Insight: Ballet glossary - arm positions

Romany Pajdak, Royal Ballet First Artist, demonstrates arm positions.
Ballet uses strictly defined positions through which most arm movements travel. There are five basic positions: first, second, third, fourth, fifth.

First position: Both arms are held out in front of the body at approximately
80 degrees, maintaining rounded elbows and an oval shape, sloping down a little from the shoulders.
Second position: Both arms are held out to the sides to form a strong horizontal,
but with a slight slope downwards from shoulders to wrist.
Third position: One arm is held forward in first position, the other is held to the
side in second position.
Fourth position: One arm is held to the side in second position, the other is raised
up, slightly in front of the head.
Fifth position: Both arms are raised up high almost vertically, but held slightly
forward of the head.

[victoriatomas]

you should do more of this videos. They are fabulous. so classy and helpful

[strawberryrose]

Never learned that fourth as fourth, it was always a third. Fourth crossed was the fourth I was taught

[StarfighterVicki]

I was looking for ballet moves to show a friend, and this was perfect!
Thank you!

[sweetpinkybear]

I'm trying to learn ballet so i can start in the fall. this helped me a lot

[Periculo]

Searched for "fps arm positioning".. Instructions not clear.. ended up learning some bad ass ballet moves but still cant for my life aim in Overwatch.

[BalletBend]

done well, a simple port de bras such as this, is beautiful.

[muffin-marydairy]

Fourth crossed is the only fourth I know. The fourth position they showed for me was Upper Third. My teacher taught me bras ba, first, demi, second, upper third, third, lower third, fourth, and fifth.

[Lucedance]

Could you do a video for the principal head movements in ballet. I never properly learned that, and have never found a guidance for that.

[pascalelean]

That's a great video! Thank you for keeping it short!

[chantelbrown]

I think this is much better and shorter. I like it.

[chevvonnejohnson]

Question...May you explaim the position of the hands and fingers please? It looks like the middle finger is down..

[lostmelodyy]

Do the arms go straight to the sides in second position or are they slightly bent?

[nadiamargueritelaarif]

Who know the name of the classical song?

[Mister_Soyuz_on_YT]

I like the Cechetti method only because I was taught that in my Beginning ballet class. I believe this is the Russian method???

[Lucedance]

Thank you very much for your advice, but the video you told me about, shows just the positions of the head alone and not in combination with the steps, like port de bras. I would need something that explains the head movements together with the other movements of ballet. Do you know if somothing similar exists?

[aimsical]

That's great! Why were you watching it then? Some people watch videos so they want to learn something, or can help someone else learn something. It's too bad that announcing that you know something doesn't help anyone learn, because you probably could be very helpful.

[joytan]

Hi, does anyone know what musical piece this is? thanks so much!

[aquastartv]

Everyone's talking about how they're using this for ballet practice, but then there's me, I'm using this for my school's one act.

update: our school got 2nd place.

[tresordelamer]

my russian teachers would like to argue about this lol

[travionna]

i do ballet n i no all dis it hard to learn relve n spin