What is the Cecchetti Method of training? It is a rigorous system drawn up with careful regard for the laws
of anatomy, and it is designed to endow the human body with all those qualities essential to the
dancer...balance, poise, strength, elevation, elasticity, "ballon" and so forth.

These qualities are naturally not the monopoly of the Cecchetti Method; they are the ideal of every school
of training. But the Cecchetti Method differs from those other schools in the endeavor to reduce the
dancer's training to an exact science, by imposing a formula evolved over years of preparing boys and girls
of many nationalities to become dancers, to knead and shape their bodies to bear the strains and trails of
public appearance and to fit their muscles and tendons and nerves to respond readily to whatever steps
and movements might be required of them by the choreographer.

The imposition of a spartan unalterable regimen, according to which every day in the working week has its
own particular set exercises, is an essential part of the system. This ensures that different types of steps are
infallibly practiced in a planned sequence, stretching and contracting each set of muscles in turn and to a
carefully calculated degree. Each exercise is executed to the left as well as to the right, beginning one side
one week, and the other the next. The cumulative effect of such exercises carried out in the prescribed
manner is definite.

Another important feature of the Cecchetti Method is that the student is taught to think of the movement
of the foot, leg, arm, and head, not as something apart, but in its relation to the whole body, which
develops a definite feeling for line. Again Cecchetti laid down that it is more important to execute and
exercise correctly once, than to do it a dozen times carelessly. Quality therefore rather than quantity is the
guiding rule. The Cecchetti Method is classic in its purity and clear-cut style; it is classic in its strenuous
opposition to all extravagance and fussiness of movement; it is classic in its insistence on the importance
of line.

The complete Cecchetti Method includes a very full vocabulary of movement, including nearly forty
"adages," composed by Cecchetti himself for the development and maintenance of balance and poise in
every conceivable position and in every type of movement, the body being supported on either leg. The
eight "Ports de Bras," or exercises to develop the graceful movement and coordination of the arms, are
generally admitted to be unsurpassed.

The prime purpose of the Cecchetti Method is that the student shall not learn to dance by trying to imitate
the movements executed by his teacher as a model for him to follow, but shall learn to dance by studying
and imbibing the basic principles which govern the art; in short, to grow and develop from within out, to
become completely self-reliant.

One final point; although Cecchetti insisted upon strict adherence to his program of daily practice, he
invariably advocated that the lesson of the day should be followed by studying unseen steps composed by
the teacher in order to develop the student's powers in "quick study" and his ability to assimilate new steps
and new "enchantments."


The Cecchetti Method
Written by Cyril W. Beaumont
Balance, Poise, Strength
The Cecchetti Method
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