Festival Opens Youngsters’ Eyes to Ballet

Depending on whom you talked to, the 30th annual Dorothy B. Chandler Children’s Festival was either a cultural awakening for thousands of young minds--many of them witnessing live ballet for the first time--or just a “really cool” field trip.

Either way, when it concludes early this afternoon, the four-day event will have brought an estimated 16,500 elementary school students to the Ahmanson Theatre. Each day, about 2,000 children have been treated to an hourlong performance by the American Ballet Theatre Studio Company.

Ten-year-old Gilbert Gonzales, for one, was impressed.

“All the spins and everything they did--it’s pretty dangerous,” said the fifth-grader from Rosemead, whose Savannah Elementary School class visited on Tuesday. “If they drop them, and they fall, they could break their neck or break their leg or something.”

The ABT Studio Company has performed twice each morning for the children--mostly fifth-graders--who have been bused in from nearly 200 Southern California schools. For many youngsters, the festival marked their first exposure to live performance.

Students have also staged performances of their own. After each show, they have adjourned to the Performing Arts Center plaza outside, where each class has made a circle and performed a synchronized dance set to a tango rhythm.

Children have oohed and aahed through most of the professional ballet shows--and, being fifth-graders, they’ve giggled when two male dancers appeared wearing flesh-colored tights. Some were pleased, others bored--but at the least it was a new experience.

“One thing about 10-year-olds--there’s no kidding with them,” said Joni Smith, president of The Blue Ribbon, a volunteer membership group that sponsors the Children’s Festival. “If they like it, they like it. If they don’t, you’re going to notice that, too.”

As to the children’s verdict, Smith said, “I didn’t notice any mass exodus to the bathroom.”