Bringing ballet to our community
Madison Ballet Outreach invites our community to experience ballet beyond the performance itself. We bring dancers into schools and libraries, welcome audiences into conversation with artists, and offer opportunities to discover how a ballet comes into being. Our hope is simple: that an encounter with ballet will inspire curiosity, deepen appreciation, and perhaps begin a lifelong love of dance.
Ballet is also a living tradition. It has a rich history, demanding technique, and a remarkable capacity to tell stories, express ideas, and create beauty through human movement. Every performance is the result of years of training and the imagination and labor of people working together. Its traditions are passed from one generation to the next, not simply preserved but renewed by the artists who practice them.
Our programs offer opportunities to see ballet up close, meet the people who make it, ask questions, and discover something new. Whether you are encountering ballet for the first time or have loved it for decades, there is always more to see.
Welcome to Madison Ballet Outreach.
Ballet in Schools
Madison Ballet brings the experience of a professional ballet company directly into area schools.
Our school programs combine live dance with conversation and demonstration, introducing students to the physical discipline, artistry, music, storytelling, and collaborative work behind ballet. Programs can be adapted for different ages and settings and may feature Madison Ballet dancers, trainees, teaching artists, and members of our Outreach team.
Students don’t just watch ballet—they get a chance to look inside it.
Ballet Storytime
Presented at libraries and other community spaces, Ballet Storytime combines storytelling with an interactive introduction to dance. From The Nutcracker to other children’s favorites, young audiences hear a story, meet a ballet artist or educator, explore movement and musical ideas, and discover some of the ways dancers use their bodies to tell stories without words.
Designed especially for young children and families, Storytime requires no previous experience with ballet.
Before & after the performance
The conversation doesn’t have to begin when the curtain rises—or end when it falls.
At select shows, Madison Ballet Outreach presents pre-performance programs and post-show talkbacks that bring audiences closer to the people, ideas, music, history, and creative decisions behind what they’ve just seen.
Talkbacks feature dancers and members of the artistic and creative teams in informal conversation with Madison Ballet Outreach, giving audiences an opportunity to ask questions and hear directly from the artists who make the work.
Exploring Ballet
What happens before a ballet reaches the stage? What goes into the ballet culture we receive and how do we develop that into a future we want to see? At Madison Ballet, we ask questions of dancers, writers, and administrators, and let everyone hear the answers.
Through demonstrations, talks, workshops, and other special programs, Madison Ballet Outreach offers a closer look at ballet as both an art and a craft. Programs may explore everything from pointe shoes and partnering to choreography, music, design, ballet history, and the daily work of a professional dancer.
These events are designed for curious people—not experts. Come knowing nothing about ballet or come ready to argue about Balanchine.
At the Barre with Madison Ballet
Go behind the curtain with the people who make ballet.
At the Barre with Madison Ballet is Madison Ballet’s podcast featuring conversations with dancers, choreographers, designers, musicians, teachers, and other artists about their work and the world of ballet.
Hosted by Madison Ballet’s Director of Outreach, Chris Fahrenthold, the podcast explores not only what audiences see onstage, but how a ballet gets there: the training, collaboration, decisions, accidents, traditions, and personalities behind the finished performance.
Bring Madison Ballet to Your Community
Madison Ballet Outreach partners with schools, libraries, universities, community organizations, and other groups throughout the region.
Programs can range from a single visit or demonstration to a conversation, workshop, performance-related event, or longer collaboration. If you have a group you’d like to introduce to ballet—or an idea you’d like to explore with us—we’d love to hear from you.
Contact Madison Ballet Outreach:
outreach@madisonballet.org
