Eva Kistrup on the Royal Danish Ballet School

[Alexandra]

Eva Kistrup has launched a series of articles as background for the forthcoming American tour by the Royal Danish Ballet. She just posted the first article, on the Royal Danish Ballet School and an interview with its director, Niels Ballet, in her danceviewtimes blog:

Royal Danish Ballet School, a success story

As the Royal Danish Ballet will tour USA May - June 2011, I am writing a number of articles leading up to the tour presenting ballets, dancers and the company history. We will kick off the series with an interview with Niels Balle, the leader of the ballet school and possible the most important person in securing the company's future.

Royal Danish Ballet School, a success story

After decades of dwindling numbers of applications and limited output, the Royal Danish Ballet School is up to the task and is now producing scores of talented young dancers. This year 7 apprentices have been promoted to first-year-dancers and a record of 9 students have been accepted to the apprentice programme.

[Helene]

I think this is particularly exciting:

“It is the prerogative of the artistic director to decide which dancers he can use in the company, and this year two students did not make it to the company. But we do not cut the ties to the students. Instead, like many other ballet schools, we help the students to apply for other international and leading ballet schools where they may finish their education. It is a new development for the school that we can also produce dancers for other schools and companies than the RDB. The Danish school combines a century old tradition and skills with a high level of professional education to the demands of today’s ballet scene. We do focus on the needs of the RDB company but the staff and I are proud that our students do well elsewhere and also have skills they can use in and outside the ballet world”, concludes Niels Balle.

(Emphasis added)

Hopefully we'll see some of these students "finish" at the PNB school and have a chance at an apprenticeship.

[kitcat]

Interesting article, thanks for posting.

My daughter has learned a Napoli variation with all the beats, and it's quite beautiful. I'm really looking forward to seeing Napoli at OCPAC in May!