Questions to Ask Dancers
These are questions to ask dancers in an interview, whether you are writing a profile, doing a school assignment, recording a podcast, preparing a programme note or sitting on the panel that is casting or hiring. The 60 dance questions run in the order the conversation usually goes: training, rehearsal, the stage, the working life and dance itself, with a last group for directors and studio owners interviewing a dancer for a job.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Training
What did you do in class this morning?
Why ask it
A morning class is specific, so the answer starts inside the work instead of with a summary of a career. Not every dancer takes daily class, and if yours does not, ask what they practised last and who was leading it.
How old were you at your first class, and who decided you should go?
Why ask it
The second half is the better one: a parent, a sibling's class with a spare place, a school visit, a video watched alone. Dancers who started at fourteen or at university often took the more unusual route in, so do not treat an early start as the rule.
Which style did you train in first, and what did you have to unlearn later?
Why ask it
Dancers who have crossed between forms tend to answer precisely: turnout that had to be dropped, a held chest, a habit of landing a certain way. Stay on whatever was hardest to lose, because it explains a good deal about how they move now.
Which teacher's voice do you still hear when you work?
Why ask it
Many dancers can quote the exact phrase years later. Ask what the teacher was correcting at the time, because the words alone rarely make sense to anyone who was not in that studio.
What do you still practise that you first learned as a beginner?
Why ask it
A plié, a basic bounce, a time step, a walk: the first things taught are the ones professionals never stop working on. A student reading your piece needs to hear this, because it says the basics are the job and not a stage to get past.
When did dance stop being an after-school activity and become the plan?
Why ask it
Listen for an event more than a feeling: a summer course, a scholarship, a teacher who said it aloud, a first paid job. Some dancers will tell you it never felt like a decision, and that is worth following too.
What would a teacher from a different style notice first about how you move?
Why ask it
Training leaves marks a dancer can list: a lifted chest, weight held low in the knees, feet that point on their own. The question asks them to see themselves from outside, and the answer is often funnier than you would expect.
How do you warm up, and how has that changed since you were a student?
Why ask it
Ask for the order, on the floor first or straight to standing, and how many minutes it takes now. The change over the years is the story, and it tends to arrive without any prompting about age.
Rehearsal
How does a piece get into your body: counts, images, or watching someone else?
Why ask it
Dancers learn in different ways and most know exactly which one they rely on. The answer tells you how they will describe everything else in the interview, whether in music, in shapes or in stories.
How long does it take you to learn a minute of choreography?
Why ask it
The figure swings with the style and with how the material is handed over, so ask about one particular piece. Then ask how long it was before that minute no longer needed thinking about, which is a much bigger number.
What is the difference between marking a phrase and dancing it full out?
Why ask it
Marking means going through the steps at part strength, to save the body or to fix the memory, and few outsiders know to ask about it. It leads straight to how a dancer rations energy across a long rehearsal day.
How do you take a correction you disagree with?
Why ask it
Dance training involves constant public correction, and the answer shows how a dancer holds their own judgement inside that. Listen for whether they try it first and argue later, which is the working professional's answer.
What happens when you and the dancer next to you remember a count differently?
Why ask it
Someone has to settle it: the rehearsal director, a dance captain, last week's video, or whoever sounds most sure. How it gets settled shows who holds the authority in that studio once the choreographer has left.
How do you work with a choreographer who cannot explain what they want?
Why ask it
It comes up often enough that most working dancers have a story about guessing, offering three versions and reading the room. Notice whether they tell it with irritation or as an ordinary part of the job.
When a choreographer asks you to make material yourself, what do you reach for first?
Why ask it
Everyone has default moves, and good dancers know theirs well enough to name them. If the piece you are writing about was made this way, ask which thirty seconds started with them and how that was credited.
How much of partnering is trust and how much is technique?
Why ask it
The honest answer usually rejects the split, because trust in partnering is built from repeatable mechanics rather than feeling. If they work solo, ask instead about dancing in unison, which raises the same question in a different form.
What does cleaning a piece involve, and who does it?
Why ask it
Cleaning is the working word for making a group match: the angle of an arm, the height of a leg, the exact count a head turns on. A plain account of it in the dancer's own words is a ready-made line for a programme note or a caption.
What did you learn from covering a role or waiting in the wings?
Why ask it
Understudying is a large part of many careers and seldom comes up in interviews. Ask how they learned the part from the side of the room, and whether they ever got to dance it.
Which other dancer do you watch in rehearsal, and what are you taking from them?
Why ask it
It lets them praise a colleague by name, which most dancers are glad to do. The detail they pick, such as how someone uses a breath or finishes a turn, shows what they are working on themselves.
On stage
What happens in the last hour before a show?
Why ask it
Warm-ups, shoes, hair, superstitions and where they stand in the wings are all concrete and specific to the person. Vague answers about focusing usually mean you need to ask about a particular venue or performance instead.
Where do your eyes go while you dance: the audience, a fixed point, or the other dancers?
Why ask it
Focus is taught and often set by the choreographer, so there is a real answer. A dancer who turns will explain spotting, one who battles will say the opponent, and someone in a line of sixteen may say the shoulder in front, always.
Who decides what your face does on stage?
Why ask it
In some forms the expression is coached as closely as the feet, and in others a neutral face is the rule. Competition and commercial dancers usually have the most to say here, especially about being told to smile.
What is the hardest thing you do that looks easy from the seats?
Why ask it
Here is where the technical detail comes out: a slow controlled descent to the floor, a balance held still, an ordinary walk across the stage. Expect something you had not noticed was difficult.
How do you dance a section you find boring?
Why ask it
Most dancers will admit to one, and the admission tends to loosen the rest of the conversation. Good answers are about finding a task inside it: a breath, a partner, a change of intention.
How do you get back in when you blank on the steps mid-performance?
Why ask it
Recovering is a skill in its own right: catch the next count of eight, read the dancer beside you, keep the upper body convinced. Ask for a particular night, since the general answer is always that nobody noticed.
What does the floor change about how you dance?
Why ask it
Sprung wood, a raked stage, vinyl laid over concrete, grass at a festival: each one changes what is safe and what is possible. Dancers care about floors more than outsiders would guess, and the ones who tour can list the bad ones by city.
What do you do to a new pair of shoes before you will dance in them?
Why ask it
Pointe shoes are often sewn and softened by hand, taps can be tightened or loosened for the sound, and some trainers never leave the studio. A dancer who works barefoot will tell you about the feet instead, which is just as good.
Where in a piece do you get your breath back?
Why ask it
Stamina on stage is planned: a walk upstage, a held shape, eight counts hidden behind another group. The answer shows the piece from the inside, where the hard part is seldom the part that looks hard.
How do you handle the gap between how a performance felt and how it looked on video?
Why ask it
Plenty of dancers have been undone by footage of a show they thought went well, and the reverse happens too. The answer tells you how they judge their own work, and whether they trust their sensation or the recording.
What does your part in this piece ask of you that your last one did not?
Why ask it
For a preview or a programme note, here is the question that ties the interview to the show on sale. The comparison keeps the answer off the plot and on the work: a new partner, a faster score, more time on the floor, a costume that changes the turns.
Working life
Tell me about an audition that went badly.
Why ask it
Auditions are the everyday reality behind any performance career, and the failures are told more freely than most people expect. Look for what they took from it, since dancers often learn more about casting from a rejection than from a job.
How do you hear about auditions and jobs?
Why ask it
Open calls, an agent, a group chat, a phone call from a former teacher: the route tells you how open or closed that corner of dance is. It is also the most practical thing a student could take from your article.
What does a contract look like in your part of dance: a season, a single project, or a day rate?
Why ask it
Terms differ widely by country, company, sector and union, so ask how it works where they are and write it up as one person's experience. Ask what counts as paid time too, because rehearsal, class and travel are not always treated alike.
How do the parts of your working year fit together: performing, teaching, anything else?
Why ask it
Many dancers build a year from performing, teaching, commercial jobs and work outside dance, and a plain question about it is usually welcome. Do not call the non-dance part a fallback; let them say what it is to them.
What do you teach, and what has teaching shown you about your own dancing?
Why ask it
Having to explain a step to a room of beginners exposes what you never quite understood yourself, and most dancers who teach have an example. The question also treats teaching as craft, which is how the people who do it think of it.
What does a full working day look like when you are in rehearsal for a show?
Why ask it
Ask for clock times: when class starts, how long the breaks are, when the last rehearsal ends and what happens after it. Students interviewing a dancer for an assignment get more from this one answer than from any question about passion.
What does a week look like when you are between jobs?
Why ask it
Class paid for out of pocket, a gym, teaching shifts, other work and applications are the usual ingredients. Ask it as a scheduling question and you will get the detail; ask it as a question about struggle and you will get a shrug.
Which part of your body tells you first that you have done too much?
Why ask it
Dancers tend to know their warning signals in detail, down to one joint or one tendon. Report it in their words and do not turn it into a diagnosis.
Has an injury ever changed how you dance?
Why ask it
Where there has been one, the lasting change is often technical: a different preparation, a side no longer favoured, a warm-up that got longer. Ask once, accept a short answer or a plain no, and leave the medical story alone.
Do you read reviews?
Why ask it
A short question with a long answer. Follow with something a reviewer said that was useful, and for a competition or commercial dancer ask about judges' score sheets or comments online instead.
What do you wish someone had told you before your first professional job?
Why ask it
The answers are practical and rarely about dancing: read the contract, keep receipts, bring your own food, find out who to call when the schedule changes. For a school or student publication this is the one to print in full.
What do you want to be doing when you stop performing?
Why ask it
How long a performing career lasts depends heavily on the form, so ask it as an open question and not as a countdown. Teaching, choreography, rehearsal direction and work outside dance all come up, and dancers who have thought about it answer in specifics.
Dance itself
What is the first thing you look at when you watch another dancer?
Why ask it
Feet, the back, how they use the floor, what happens between the steps: the answer is a short lesson in how to watch. It also tells you what they value, which is seldom the trick the crowd cheers for.
What makes a dance good to you, apart from being difficult?
Why ask it
Taking difficulty off the table forces a real answer about timing, intention, surprise or restraint. Ask for one example they have seen in the last year so the idea has something attached to it.
How do you hear music differently from someone who does not dance?
Why ask it
Dancers tend to hear structure before melody: where the eight starts, what sits on the off beat, how long a phrase lasts. Put a track on if the setting allows and ask them to count it aloud for you.
What does your style demand that another style does not?
Why ask it
You get the comparison between forms without asking anyone to rank them. A tap dancer may talk about being the percussion, a ballroom dancer about leading and following, a breaker about the floor and the circle around it.
Which class would you send a complete beginner to, and why that one?
Why ask it
Plenty of the people reading or listening would like to start, and this gives them somewhere to go. Ask about adult beginners specifically, since most advice assumes a child.
What should someone watching dance for the first time pay attention to?
Why ask it
A preview or a programme note can be built on this answer alone. The best versions are small instructions: follow one dancer for a whole section, notice who is standing still, stop trying to work out the story.
Do you dance when nobody is watching and it is not work?
Why ask it
Some say all the time, in the kitchen and at every wedding, and some say never, because it is a job and the body is tired. Either answer says something true about turning a pleasure into a profession.
What do audiences consistently miss?
Why ask it
The natural closer for a press or podcast interview: it hands them the floor to correct something, and it is often the most quotable moment of the conversation. Answers tend to be about labour, about the dancers behind the soloist, or about how much is decided in the room rather than choreographed.
Hiring
What have you been working on in the last six months?
Why ask it
Recent work tells a panel more than the full list on a CV, and it shows what condition a dancer is in now. Gaps between jobs are ordinary in this field and should not count against anyone.
Which styles can you perform at a professional level, and which can you get through?
Why ask it
The honest split protects both sides, because a dancer cast in a style they can only get through has a hard contract and the number suffers with them. See the first list danced in the audition before you rely on it.
Why this company or this show, and what have you seen of our work?
Why ask it
A dancer who has watched the repertoire, even on video, can say where they would fit in it. Someone who has not seen it may still be right for the job, so treat the answer as a measure of preparation and not as a test of loyalty.
Tell us about a part you had to learn at very short notice.
Why ask it
A swing, a cover or anyone joining a show late needs this skill, and the story shows the method: video, written notes, a patient colleague. Ask how many days they had and what they did first.
How do you respond when you are given a smaller part than the one you auditioned for?
Why ask it
A great deal of the work in a company or a show is ensemble work, and a production runs on the people who stay engaged at the back of the group. You are listening for a real example, not a promise to be a team player.
Are there dates in the rehearsal and performance period that you cannot do?
Why ask it
Freelance dancers hold several commitments at once, and a clash named now can usually be planned around. Put the same question to every candidate so nobody is singled out for having other work.
Is there anything in this job, such as lifts, floor work, heels or a particular costume, that you would want to know about before saying yes?
Why ask it
Describing the demands and letting the dancer respond is fairer than asking about their body or health. What an employer may ask about health or age depends on the country, so check the rules where you are before the interview.
Have you taught before, and which ages and levels?
Why ask it
For a studio post, follow it by asking how they would run the first ten minutes with a class of beginners. Background checks for working with children depend on the country and the employer, so find out what is required where you are.
What do you need from us to work safely: the floor, warm-up time, breaks?
Why ask it
An experienced dancer has an answer ready, and having one is a good sign and not a demand. It also tells you early if the venue's floor or the schedule is going to be a problem.
What do you want to know about pay, hours and the contract before you decide?
Why ask it
Dancers are often slow to raise money in an audition room, so raise it for them. State the fee and what it covers first, then leave room for the questions that follow.
How to use these questions
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Getting real answers
Take one or two groups, not the list
Half an hour with a dancer covers eight to ten of these properly. A student journalist might take Training and three from Rehearsal; a critic previewing a show, On stage and Dance itself; a podcaster with an hour, a few from each of the first five groups. The Hiring group is a separate conversation and should not be mixed into a press interview.
Start in the studio, not the career
Questions about this morning's class, today's rehearsal or the shoes they are wearing get concrete answers immediately. Career questions asked first tend to produce the biography they have given twenty times.
Learn the vocabulary of their form before you arrive
Knowing that ballet, contemporary, tap, hip hop and ballroom have different training structures, hierarchies and audition cultures changes what you can ask. It also stops you asking a company dancer about competitions or a battler about repertoire.
Watch a rehearsal if you can
Fifteen minutes in the room gives you three specific questions no list can supply: a correction you saw given, a phrase they repeated eight times, a moment they laughed. Interviews built on something observed are better than interviews built on preparation alone.
Ask about the work, not the sacrifice
Dancers are routinely asked about pain, discipline and what they gave up, and most are tired of it. The craft questions produce warmer answers and better material.
What the answers tend to reveal
- Whether they describe movement in counts, in images or in physical sensation. It is a good clue to how they were trained.
- How they talk about choreographers and rehearsal directors. A dancer who describes what the person does in the room, and not only how they felt about them, is giving you material you can print.
- Whether they mention other dancers by name. Company culture shows up here more clearly than in any answer about teamwork.
- What they say about money. A straightforward account of a mixed income is a sign they trust the conversation.
- Where they become technical. That is the subject to stay on, because it is where they know more than anyone else you will speak to.
What to avoid
Do not ask about weight, diet or body shape
These are sore subjects in a lot of dance training, and a question from an interviewer can land badly whatever the intent. Leave them alone unless the dancer raises them, and if they do, follow their lead instead of asking for detail.
Do not ask which style is hardest or best
It invites a defensive answer and reveals that you see the forms as ranked rather than different. Ask what a particular style demands that another does not, which gets you the same information without the comparison.
Do not ask them to demonstrate
Many dancers will not move cold, in ordinary clothes, for a photograph or a clip, and they are the judge of what is safe for them. If you need movement, arrange it in advance with time to warm up, and accept a refusal without negotiation.
Do not treat a teaching or unrelated job as failure
Most professional dancers earn from several sources, and framing that as not having made it will end the useful part of the interview. Ask how the pieces of the year fit together instead.
If you are interviewing a dancer for a job
Let the audition answer what it can
Technique, pick-up speed and how someone waits at the side of the studio are all visible in an audition, so do not spend interview minutes on them. Keep the Hiring questions for what dancing cannot show you: availability, experience of short-notice work, teaching, and what the dancer needs from you.
Describe the job before you ask anything
Give the dates, the hours, the fee, the floor and what the choreography involves at the start. A dancer who knows there are lifts on a hard stage or eight shows a week can tell you plainly whether the job suits them, which is better for both sides than finding out in the second week.
Ask every candidate the same questions
Pick five or six from the Hiring group and put them to everyone in the same order. It keeps the comparison fair, and it stops a panel asking the dancer they already like only the easy ones.
Stay off weight, age, health and family plans
Ask about the demands of the work and let the dancer say what they can do. What an employer is allowed to ask differs from country to country and sometimes by state, so if you are unsure, find out how it works where you are before the interview and not after it.
Follow-ups worth keeping ready
- "Show me what you mean with your hands." Dancers explain movement gesturally, and it usually unlocks a much better verbal description.
- "Who taught you that?" Almost every technical habit has a person attached to it, and the answer gives you their lineage.
- "What were you thinking about in that moment?" Better than asking how it felt, which tends to get an answer about the audience.
- "How many times had you done it before that night?" Puts a number on the labour behind a performance, which is the thing audiences most underestimate.