The Royal Ballet promotes Calvin Richardson and Joseph Sissens to Principal
Director of The Royal Ballet, Kevin O’Hare, has announced the promotions and the joiners and leavers for The Royal Ballet‘s 2024/25 Season.
It has been immensely rewarding – he said – to watch the dancers display their extraordinary artistry and versatility on stage during the 2023/24 Season. Each artist makes a fantastic contribution to the Company’s artistic life and I am pleased to thank them all and detail the changes for next Season.
The following promotions have been made:
Principal Dancers
Calvin Richardson and Joseph Sissens are promoted to Principal.
First Soloists
Annette Buvoli, Leticia Dias, Sae Maeda, Mariko Sasaki, Lukas B. Brændsrød, Leo Dixon and Joonhyuk Jun are promoted to First Soloist.
Soloists
Sophie Allnatt, Chisato Katsura, Liam Boswell, Daichi Ikarashi, Joshua Junker and Francisco Serrano are promoted to Soloist.
First Artists
Madison Bailey, Viola Pantuso, Sumina Sasaki, Marianna Tsembenhoi and Brayden Gallucci are promoted to First Artist.
The Aud Jebsen Young Dancer programme was established in 2014 and provides recently graduated dancers a year’s contract to be nurtured and perform alongside the corps de ballet of The Royal Ballet. The Company is indebted to the most generous philanthropic support of Aud Jebsen for this life-changing opportunity for graduates of The Royal Ballet School. By the beginning of next Season, 61 contracts will have been made available for dancers at the first stage of their careers since the programme’s inception.
From the 23/24 Season’s intake, Bethany Bartlett, Sierra Glasheen, Isabella Shaker, Caspar Lench and Blake Smith become Artists.
For the 2024/25 Season, six graduates from The Royal Ballet School join the Aud Jebsen Young Dancers Programme: Francesca Lloyd, Katie Robertson, Rebecca Myles Stewart, Ravi Connier-Watson, Emile Gooding and Alejandro Muñoz.
Airi Kobayashi from the Deparc Ballet School in Japan joins as the Prix de Lausanne dancer for the 2024/25 Season.
Leavers…
As previously announced, Principal dancer Alexander Campbell left The Royal Ballet earlier this year to take up a new role as Artistic Director of the Royal Academy of Dance.
After 11 years with The Royal Ballet, and with the last year spent as a guest dancer in Norway, Soloist Gina Storm Jensen will now become a permanent member of The Norwegian National Ballet.
Soloist David Yudes also departs the Company after 10 years to become director of the Escola de Dansa Marisa Yudes in Barcelona.
Artist Stanislaw Węgrzyn leaves The Royal Ballet to take up a soloist contract at the Semperoper Dresden.
Seunghee Han from the 2023/24 Aud Jebsen Young Dancers Programme leaves to join the National Ballet of Canada RBC Apprentice Programme.
The Company’s current Prix de Lausanne dancer, Julie-Ann Joyner, joins Norwegian National Ballet 2.
Graham Spicer, aka ‘Gramilano’, is a writer, director and photographer based in Milan. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy. His articles have appeared in various publications from Woman’s Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the Danza in Italia column for Dancing Times magazine. Graham was the historical advisor on Codice Carla, the 2023 documentary on Carla Fracci.
Graham also works as a dance photographer, and his photos have appeared in many books, theatre programmes, and magazines, including Dancing Times, Dance Spirit and Ballet2000, as well as all the major Italian newspapers.
He is a member of the Dance Section of The Critics’ Circle.
