Spotlight: Evelyn Cisneros-Legate, Ballet For Dummies
Congratulation to Ballet West Academy Director Evelyn Cisneros-Legate on the 20TH ANNIVERSARY of the publication of her book Ballet For Dummies! We’re so proud of her!
Evelyn still uses the book as a reference when she is teaching Ballet West Academy Level Ones and Twos up in Park City. “It is a good reference book even for people who know the industry well.”
When she retired in May of 1999, Cisneros-Legate wanted to work in community engagement and outreach. “I had a real sense of urgency to pass on the art form in America to others who may not know about it, since it’s not part of our culture. It’s important to work with our youth to let them know how wonderful it is.”
Whie Cisneros-Legate worked with the San Francisco Ballet for Dance Education, Scott Speck, a music conductor for the San Francisco Ballet, who had also collaborated on the books Opera for Dummies and Classical Music for Dummies, reached out to her about collaborating with him on a Ballet for Dummies book.
“I do enjoy writing and I knew the subject well. My son was just a baby, so I could write at night when he was asleep, so I said ‘let’s do it.’ We wrote a sample chapter, sent it to the publisher, who enthusiastically said yes, so we spent the next year writing it. Scott has a great sense of humor and he already knew how to format the information. He was living in New York and I was in San Francisco, so we dealt with the time change and wrote late at night. It was really a labor of love so by the time we got to the end, I was so sad I wanted to write it all again, at least the sample chapter.”
“I love the art form, I love the experiences that I was able to have because of the art form, and I loved people I worked with who poured into me their craft, knowledge, and creativity, which was such a gift. I was accepting all those gifts through my whole career, always honing my craft and technique to become better, while working with incredible coaches and partners, dancing to music that just takes your breath away, was so wonderful. I poured all that love of the art form from my experiences into the book to hopefully share that heart with people who don’t know anything about it, so when they did go to the ballet, they could enjoy it more because they have that knowledge.”
They didn’t have money to hire a photographer, so Cisneros-Legate took all the pictures, using her husband, Stephen Legate, and Leslie Young from the company as models. Cisneros-Legate even posed for some of the stretching photos and included many of her performance photos, thanks to the gracious approval from the photographers.
“It was something I hadn’t done before. In middle school, I used to really enjoy writing, so this was a revisitation of that. When you are dancer, it is so consuming. All my time and energy was focused on my work. I would make my own tiaras for the Sugarplum Fairy role in The Nutcracker, perform at guest engagements, sew my own pointe shoes, work out, or rest. Writing was a wonderful challenge I was able to pursue once I was retired.”