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© Corey Miller Photo
Motion Studios' Morgann Rose.
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Morgann Rose, founder and owner (left), with her colleague Betsy Larabee (right), using the GYROTONIC Tower to improve their ballet movements.
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Rose is coaching her client on the GYROTONIC machine with an “Arch and Curl” series to improve upper-body mobility and strength, including the neck, shoulders, and spine. The movements mimic the sensations and benefits of swimming, Tai-Chi and dance.
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The GYROTONIC method is beneficial for both men and women. This client is being coached on mobility and stability of his shoulders to help improve his golf swing. The circular movements promote healthy joints and elasticity in the muscles.
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Rose is coaching a client recovering from both hip and knee replacements. The low-impact nature of the movements allows for a safe and effective rehabilitation process. While stretching the hamstrings, there is a major focus on alignment and function of the entire leg.
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The GYROTONIC Method benefits all ages and physical abilities. Here a client is working on spinal motions using the “Wing Master” that safely and effectively assists the spine in proper movement patterns. This technique improves mobility and stability and decreases pain.
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© Corey Miller Photo
Motion Studios offers group classes, including “Movement Therapy” (pictured above), “Ballet Based Conditioning,” and “An Introduction to the GYROTONIC Method,” which is conducted on the machines.
When the toddler saw a ballet being performed on public TV, she instinctively began jumping around, imitating the dancers. When her mother asked the little girl what she was doing, she could only respond, “That, that!” After being told it was ballet, the child excitedly told her mother, “I like valet!”
And while many young girls clamor for “valet” lessons, Rose was committed from the start. She started taking ballet, tap and jazz lessons, continuing until she was 9 years old and found her passion for ballet. With parents who supported her fully, she took classes five to seven days a week, her brothers doing their homework at the ballet studio while she danced.
At 15, Rose left her California home on a scholarship to the University of North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem. “It was wonderful being around so many like minds in a nurturing environment,” Rose recalls. “It really prepared me for my life.”
The natural next step was New York, where she joined Ballet Tech, a contemporary ballet company led by choreographer Eliot Feld, where, as she puts it, the company “worked our butts off.” But her focus changed when some friends came through New York en route to audition for the Washington Ballet and its hip, young artistic director, Septime Webre. Although Rose hadn’t considered going to the auditions herself, she was looking for something new. “I decided the morning of the audition to go, so I had holes in my leotard and tights,” she says with a laugh. “I was just so happy to dance. The next morning, I got offered a job.”
After finishing out her New York contract, she moved to Washington, D.C., where she stayed for 20 years, progressing from apprentice to a principal dancer and often working with the choreographer on female role development. After retiring, Rose was hired by Webre to stage his works with various companies around the world, including the Oregon Ballet Theatre, Nevada Ballet Theatre and Hong Kong Ballet.
Albert Einstein famously said, “Dancers are the athletes of God,” but ballet, like all athletic endeavors, can result in injuries. In 2001, Rose began cross-training to address an imbalance in her muscles. It was then that she discovered GYROTONIC® Method, a movement method that stimulates the nervous system, increases range of motion and improves strength and movement efficiency using specialized equipment to guide, assist and challenge the user. Because each movement flows into the next, the joints can move through a natural range of motion without being compressed or jarred. The Washington Ballet had an arrangement with a local Gyrotonics studio and Rose soon began taking classes twice a week. “It helped me elongate my muscles and kept them healthy,” she says. “GYROTONICS helped save my career.”
While performing as a soloist in 2005, something snapped in her hip. Because of a misdiagnosis, she went through some physical therapy and continued dancing on the severely injured hip for the rest of the year. The next year she had surgery to repair the torn cartilage at the top of her hip and went through another round of physical therapy. “But I wasn’t getting my mobility and flexibility back,” she says. “Then I remembered GYROTONICS.” After finding a studio in Bethesda, she returned to regular GYROTONICS classes. “Within a month, I was back to dancing.”
Realizing that she needed GYROTONICS in her life every day, she began working at the front desk of a Georgetown GYROTONIC studio in exchange for taking classes. Before long, the owner suggested that she go through the training to become certified to teach during her summers off from ballet. But it wasn’t just a matter of becoming certified because recertification every two years was also required, an expensive proposition for a dancer. Rose applied for a Career Transition for Dancers grant, explaining in her essay why she needed the funds and what she intended to use them for. “That helped fuel my GYROTONICS journey,” she says. “I taught and apprenticed and got my final certification with a master trainer.”
Rose has been teaching since 2008 as a way to bring in supplemental income and continue her own development. The reason is simple: “The more you develop your own practice, the better you can relay that information to a client.”
During a dress rehearsal in 2016, Rose’s hip went out again. An MRI revealed that the cartilage was frayed, so reconstructive surgery, another round of PT and GYROTONICS followed. By the time she returned to the company healthy, Webre had left, and a new artistic director was in place. It felt like a natural stopping point, so Rose retired in 2017. “It was hard to lose my identity as a dancer, but I had been able to do what I loved my whole career,” she says. “I felt very blessed to have had that experience.”
In 2019, Rose moved to Reston, where she opened her own GYROTONIC studio. When friends invited her for a weekend in the Northern Neck, she was happy to have a reason to escape the city. “It was early spring and there was no mention of this really handsome guy whose house we were going to,” she laughs, recalling how their mutual friends intended for them to meet. “So, we were introduced in a sly way, but then we clicked and that was it!”
Although Pierre Monacelli lived in Old Town Alexandria, he’d had a house in Reedville for two decades. When life as we knew it came to a stop in 2020, the couple decided to relocate to the Neck for a couple months to escape the pandemic. Not surprisingly, they fell in love with the natural beauty, slower pace and friendly faces. “We hated to leave here. It was a leap of faith, but it’s the best decision we ever made,” she says of selling her condo in Reston in a mere two days. “Between the people and the environment, we got through the pandemic with so much love and serenity.”
Rose began teaching at Etudes Ballet School in White Stone in fall 2020, where she met recent Houston transplant Betsey Larabee during summer 2021. Larabee was a cancer survivor who had rehabbed her body using GYROTONICS and then gone on to get her certification. Her goal was to work with others recovering from cancer and traumatic life events. Suddenly, the pieces fell into place. “Now that I knew another person who could be at a studio, the wheels began turning,” Rose says. “That helped me bite the bullet and do it.”
Motion Studios opened on Church Street in Kilmarnock in March, with Rose confident enough to sign a three-year lease. With an eye to the future, she chose a space that can be built out to house a larger variety of one-hour classes as the need arises. In addition to private and group GYROTONIC sessions, she offers movement therapy, barre conditioning classes, yoga sessions and private sessions. The studio is ADA-accessible, and sessions can be done from a wheelchair. The current class schedule is expected to evolve as she hears from people about the kinds of classes they’d like to see offered.
And while the wooden machines may look foreign to the first timer, the beauty of GYROTONICS is that the small class size—there are four machines that offer guidance and resistance—and hands-on approach of the instructor make for a very in-depth and personal form of movement. “It’s one-on-one with the instructor guiding your muscles in the right direction and directing your breathing,” Rose says. “We’ll help you find the muscles that are overworking and indicate the muscles that should be working. We’re there to help you, guide you and let you find out for yourself.”
The benefits are many, from feeling more elongated in your spine to a feeling of lightness, making for less impact with movement. Rose sees it as an ideal complement to golfing, boating and fishing, among other activities. “It doesn’t replace cardio, but it does give your joints space, so you feel more buoyancy in your muscles,” Rose says. “Many people say it gives them a deeper mind-body connection. It’s one more holistic way for people to feel healthy and discover their bodies.”
Perhaps best of all, GYROTONICS has no age or agility requirements, nor is it necessary to be athletic or particularly bendy. Those rehabbing from knee, ankle and hip surgery are especially good candidates. Regardless of fitness level, anyone can find a way to move using the handles, straps and pulleys under Rose’s guidance. “Think of it as a new wellness component that can help you get back to being able to tie your shoes, garden or do the things you’re now avoiding because of back pain,” Rose says. “It helps people get back to their former lifestyle.”
She should know. Ballet provided a glorious life experience, traveling, meeting people and dancing dream roles. “I learned from the world and through the art,” she says happily.
“It brought me to GYROTONICS, and it shaped who I am.”
Motion Studios I 15 East Church Street, Kilmarnock, Virginia 22482 I motionstudiosva@gmail.com I 202-580-9542 I motionstudiosva.com