Dancer wins a place in Australian company

Press, 10 February 1988, Page 22

Dancer wins a place in Australian company

At 14 Christchurch’s Adrian Burnett made ballet history when he became the youngest dancer accepted by the Australian Ballet School. He has just notched up another ballet triumph as one of four graduates from the school accepted this year as members of the Australian national company. He finished his time at the school in December having danced well enough there to win the Australian Ballet Foundation Scholarship in 1986. The Christchurch teenager went to Melbourne to further his dancing in 1983. He had taken ballet lessons at the Rhondda

McGlinchy-Sharon Wakefield School of Dance for nine years, passing all his examinations with honours. In Melbourne he joined the Victorian College of Arts for a year before auditioning for the Australian Ballet School. He was one of the class of 30 chosen from the 600 students who auditioned. Only four of that original class went on into the company proper this year. Before starting with the company the young dancer spent four weeks in Europe in private lessons. He had classes, with Maurice Be’jart in Switzerland, whom he found inspiring, the Kirov Com-

pany in Paris and the London Festival Ballet. One of his Christchurch teachers, Mrs Rhondda McGlinchy, who went to Melbourne in December to see him graduate, said the Europe lessons had been organised by the

dancer himself with help from the director of the Australian Ballet School. He is now working on roles for the national company’s production of “Sleeping Beauty” and in June will return to Europe with the company on a two-month tour. The dancer is still only 17 — an age when many students are just beginning their professional training. He wants to continue dancing for as long as he is able and would some day like to return to Christchurch. The Australian Ballet Company has had its share of dancers who began their careers in New Zealand. Fiona Tonkin, also from Christchurch, is at present a principal of the company.