excited to come out and bring ballet to your group or your school in the community. So if you have an event coming up and you think, hey, it'd be really cool to bring some ballet this event, whether it's kids or adults, you know, whatever kind of group you have, reach out to us and just let us know what's going on. And we would love to talk to you about how we could also come and be a part of your event. In terms of, I guess, things that we have done last year, but expanded, Storytimes are one of those. We'll be going more places.
Speaker: I also would like with this coming year, with the podcast to, again, do similar but different. We'll still be interviewing people. choreographers and dancers. But part of what i'm I'm excited for now is to expand to other artists and artisans who go into making ballet. It's a big production and I don't think the public often gets to hear from or about, say, the costume designer.
Speaker: or the lighting designer. And so I'm excited to bring interviews to folks from both of those for our Jekyll and Hyde production, as well as stage managers. I'm also interested in those corners of the ballet ecosystem, like coaches, those people who teach professionals, say in the summer, or that we hear about when someone says, oh yeah, i went and studied with so-and-so for a bit, and you know now my alignment's much better. All of those aspects of ballet are things that we can, from this perch with a little more time, we can get to.
Speaker: We'll also be at select shows this fall, having opening night Q&A talkbacks with the creatives and some of the dancers. We won't be doing that for Jekyll and Hyde because that Friday we will be having a reception for the creatives right after the show.
Speaker: And so if you do come to opening night, stick around in the lobby right there on the fourth floor of MyArts. You'll be able to ask them the questions, say, that I might have, or come find me and I'll ask them for you.
Speaker: But we will certainly have those for Swan Lake in the spring and Four Seasons and Rite of Spring. Another aspect of being able to do what we do from inside the company that I'm i'm looking forward to is exploring pre-show talks for shows like Nutcracker, Swan Lake, Rite of Spring.
Speaker: Part of what I think... podcasts like the one we're recording now are good for is that it does give someone who's coming to a mixed rep show or a story ballet some context about what they're about to see on stage. But if you didn't listen to the podcast and you got to the theater a little early, it would be nice to be able to hear just a little about what you're going to be seeing. I found those very helpful. you know Many places I've gone. Part of why that's been difficult here is There are so few of us, we do so many different jobs. So usually I've got stage management duties and we also at Nutcracker don't mind people you know hanging out in the lobby, buying ornaments and nutcrackers and sharing holiday cheer.
Speaker: But I think expanding those pre-show offerings that let people know that what they're about to see is an art form with a language that's been handed down and that the dancers are going to be demonstrating both steps that are hundreds of years old and movements that are just days or weeks old that were originated in the studio on Odana. That's stuff that I would like to know.
Speaker: And in keeping with our Madison Ballet Special Projects roots, if I'm curious about it, I'm hoping that someone else would be too. The other thing that I think I'm really excited about us trying that's new is displaying artifacts with context, like costumes, like sketches and swatches of the costume. Giving people who come to a show some greater sense of being up close to what they're about to experience and what they've just seen.
Speaker: And that sort of multi-sensory experience of ballet from you know the loud clacking of pointe shoes on the Marley to the sparkle. of a light on a particular crystal embroidered onto a tutu is something that once you experience it, you'll want to keep experiencing it.
Speaker: And as you know, that's kind of our goal here is getting people to keep coming to the ballet. Before we get into... giving the how and when to see the company on stage. Is there anything reflecting upon our past and and our present? Anything that you would hope for this season that we connect to what we've done before?
Speaker: I think you just said it, Chris. At the core, our mission really remains the same. We want to bring more people to the ballet. So whether that's someone who took ballet growing up as a kid, but hasn't come back to it in a while,
Speaker: Maybe they're a current ballet lover who didn't know we have a world-class company right here in Madison. Or maybe there's somebody who didn't think they even liked ballet, but then they come to a show like Jekyll and Hyde and realize there's many different sides to ballet and there's something for everyone to and enjoy. So I think my biggest hope is that all the seeds we planted over the last year are really going to sprout this year. i think we live in such an incredible arts community here in Madison, and we have so much exciting things coming up. I want everyone to know about it and to come out. So I'm just excited to continue making those connections with our community and bringing more people into the ballet.
Speaker: And I'm also curious to hear what you'd have to say to this question. And also... How do you think that it connects to your vision of the company's further outreach efforts and our general growth? I'm actually very confident in ballet's future. It is a beautiful discipline with the built-in practice that ends in a performance. And it's an art form that it justifies itself just by doing it.
Speaker: There's class, technique, progression, and a canon you know to draw upon. But that doesn't mean that each ballet company gets to exist. In a democracy, there's no Russian czar or Soviet commissar that's funding ballet as a weapon of influence and prestige. That means that for Madison Ballet to exist,
Speaker: It needs to have a Madison that values it the way we do. And as someone who came to you know value and love ballet through a direct encounter, a direct chance encounter, I want to share that with as many people. I said ballet justifies itself because I think the doing of it is worth doing, but it doesn't explain itself.
Speaker: And that is where I think we come in. We can help explain and just point at what is happening on stage and who the amazing artist athletes in our community that live among us are. And that's something that I think we've gotten pretty good at.
Speaker: I also just find being this close to artistry, i kind of draft off of it and I'm inspired. And I think that people, whether they're creatives or not, will hopefully feel similarly. So I say that to say that we have a sense of mission.
Speaker: We know what we want to do and need to do. We need to put people in seats. We need to put ballet in front of folks and we need to...
Speaker: Let people know that there is a world-class ballet company and school in their town. That's what we're doing. So I'm i'm so excited to head into this next chapter with you, Caitlin.
Speaker: And I think we're going to continue to do good work. We'll just be doing it more easily and with more people. So for people to join us and see what amazing work is now on stage, Jekyll and Hyde premieres Thursday, October 29th to our preview show, or we run throughout the weekend, starting on Friday the 30th and going through Sunday the 1st. And those are all at the My Arts Center in Madison, Wisconsin.
Speaker: You can get tickets at madisonballet.org. And we look forward to seeing all of you there. And then at Nutcracker, and then at Swan Lake, and then at Rite of Spring and Four Seasons. And we hope to see you at a library, a school, a bookstore, anywhere in between this season. So thanks again, Caitlin, for joining me this this week. And I will see you around the studio.
Speaker: Yeah, thanks, Chris.
Speaker: Thank you for tuning in to at The Bar with Madison Ballet. If you enjoyed this episode, we invite you to experience Madison Ballet in person by joining us at one of our upcoming performances or community events.
Speaker: From accessible, innovative productions to in-depth conversations with artists, our goal is to create welcoming spaces where everyone can experience ballet in a meaningful way.
Speaker: You can find performance dates, event details, and ticket information on our website and social media platforms. Whether it's your first time attending or you're a long-time supporter, we'd love to see you in the audience and share the experience with you live.
Speaker: Thanks again for listening. We hope to see you at the ballet soon.
