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No city in the world speaks the language of ballet as well as Paris. Although ballet’s origins were in the Renaissance courts of Italy, it’s Paris that can lay claim to being the birthplace of classical ballet from the 16th century. The elegance and exactitude of ballet is reflected in the architecture of Paris itself, a city that in the 19th century was transformed into a harmonious assembly of avenues, parks, boulevards, arches and bridges and magnificent buildings such as the neo-Baroque Palais Garnier, home of the Paris Opera Ballet. Both inside and out, the Palais Garnier is a monument...

At Christmas, we yearn for home or at least the memory of home as it was when we were children. And apart from carols, nothing evokes Christmas past like popular music, from Bing Crosby’s White Christmas, Frank Sinatra’s Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, Last Christmas I Gave You My Heart, by Wham! and Jose Feliciano’s Feliz Navidad. Our favourite depends on our age but there’s one musical backdrop to Christmas that’s ageless - as appealing to children as it is to their grandparents. Tchaikovsky’s score for Nutcracker with its march, gallop, polka and waltzes is the marker of December,...

So you have finished year 12 or decided that Uni just isn't for you despite that your parents are telling you to get a 'real' career and all you can think about is Performing on stage with Beyonce or Playing Liza Minelli in The Boy From Oz. There is that saying in life, 'Once a Performer always a Performer' or 'you can take the girl out of country but you can't take the country out of the girl.' It is the same for all Dancers, Singers and Actors. We thrive for our after school rehearsals and don't care that we can't go...

We can pinpoint the moment Australia fell in love with ballet to a winter's day in 1913 when Adeline Genée sailed into Sydney harbour. The diminutive ballerina was greeted by cameramen, filming her walking on the deck of the liner, Makura, and by reports eager to interview the dancer billed as "The ideal of Our Age" and "The World's Greatest Dancer". The Sydney Morning Herald headlines its report: "A Famous Dancer", describing Genée as a "dainty little lady with a radiant smile and a rare charm of manner". Later that day she was the guest of honour at the restaurant, Paris...