Feb 21, 2024
Ballet Help Desk sat down with Vanessa Léonard, Director of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet's Anna McCowan-Johnson Aspirant Program. She covered not only how the program is structured, but how dancers work with the main company, where dancers get jobs and also how students can audition to join the program. Ms. Léonard also covers the unique challenges that dancers face when trying to dance in a country that isn't their own, especially when it comes to visa issues. Tune in to hear more about this unique Canadian company!
Interested in auditioning for Royal Winnipeg Ballet School?
Video auditions being accepted through June 1, 2024:
https://www.rwb.org/school/professional-division/audition/video-auditions/
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Vanessa Léonard Bio
Originally from Edmonton, Alberta, Vanessa Léonard has been
gracing the studios
and stages of the Canada’s Royal Winnipeg Ballet since 1994 as a
student, principal
dancer, and ballet master. In 2021, Ms. Léonard was honoured to be
appointed as
Director of the RWB’s Anna McCowan-Johnson Aspirant Program. She
received her
early training from the Edmonton School of Ballet and the RWB
School Professional
Division before being hired into the RWB Company in 1997.
During a fifteen-year career, Ms. Léonard portrayed the lead female
role in many
well-known works; the first of such roles was in David Nixon’s
Butterfly when Nixon
picked her from the corps de ballet to perform the lead. In the
2001/02 season she
worked with Sir Peter Wright to dance the dramatic and technical
role of Giselle.
Other roles that Ms. Léonard enjoyed dancing include Odette/Odile
in Galina
Yardonova’s staging of Swan Lake, Princess Aurora in The Sleeping
Beauty, Lucy in
Mark Godden’s Dracula, Pamina in Mark Godden’s The Magic Flute, the
tender Cours
D’Amour in Mauricio Wainrot’s Carmina Burana and the lead role of
Nancy in Val
Caniparoli’s A Cinderella Story. Ms. Léonard is known for roles
that have been
created on her including Tinker Bell in Jorden Morris’ Peter Pan;
Destiny in Mauricio
Wainrot’s Carmen, The Passion; March Hare in Shawn Hounsell’s
Wonderland; and
Natalie in Jorden Morris’s Moulin Rouge® – The Ballet. In 2009 Ms.
Léonard danced
the role of Juliet in Rudi van Dantzig’s Romeo & Juliet for which
she was called
“simply stunning” by the Winnipeg Free Press.
Ms. Léonard has appeared as a guest artist internationally,
performing in galas with
the Compania Nacional de Danza in Mexico City, the Benios De La
Danse in
Moscow, the 10th and 13th International Ballet Festivals of Miami,
and the Encore
International Dance Festival in Quebec. She has also been invited
to dance with
various companies and schools in full-length productions of
Nutcracker, Swan
Lake and The Sleeping Beauty in Canada, the USA and Spain. In 2009,
Peter Quanz
selected Ms. Léonard to perform a new piece called In Tandem at the
Guggenheim
Museum in New York City and at the 2010 Canada Dance Festival in
Ottawa. As part
of the Cultural Olympiad for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic
Games she
performed the lead in Iztik Galili’s Hikarizatto.
Since retiring from dance in 2013, Ms. Léonard has staged and
coached many
ballets for the RWB Company, Professional Division and Aspirant
program. She has
also staged full length ballets for Orlando Ballet, Louisville
Ballet and the National
Ballet of Cuba and has enjoyed guest teaching for schools and
companies around the world.