Matthew Wisniewski/Curb
The feet of dancers in mid-air.

Each Saturday afternoon this fall, the youth ballet’s dancers squeezed into the school’s basement studio for four-plus hours to learn and demonstrate a remarkable amount of choreography. Their rehearsal readied them for the company’s first-ever full-length performance of the Nutcracker Ballet under Makaroff's artistic direction, performed at Lawrence University’s Stansbury Theater in Appleton.

Only in ballet do bobby pins flying out of girls’ hair reveal flying out of girls' hair indicate the intensity of their rehearsal, and there was no shortage of flying pins at Makaroff’s rehearsals.

Her dancers would not know that at the end of the day, after being pushed to fatigue and tears, Makaroff would speak of them with reverence. She teaches to enrich their lives and perpetuate a shared experience.

“I know what it feels like to be up on a pointe shoe and do five or six pirouettes on my own. I know what it feels like to be in my partner’s arms and be able to give myself over to the music. And I’ll never forget what that feels like,” Makaroff said.

“Maybe it’s sheer indulgence, maybe it’s total selfishness, but not of a negative variety. It’s something that I have. I love teaching. I love giving it to these students. These girls were dead and exhausted, but yet they kept picking themselves up and doing it again . . . once they get it right, you can see, as tired as they are, there’s this look behind their eyes. It’s something that we all share and I don’t really know how to put that into words.”

Photo by Woodrow Leung
Youth ballet soloist graces stage in Waltz of the Flowers.

The Makaroff Youth Ballet, led by a new board of directors and fiery artistic director, hopes to move into newer studio facilities, participate in international and national dance festivals, and perform their full-length Nutcracker Ballet in the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center, located just 10 steps away from the Makaroff School of Ballet studio.

On a fundamental level, Makaroff teaches to continue the 47-year legacy started by her family. Just like Earle Smith and Alyson Vivar, she teaches to maintain the identity of classical ballet in her community. From different areas of Wisconsin, with different resources and support systems, each work with the same fervent desire to perpetuate the love for classical dance.

Smith echoes the great choreographer and founder of American ballet George Balanchine, when explaining the philosophy behind Madison Ballet: “But first, a school.”

After Milwaukee Ballet’s finale performance, the school children usher out of the auditorium like little ducklings in single file lines. One blonde duckling, three and a half feet tall and clad in a fuzzy pink sweater, stretches out her arms in what she did not know to be an artfully perfect arabesque position.