La Esmeralda is a ballet, which has three acts and five scenes. Notre-Dame de Paris, by Victor Hugo, influenced the making of this ballet. La Esmeralda is about a gypsy girl named Esmeralda, who marries a poet so he doesn’t die from the gypsy king. Later on, Quasimodo is ordered by his master, Clause Frollo, who is the Archdeacon of Notre Dame, to abduct Esmeralda. When Quasimodo attacks and abducts Esmeralda, the King’s Archers come to rescue her. The King’s Archers are led by Phoebus de Chateaupers, who then captures Quasimodo. Because the Archers wanted to punish Quasimodo and Esmeralda was against that, he was touched by her affection. Phoebus then gave her his scarf, given to him by his fiance, Fleur de Lys. Soon after, Esmeralda arrives at Fleur de Lys’s engagement celebration. There, Esmeralda finds out that Phoebus is her fiance, as Fleur de Lys sees Esmeralda wearing the scarf she gave to Phoebus. Furious, she decides to cancel the engagement, knowing that her fiance has fallen in love with someone else, and Esmeralda leaves the celebration with Phoebus. When the two are alone, they declare their love for each other, but they don’t know that Frollo is listening to their every word. Frollo finds a dagger from Esmeralda’s room and stabs Phoebus. Then he calls the officials, telling, and showing, them the dagger and the body. Subsequently, Esmeralda is sentenced to death. The next morning, Esmeralda is supposed to be hanged up for committing the crime, but, just in time, Phoebus comes out, alive, and tells the truth about what happened. Frollo tries to kill them once again with a dagger, but Quasimodo takes it from him and stabs him to death. The two are finally together again.

This variation is well known for the tambourine and is competed in competitions. La Esmeralda is also a very hard variation because of the turns throughout the variation, as well as having to balance during the ballones at the end. During the variation, the character portrayed is youthful and bold, as well as ostentatious and ambitious. In the beginning, make sure to have a nice plie, with both heels on the floor, when going into the next moves, hold the shoulder blades/ back to make each movement even stronger. Keep the knees straight for all echappes and the supporting leg. For whatever turn done next, hold your arms and make sure to sustain a turned out knee. Also, land softly into fourth position and don’t crash down. Then, when you turn, support your elbows, lift up, and stay on top of your supporting leg. When landing, keep the heel on the floor so you don’t wobble. For the next part, also land softly on each, keep the leg right behind you, keep your arms in front, and maintain the character. (If you would like, stare into someone’s eyes, I know, creepy right?) After, comes the “circle,” which includes tour degages, or lame ducks. Once the “circle” is finished, there is a diagonal with ballones. When doing those, the hips have to be straight and the leg has to kick out and be strong. Like everything else, hold your arms and your back to help stay balanced. And finally, end with a big jump, into the ending pose, with a nice smile, of course!


Publish Date: 09/20/2020