Dutch National Ballet Junior Company Auditions

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If I were a talented young dancer (or the mother, father, aunt, uncle, brother, sister, cousin, friend or teacher of such a dancer) I would be thrilled by the opportunity of joining the Dutch National Ballet Junior Company.  This is a half way house between ballet school and the professional stage which I discussed in an interview with Ernst Meisner in The Junior Company on 3 Dec 2014.

The Junior Company has already been the springboard for some brilliant careers.  I saw Michaela DePrince in Nov 2013 just after she had joined the Junior Company (see The Junior Company of the Dutch National Ballet - Stadsshouwburg Amsterdam 24 Nov 2013 25 Nov 2013) and she is already a grand subjet with the National Ballet. DePrince has been particularly successful but there are others who have done very well too. The outstanding young Italian dancer, Cristiano Principato, for instance, has already had a chance to show his talent for choreography by staging his own ballet (see Palagio 4 June 2016). Many of them have been recruited to the main company or been offered contracts with other fine companies such as the Stuttgart Ballet, the Norwegian National Ballet and the Hungarian National Ballet.

Such an opportunity has arisen because the Dutch National Ballet is holding auditions for next year's Junior Company at Amsterdam on 21 Jan 2017 (see Audition Junior Company on the Dutch National Ballet's website). Candidates can apply online so long as they meet the following requirements:

• strong classical ballet technique;
• minimums height of 5 feet 5 inches (1.65 metres) for ladies and 5 feet 11 inches (1.8 metres) for gents; and
• graduating this year or next.

I hope that there will be at least a few applications from the UK and that some may actually be good enough to get in but I wish all candidates from all countries all the very best. Whether or not he or she is accepted I wish each and every candidate who is good enough to try every success in his or her training and subsequent career.