Swan Lake, Op. 20, is a ballet composed by Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky in 1875–76. Despite its initial failure, it is now one of the most popular ballets of all time.
New York City Ballet (NYCB) is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company. Léon Barzin was the company's first music director. City Ballet grew out of earlier troupes: the Producing Company of the School of American Ballet, 1934; the American Ballet, 1935, and Ballet Caravan, 1936, which merged into American Ballet Caravan, 1941; and directly from the Ballet Society, 1946.
Contemporary dance is a genre of dance performance that developed during the mid-twentieth century and has since grown to become one of the dominant genres for formally trained dancers throughout the world, with particularly strong popularity in the U.S. and Europe. Although originally informed by and borrowing from classical, modern, and jazz styles, it has come to incorporate elements from many styles of dance. Due to its technical similarities, it is often perceived to be closely related to modern dance, ballet, and other classical concert dance styles.
The National Ballet of Canada is a Canadian ballet company that was founded in 1951 in Toronto, Ontario, with Celia Franca, the first artistic director. A company of 70 dancers with its own orchestra, the National Ballet has been led since 2022 by artistic director Hope Muir. Renowned for its diverse repertoire, the company performs traditional full-length classics, embraces contemporary work and encourages the creation of new ballets, as well as the development of Canadian dancers and choreographers.
The Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT) is a modern dance company based in New York City. It was founded in 1958 by choreographer and dancer Alvin Ailey. It is made up of 32 dancers, led by artistic director Robert Battle and associate artistic director Matthew Rushing.
The Cape Town City Ballet Company, formerly known as the CAPAB Ballet Company, is a dance company based in Cape Town, South Africa.
Elizabeth Triegaardt is a South African ballet dancer, now retired. She is professor emerita of the University of Cape Town School of Dance and an honorary executive director of the Cape Town City Ballet.
David Poole was a South African ballet dancer, choreographer, teacher, and company director. During his thirty-year association with dance companies in Cape Town, he had "a profound effect on ballet in South Africa. He is internationally recognised as a significant figure in the world of dance.
Sara Ann Mearns is an American ballet dancer. She is a principal dancer at New York City Ballet.
Jay Pather is a South African curator, choreographer, and director working in Cape Town. He is the director of Siwela Sonke Dance Theatre and an associate professor at the University of Cape Town. Pather has been involved in the choreography and direction of over one hundred productions in South Africa and even more internationally.
Leán Coetzer is a South African dancer and choreographer. Her dance career officially began as founder member of the PACT Dance Company in 1988. Since then, Coetzer has performed and choreographed around South Africa, including the creation of several performance art pieces in various exhibitions and festivals. She works as a Voice Movement Therapy Practitioner.
Jazzart Dance Theatre is a leading contemporary dance company in South Africa. It is known not only for its combination of Western and African styles, but also for its focus on social justice and community improvement. Jazzart Dance Theatre aims to be a trransformative dance company that reflects the changing social environment of South Africa. Meanwhile, Jazzart's training programme provides dance theatre training and creative interventions to South African communities most in need of opportunities to express their artistic impulses.
Vincent Mantsoe is a South African dancer and choreographer. Raised in the Soweto township outside Johannesburg, he combines the street dance of his childhood with traditional and contemporary dance styles. Spirituality and the cultural influences of African, Aboriginal Australian, Asian, contemporary, and ballet traditions are important influences on Mantsoe's work. He is also the founder of Association Noa.
Mamela Nyamza is a dancer, teacher, choreographer, curator, director and activist in South Africa. She is trained in a variety of styles of dance including ballet, modern dance, African dance, the Horton technique, Spanish dance, jazz, movement and mime, flying low technique, release technique, gumboot dance and Butoh. Her style of dance and choreography blends aspects of traditional and contemporary dances. Nyamza has performed nationally and internationally. She has choreographed autobiographical, political, and social pieces both on her own and in collaboration with other artists. She draws inspiration from her daily life and her childhood growing up in Gugulethu, as well as her identity as a homosexual, Black, South African woman. She uses her platform to share some of the traumas faced by South African lesbians, such as corrective rape. Additionally, she has created various community outreach projects that have spread dance to different communities within South Africa, including the University of Stellenbosch's Project Move 1524, a group that uses dance therapy to educate on issues relating to HIV/AIDS, domestic violence and drug abuse.
Frank Staff was a South African ballet dancer, choreographer, producer, and company director. He was a major figure in the history of European theatrical dance in South Africa.
Faith de Villiers was a South African dancer, producer, choreographer, teacher, company director, and adjudicator. Active primarily in the northern province of the Transvaal, she is recognized as one of the most influential pioneers of ballet in South Africa.
Philip Miller is a South African composer and sound artist based in Cape Town. His work is multi-faceted, often developing from collaborative projects in theatre, film, video and sound installations.
Kirvan Fortuin was a Khoikhoi First nation dancer, choreographer and LGBT activist, the child of Ms Charlotte Fortuin, a Khoikhoi community stripped of language, land and culture and who were erased as a people post-democracy South Africa
