Im thinking about starting BAL ballet and was wondering what is included in the syllabus??


What are we marked on in exams???
thanks

hello,

i have taken BAL for a number of years. The junior levels go from beginners, pre primary, primary, grades 1-5, grade 6 is optional, then pre el, elementry, intermediate, and advanced.

pre elementry is the first exam to be taken which includes pointe work (from memory 3-4 barre excersises and 3-4 centre excersises en pointe in this grade.) to take a senior exam (pre elementry and up) you MUST have passed grade 5 ballet in BAL or a similar syllabus.

it is a great syllabus, and i have found the examiners to be very fair. in exams you are marked on a number of things - technique, presentation, etc etc. in a senior exam you must pass all sections to recieve at least a pass mark, whereas in junior you could fail a section and do really well in other sections to still pass.

its difficulat to descibe exactly what is included in the syllabus, but id say it is on par in terms of difficulty in each grade with RAD, if you are familiar at all with that syllabus.

The good news is the BAL headquarters are located in sydney, so its great for you

any more questions, just pm me

thanks so much!!!!
im going to start the syllabus next year

just wondering does grade 5 include character dance??
thanks so much

Grade 5 now does include a dance, but I wouldn't call it a character dance, well not what BAL calls Character anyway since they have a specific syllabus for national character. They give you I think two choices of music that you can decide between and usually your teacher will choreograph a dance to for the exam. Dances in ballet exams are only a new thing for BAL ballet grades, when I did these grades only pre-primary, primary and grade 6 ballet required dances. Although from Pre-Elementary ballet and up don't require any dances.