Our daily ballet vocabulary lesson with A Ballet Education: April 3, 2020

Temps de Poisson or Pas De Poisson or Sissone Soubresaut, or Temps Collé are all names for this difficult step. While back in the day it was a step of reserved for men, we are now progressive feminists and don’t discriminate steps via gender. Temps de poisson means time of the fish, whlie pas de poisson means step of the fish. While we can debate what school of thought (pedagogy) names what steps, it is more important to talk about the technique behind the step.

This step commonly shares a lot of the ideas and facings with sissone faille. For example, the step starts in croisé, but the position in the air would be effacé, while landing in a fourth croisé. The difference is going to be what the legs actually do in the air. While sissone faille (a very common step in ballet class), focuses on the legs splitting apart, temps de poisson focuses on to keep the legs glued together (like a soubresaut, hence the name) in a tight fifth position in effacé. Now stylistically, people get fancy and focus on the lean back or really shaping the arch of the position, or even the shape of the arms.

THINGS TO FOCUS ON:
DO NOT BEND YOUR KNEES IN THE POSITION! If you bend your knees or a single knee, it is a different step.

I like to encourage staying in the plié before take off for as long as possible so you can really push into the position.

Like an airplane take off, make sure you are on taking off moving forwards, and never backwards or arching too soon.

Keep the arms relaxed so you don’t look snazzy.

Grab a temps de poisson fat panda sticker for $5 – Click the image below.

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