SPRING SEMINAR

March 17 – 23, 2024

The Spring Seminar is a week-long workshop with international teachers for dance students aged 11-18 yrs, held at the Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie Street in Vancouver. Auditions are required.

For one week during March break, the VBS brings in accomplished teachers from Canada and abroad to lead the dance intensive, culminating in a presentation of both intermediate and advanced levels. Students spend half the day in ballet classes and the other half of the day in contemporary classes, coming together for lunch time presentations and meetings.

At the end of the week-long intensive, the students present a performance in the Faris Theatre. The guest faculty select students who will be awarded scholarships, which they receive at the performance. Each year through fundraising efforts, approximately $20,000 are awarded to young dancers from British Columbia. The VBS has been doing this for the past 20 years.

$500

Tuition

March 17 – 23, 2024

Spring Seminar Dates

Age 11+

Requirements

REQUIREMENTS

Intermediate

11 – 13 years old
Minimum Cecchetti Grade 5/6 or RAD Intermediate Foundation or their equivalent. 

Advanced

14 – 18 years old
Minimum Cecchetti Intermediate or RAD Advanced 1 or their equivalent.

Must be a VBS member to attend. Must be the age requirement by March 17, 2024.

AUDITION

Date: Sunday, January 14, 2024
Location: Scotiabank Dance Centre

Advanced

10:00am – 11:30am

Intermediate

12:00pm – 1:30pm (Group 1)
1:45pm – 3:15pm (Group 2)

Cost: $40 for VBS members and non-members (includes GST). Membership is required to be eligible for scholarships. Space is limited and pre-registration is required on a first-come, first-served basis.

Scholarship Eligibility

In order to be eligible to receive a scholarship with the Vancouver Ballet Society during Spring Seminar, you must meet these requirements:

  • • Be 11-18 years old
  • • Be a BC resident and training in BC
  • • Cecchetti Grade 5/6 or RAD Inter Found and higher
  • • Current membership with VBS
  • • Must attend the audition
  • • Must participate in 75% of the Spring Seminar 

Our 2024 Spring Seminar Audition Teacher

Maureen Eastick

Maureen Eastick is the founder and former/Artistic Director of Pacific Dance Centre. She has led a distinguished career as a dance educator and has trained many successful dancers including Crystal Pite. 

For fourteen years, Mrs. Eastick was a ballet pedagogue in the Dance Training Department at the Banff Centre for the Arts. Believing so strongly in the value of this program, she created the Maureen Eastick Endownment Fund, enabling many gifted young dancers to further their studies at that remarkable institution.

Mrs. Eastick holds a BFA from the University of Victoria and has Life Member Status with the Royal Academy of Dance. She is a regular guest teacher and adjudicator throughout Canada and was awarded the Dance Victoria Chrystal Award in recognition of a lifetime of contributing to the dance community.

Our 2024 Spring Seminar Teachers

Deborah Hess

Deborah Hess is an internationally renowned ballet teacher and coach.  A faculty member at Canada’s National Ballet School, she also leads the School’s Student Exchange Program.
Ms. Hess is a frequent guest teacher at companies and schools around the world and is a sought-after juror for major international ballet competitions.  
She had a rewarding international performing career dancing a wide range of roles from Odette in Swan Lake, to neo-classical works by choreographers such Bronislava Nijinska and contemporary works by choreographers like Lar Lubovitch, to name a few.  She toured throughout Europe, North and South America with such luminaries as Rudolf Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn.
 
Deborah was always interested in teaching and began pursuing her passion for teaching while she was the Assistant to the Director at the San Francisco Ballet School, Greatly influenced by her own teachers, Valentina Pereyaslavec, Kathleen Crofton, Asaf Messerer, Jorge Garcia and Anna-Marie Holmes, she values most highly the artistic possibilities of dance and strives in her teaching to bring out the individuality of each student, highlighting musicality, generosity of spirit and dynamic range, while respecting the purity of form.
She is delighted that so many of the dancers she had the privilege of teaching are now dancing so successfully on stages around the world.

Jon Ole Olstad

Jon Ole Olstad graduated from the National Academy of the Arts in Oslo with a bachelor’s degree in 2009. He was then hired for the tour project “Kamuyot", a collaboration between the Swedish Riksteatern, and Batsheva Dance Company, led by artistic director Ohad Naharin. From 2012-2014, he worked at Nederlands Dans Theater 1, led by artistic director Paul Lightfoot, where he had the honor of working with him and Sol Leon, Johan Inger, Hofesh Shechter, Marco Goecke, Alexander Ekman, Jiri Kylian, Mehdi Walerski and Crystal Pite. His own choreography has been presented at several festivals, and choreographic competitions such as Cross Connection Choreography Competition in Copenhagen, Stockholm Dance Film Festival, and Gala of the stars. 
 
In 2015, he presented his solo “and we already knew the names" at the prestigious International Solo Tanz Competition in Stuttgart. He was awarded 1st prize dancer and 1st prize choreographer and toured the solo in Germany, Brazil and NYC. In 2019 he was awarded the production prize from Ballet Basel at the 33rd International Hannover Choreography competition with the solo ’Finally it's everything’. 

In 2009, he started teaching to share his knowledge and his love of dance. He has taught and choreographed at numerous educational programs including Juilliard, NYU-Tisch, Tanz Akademie Zurich The Palucca School, Marymount Manhattan College, Acosta Danza, Khio- Oslo, Balettakademien Göteborg/ Stockholm, Akademie Des Tanzez Mannheim, and Copenhagen Contemporary Dance School, to name a few.

Past Teachers Include

Cynthia Harvey
Cynthia Harvey
American Former Ballet Dancer, Ballet Mistress and Educator
Christian Canciani
Christian Canciani
Professor of the Contemporary Dance Department of Palucca University of Dance Dresden
Margaret Tracey
Margaret Tracey
International Dance Educator, former Principal New York City Ballet
Lesley Telford
Lesley Telford
Choreographer and Artistic Director of Inverso Productions
Ori Flomin
Ori Flomin
Independent choreographer and dancer based in New York City
Caroline Gruber
Caroline Gruber
Ballet Master at Canada’s Royal Winnipeg Ballet
Colleen Thomas
Colleen Thomas
New York based choreographer and performing artist, AD of Colleen Thomas Dance
Elena Glurjidze
Elena Glurjidze
Senior Principal at the English National Ballet
Véronique Jean
Véronique Jean
Based at the Conservatoire de La Rochelle in France
Avatâra Ayuso
Avatâra Ayuso
Creates new works for various companies around the world, AVA Dance Company