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Summary: Stretch the hamstrings and calves before practicing modern dance. Learn to do modern dance hamstring stretches with tips from a professional dance teacher in this free modern dance video lesson.
Views: 142 | Tags: exercises, poses, stretching, stretches, dancing, dance, modern, warm-ups
About the Expert
Chell Garcia-Trias Chell Garcia-Trias has been dancing for 30 years. As a community scholar at Columbia College Dance School, she earned a B.A. in dance and acting. Garcia-Trias... read more
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Questions & AnswersHi my name is Chell Garcia-Trias, I'm a modern dance instructor in Austin, Texas and I'm going to show you a nice modern dance stretch to stretch out your hamstrings and your calves. I'm just going to very easily sit on the ground and I'm going to straighten my legs out in front of me and flex my feet so my toes are pointed at the ceiling. And I'm going to rock back and forth and feel my sits bones pushing in the ground, those are the bones that are right at the top of your legs, you can feel them if you're rocking. If you don't feel two bones digging into the ground, then you're probably leaning back a little bit and you really want to push forward. If that's not comfortable for you, you might want to just bend your knees gently and put your hands to your sides and just sit like this for a little while. If that is comfortable, straighten your legs out and we're going to start reaching our chest towards our shins and go down just as far as it's comfortable. So, I'm going to take deep breaths, I'm going to reach up and out with my head and down with my chest and reach towards my shins. If this is where I'm comfortable, then I'm just going to stay here with my hands on my shins. If I want a deeper stretch, if that feels good and it feels like I want to go further, then I'll go down a little further. If that also feels good, I might reach my hands around my feet. Just take some deep breaths, relax your muscles. I can still feel my sits bones pushing in the ground. I want to drop my shoulders the whole time. And when I'm ready I'll come back up by pushing through my sits bones all the way through the top of my head to sit up. That's a really nice stretch for your hamstrings and your calves that we like to do in Modern Dance.
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