15/09/2022
⭐️⭐️⭐️ATTENTION NOTICE PLEASE READ ⭐️⭐️⭐️
This notice was announced to our own students two months ago and now it’s time to share with you all, as next week will be our last week at The Orchards and my last week teaching full time.
I have made the decision to stop dance with Emily full time. I will continue teaching two evenings per week and our performance group will continue, but that will be it.
I’ve been dancing since the age of three, studied full time professionally from the age of 15, performed, took a gap of about 4 years and now I’m 43!
I love to dance and when the music starts and you have an audience, there’s no better feeling in the world, but I’ve now reached a cross roads and it’s time for a change. When I feel as though I’m not giving my best in my teaching, it makes me sad and I know I’ve reached the end of a period in my life that has been awesome and I have made the best friends that will hopefully remain lifelong buddies.
I am venturing back into medicine, specifically physiotherapy and I’m so looking forward to learning again. The human body fascinates me and I’m looking forward to being able to continue helping people and giving them the freedom of movement again, but from a clinical environment, I may also look towards emergency work too.
The evening timetable has just been finalised and is posted below, but I will just be teaching the more advanced groups and our performance group.
Simon will also be continuing with his Pilates, as he is doing so well with this and has become an excellent coach.
The lovely Jo is going to take on the Tuesday morning improver Tap as her own, along with the intro to improvers and beginners and Emma will be taking on the Friday night street dance class and the Saturday morning Dance fitness, but not until she has had her baby, which is due in January. They will be responsible for those classes as their own. Sarah will also keep her Tuesday evening Ballet.
The last date in the unit at the orchards for us full time, is the 22nd of September.
It will be dancing as normal until then! So do come along, there will be some fun routines coming your way and you will be working hard!! Rehearsals for performances have also already started, as we will be performing in The Orchards at Christmas and also in the three night Christmas Cabaret in association to CDS.
We have so loved having our own unit at the orchards these last few months, it’s been so nice to have a base of our own. However the cost of running a small business premises is just crippling, so we knew we would have to return to hiring different venues, which has its own downfalls.
As I’m leaving this as a full time profession, I feel I can also speak (vent!) freely and say that Dance teachers have a really tough ride!
There’s been such an increase in saturation of the market in terms of people going off to do a short course (I mean short!) in barre, or ballet, or Latin, or Tap as exercise) that we now have to compete with these individuals who are untrained dancers, are happy to charge just £5 and do ‘pay as you go.’.
I owe all my training to my mum and my grandma, who re-mortgaged their house to raise thousands to pay for my years of professional training. Like many other dance teachers, we teach dance, not exercise classes and so we do charge a little more and need you to commit to us, so we can help you be the best dancer you can be, not just ‘drop in’.
So to all the dance teachers out there, you are doing an awesome job and stick by your guns!!
Please look out for all further news.
So it’s just left for me to say a massive THANK YOU to all of you who have supported Dance with Emily. We’ve come full circle. COVID has a lot to answer for and I’m so proud that we managed to dance our way through it in our living rooms!! I think it also helped us all stop, think and reflect as to how we want the future to look for us all and I’m very happy with my decision and can honestly say I feel a weight has lifted.
I love you all dearly, please keep dancing, keep moving, it’s the answer to a lot!!! Emily x
