                |
David
LaHay is the founding Artistic
Director of Ballet Kelowna and brings many years of expertise to
his directorship as a performer, teacher, ballet master and director. He
enjoyed a long and successful career as principal dancer with Les Grands
Ballets Canadiens (Montreal) and was guest artist with The Royal Swedish
Ballet (Stockholm), The Alberta Ballet (Calgary) and The Cuban
International Dance Festival (Havana). As a performer his many classical
roles included Albrecht (Giselle), Prince Seigfried (Swan Lake), The
Poet (Les Sylphides), The Cavalier (The Nutcracker) as well as Don
Quixote and The Flower Festival at Genzano pas de deux. He also danced
many neo-classical, contemporary and modern works by such renowned
choreographers as George Balanchine, Antony Tudor, Brian Macdonald,
Ronald Hynd, Fernand Nault, John Butler and James Kudelka. As a teacher, Mr. LaHay has taught extensively throughout Canada as ballet master for Les Grands Ballets Canadiens (Dir. Linda Stearns, Jeanne Renaud, Lawrence Rhodes), The Ottawa Ballet (Dir. Frank Augustyn), The Alberta Ballet (Dir. Ali Pourfarrokh) as well as guest ballet master for The Gothenburg Ballet (Sweden). His teaching affiliations have included The Hartford Ballet, Ecole Superieure de Danse du Quebec, Les Ballets Jazz de Montreal, The Vancouver Ballet Society, The Chautauqua Summer Dance Program, The Banff Centre Summer Dance Program and The Canadian School of Ballet. He has taught master classes across Canada. Mr. LaHay has been affiliated with The Banff Centre since 1993. He has taught, coached, assisted choreographers (including the Clifford E. Lee Choreographic Award winners), staged ballets for both The Professional Dance Program and The Young Dancers in Performance Program as well as choreographing many works for the Dance Training Program. He served as the Associate Director of the program until its closure this year. Mr. LaHay will be the Director of the new Okanagan Summer Dance Intensive in Kelowna. Mr. LaHay holds a BA from Trent University and an Honours BFA from York University and has been a contributing journalist for DanceCanadaDanse and Ballet International publications. |
Artistic Director - David LaHay |
