Why Dance Matters
59 episodes - English - Latest episode: 22 days ago - ★★★★★ - 4 ratingsWhy Dance Matters is a series of conversations with extraordinary people from the world of dance and beyond. It traces the impact of dance on their lives and asks why dance matters to them – and why it might matter to us all. The RAD inspires the world to dance, and we hope these insightful personal conversations – hosted by David Jays, editor of Dance Gazette, the RAD magazine – will delight and even surprise you. Find out more on our website > https://www.royalacademyofdance.org/
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Episodes
Episode 6 - Special Episode
April 04, 2024 00:00 - 25 minutes - 17.5 MBLife changing moments with Why Dance Matters! We’ve made over 50 episodes of Why Dance Matters, and the conversations often hinge on life-changing moments. This special episode gathers some compelling chats about change. Some are personal choices which prove momentous: the unlikely decision to pursue ballet, or to host a ballet class in your front room. Others include being part of a major cultural event, like a movie the whole world is watching, or a period of historic change, happening be...
Episode 5 - Olivia Lume
March 28, 2024 01:00 - 33 minutes - 23 MBWith members in over 80 countries around the world, and Royal Academy of Dance’s relationship with its members depends on its National Directors. They include Olivia Lume, who last year celebrated her 40th year with the RAD. As National Director for the Academy in Africa, she has lived through historic changes, and has seen the RAD grow, especially after its flagship event – now The Fonteyn, formerly the Genée International Ballet Competition – was held for the first time in Africa, in Cape ...
Episode 4 - Rebecca Yates
March 21, 2024 01:00 - 32 minutes - 51.9 MBThe Silver Swans programme is one of the Royal Academy of Dance’s most life-enhancing initiatives. Silver Swans are people of 55 and over taking a specially-designed programme of RAD ballet classes: some are experiencing dance classes for the very first time, and describe how Silver Swans fosters physical and emotional wellbeing. Rebecca Yates, an RAD teacher in north east England has developed a committed community of Silver Swans. But what are the charms and challenges of teaching people o...
Episode 3 - Patrick Makuakāne
March 14, 2024 01:00 - 41 minutes - 66.1 MBPatrick Makuakane is a dance maker, teacher and hula master and recently received a fellowship from the MacArthur Foundation. The fellowships are given to preeminent artists and thinkers and are popularly known as the ‘genius’ awards. Patrick is a passionate and thoughtful advocate for hula, a form of dance inextricably linked with Hawaii’s history and culture. Born in Honolulu, Patrick is now based in San Francisco, where he has built a vibrant community of hula dancers and students. He spe...
Episode 2 - Naomi Smart
March 07, 2024 01:00 - 20 minutes - 14.3 MBIn 2021, Naomi Smart qualified as a teacher from the Royal Academy of Dance. ‘Never thought dance teaching was an option for me but here I am – Deaf people can do anything.’ What are the particular challenges around ballet and dance teaching for a Deaf teacher? How did Naomi create a way of teaching that works for her and her students, and what advice would she have for teachers trying to make their classes as inclusive and welcoming as possible? Naomi Smart is an RAD teacher based in Londo...
Episode 1 - Wesley Ruzibiza
February 29, 2024 01:00 - 37 minutes - 59.8 MBWe launch the new season of Why Dance Matters with a vital figure in African contemporary dance. Wesley Ruzibiza discovered dance almost by accident – he was studying financial management at the University of Rwanda when he decided to sample a dance class. It set him on the path to becoming a choreographer and co-Artistic Director of the École des Sables in Senegal, one of the world’s most influential training organisations (their production of Pina Bausch’s Rite of Spring is an internationa...
Episode 50 - Olga Smirnova
January 18, 2024 01:00 - 24 minutes - 39.6 MBWhy Dance Matters celebrates its 50th episode in conversation with one of the world’s great ballerinas. Olga Smirnova’s Giselle with Dutch National Ballet will be broadcast to international cinemas on 21 January. She joined the company after making headlines in 2022 with a courageous, life-changing decision to leave Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In a wide-ranging and thoughtful conversation, she discusses stage fright (she never feels it), the challenge...
Episode 6 - Nina Wadia
December 21, 2023 01:00 - 39 minutes - 63.5 MBThis festive episode visits the pantomime: that uniquely British blend of song, dance, and silliness. Explaining its appeal is the cherished comic actor, Nina Wadia, who stars in Jack and the Beanstalk at York Theatre Royal. Nina, who grew up in India and Hong Kong, is the perfect guide to anyone who is not steeped in panto. She also discusses a career that includes her trailblazing sketch show, Goodness Gracious Me, the iconic British soap opera, EastEnders, and a terrible car crash that he...
Episode 5 - Benjamin Zephaniah (a tribute)
December 14, 2023 01:00 - 34 minutes - 55 MBIn this episode of Why Dance Matters, we revisit a conversation from October 2022, in tribute to the poet, performer and activist Benjamin Zephaniah, who died earlier this month. As a performance poet he gave words a glorious physical form, his rhythms dancing from line to line. He had also provided a voiceover for Rambert’s dance version of the hit tv series Peaky Blinders. In our conversation, Benjamin was impressively candid about his journey, richly reflective about poetry, and also emot...
Episode 4 - Aaron S. Watkin
December 07, 2023 01:00 - 37 minutes - 60.3 MBAaron S Watkin seems like a man who knows what he likes: perfect material to direct a leading ballet company, and to judge a leading ballet competition. The new artistic director of English National Ballet was recently a judge for the Royal Academy of Dance’s Margot Fonteyn International Ballet Competition in London. Canadian-born Aaron danced with many international companies and led the Semperoper Ballett in Dresden for 17 years, and has just taken charge at English National Ballet. What a...
Episode 3 - Pam Tanowitz
November 30, 2023 01:00 - 34 minutes - 54.8 MBPam Tanowitz is now an in-demand choreographer – but her career has followed a unique trajectory. For years, she and her company had an under-the-radar following in New York, but only recently did she win wider attention. A work set to TS Eliot’s 4 Quartets led to international tours and commissions for the Royal Ballet and New York City Ballet. Before that happened she worked and worked: at dance, but also unglamorous admin jobs. When we met at the Barbican for the London premiere of her So...
Episode 2 - Jakob Wheway Hughes
November 23, 2023 01:00 - 29 minutes - 47.9 MBJakob Wheway Hughes was gold medallist at the Royal Academy of Dance’s Margot Fonteyn International Ballet Competition 2023. The Fonteyn took place at His Majesty’s Theatre in London, the opulent home of Phantom of the Opera. Jakob performed a new solo and a bravura classical variation, and seemed strikingly at ease on stage, communicating his dance to the packed audience. It was no surprise that Dame Darcey Bussell, the RAD President, presented him with the gold medal. Jakob,16, who trains ...
Episode 1 - Drew McOnie
November 16, 2023 01:00 - 39 minutes - 63.1 MBDrew McOnie is a British choreographer and theatre director, and one of the busiest people in show business. He danced with Matthew Bourne’s New Adventures company, but soon wanted to run the show. His work hits a sweet spot between warm and witty, always with a kinetic fizz: whether in the West End, on Broadway or in ballet. His new version of the Nutcracker gives the festive favourite a sweetly queer twist, and next year sees his stage version of the Oscar winning movie The Artist. Drew be...
Episode 7 - Jennifer White
August 24, 2023 00:00 - 32 minutes - 52.1 MBJennifer White is a choreographer who occupies a unique sweet spot between RAD ballet, contemporary dance, Kylie and the year’s hottest movie: she is the choreographer of Barbie. Greta Gerwig’s film includes delirious dance sequences led by Margot Robbie’s Barbie and Ryan Gosling as Ken. Those scenes chart the film’s trajectory – in Barbie, dance really does matter. Jennifer has also choreographed films like the eerie Last Night in Soho, and worked with leading names in both pop and contempo...
Episode 6 - Endalyn T. Outlaw
August 17, 2023 00:00 - 42 minutes - 68.8 MBThe RAD’s flagship event, the Margot Fonteyn International Ballet Competition, gives young dancers a chance to learn from top professionals. This year’s coaches include Endalyn T Outlaw – dancer, educator, choreographer and Dean of the School of Dance at the University of North Carolina. Endalyn’s career is incredibly varied – she performed with the Dance Theatre of Harlem and in the original Broadway cast of The Lion King, she’s restaged ballets and developed a philosophy of dance teaching ...
Episode 5 - Mitchell Rayner
August 10, 2023 00:00 - 29 minutes - 47.1 MB‘Living in the movement’ is the motto of Australian Royal Academy of Dance teacher Mitchell Rayner. Enjoying and fully inhabiting your movement is a fantastic goal for anyone in dance. Mitchell came to dance training relatively late but progressed quickly, joining the Australian Ballet. He retired from the company in 2016, and re-trained as a dance teacher with the RAD, taking his philosophy of living in the movement through his practise and onto his own range of clothing. What was his journ...
Episode 4 - Alice Oseman
August 03, 2023 00:00 - 32 minutes - 52.4 MBAlice Oseman’s work stops hearts – in a good way. They capture the delirious rush of first love, above all in the Heartstopper series – online, in books, and onscreen – which has become a sensation. Heartstopper is also all about young people finding ways to express themselves, creatively and emotionally, becoming the people they want to be – ideas that resonate with the RAD’s own ethos. But also: Alice’s mother is a dance teacher! What has dance given them? Alice Oseman is an award-winning...
Episode 3 - Wayne McGregor
July 27, 2023 00:00 - 35 minutes - 57.4 MBWayne McGregor, one of the world’s leading choreographers, is an ideas man who makes abstract thought into thrillingly visceral dance. His collaborations are prodigious – from his own contemporary dancers to the world’s great ballet companies, and in film, fashion and more. He discusses his latest premiere for the Royal Ballet, his programme for the Venice Biennale and his game changing collaboration with ABBA. So many things matter to him – but why dance in particular? Wayne McGregor CBE i...
Episode 2 - Merritt Moore
July 20, 2023 00:00 - 28 minutes - 46.5 MBWhy Dance Matters often meets people whose interest in dance sits alongside expertise in a completely different field. Merritt Moore’s talents seem especially unlikely: she’s a Harvard-trained physicist who dances with robots. She is also a professional ballerina, performing at the highest level (most recently with Boston Ballet). Can the rigours of the ballet studio meet the intellectual challenges of the lab? During lockdown, Merritt began exploring the world of dancing with robots, and th...
Episode 1 - David Hallberg
July 13, 2023 00:00 - 28 minutes - 45.9 MBThe new season of Why Dance Matters opens with one of the great ballet princes – David Hallberg, star dancer and now artistic director of Australian Ballet. The epitome of classical elegance, in his memoir, A Body of Work, he writes feelingly about being a boy who dances, and a dancer who yearns for perfection, even when at the height of a career as a principal at both American Ballet Theatre and at the Bolshoi Ballet. Now, he has pivoted from dancer to director, leading Australian Ballet to...
Episode 7 - Dame Arlene Phillips
April 06, 2023 00:00 - 32 minutes - 44.2 MBIn an exciting bonus episode of Why Dance Matters, we meet the choreographer Dame Arlene Phillips as she receives a special honour at the Olivier Awards, marking a career packed with achievement. A dance legend, Arlene made her name with her racy dance troupe Hot Gossip in the 1970s, before becoming a major player in musical theatre, starting with Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Starlight Express. As she approaches her 80th birthday she’s working with undimmed energy, most recently on a rapturously re...
Episode 6 - Giles Terera
March 30, 2023 00:00 - 40 minutes - 65.1 MBGiles Terera is no ordinary actor. He won an Olivier Award as Aaron Burr in the UK premiere of the all-conquering musical Hamilton, writing a book about his creative journey. Last year, he played two very different roles at the National Theatre: as Shakespeare’s tragic hero Othello, and as a designer in 1930s Harlem in Blues for an Alabama Sky. He also writes songs and his play, The Meaning of Zong, will soon open at the Barbican in London. Giles is a virtuoso with language – so how do dance...
Episode 5 - Francesca Harper
March 23, 2023 01:00 - 39 minutes - 62.6 MBFrancesca Harper, Artistic Director of Ailey II, is back where it all began. She trained at the Alvin Ailey School, where her mother, Denise Jefferson, was director for 26 years. She has also choreographed for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and now leads Ailey II, which fosters new generations of shining talent and will visit the UK later this year. Francesca has enjoyed an astonishingly varied journey through classical and contemporary dance – notably as a principal dancer with William...
Episode 4 - Ana Maria Campos
March 16, 2023 01:00 - 29 minutes - 47.8 MBAna Maria Campos is a Royal Academy of Dance teacher from Brazil. She has travelled widely and lived in several different countries – dance and dance teaching are wonderfully portable skills. As an RAD examiner, she also visits dance schools all over the world – how does she calm the nerves of young dancers and help them give their best? And as someone who has dedicated their career to dance and helping others dance, she will know better than most why dance matters. Ana Maria Campos grew...
Episode 3 - Raphael Ng
March 09, 2023 01:00 - 26 minutes - 42.4 MBRaphael Ng began his career in the ballet studio – only to leap effortlessly into high finance. Based in Singapore, Raphael threw himself into ballet, contemporary and Chinese dance, taking part in international shows and competitions – but when exploring how to manage his money as a student, he caught an excitement for the financial world. Now a fund manager, he discusses the invaluable transferrable skills of dance training – and why, having co-founded a school teaching RAD ballet in Singa...
Episode 2 - Tim Arthur
March 02, 2023 01:00 - 37 minutes - 60.9 MBIn this episode, we visit the Royal Academy of Dance’s global headquarters in London to meet its new chief executive – the ebullient Tim Arthur. Tim’s previous experience is dizzyingly varied – he arrives at the RAD via senior roles in theatre, publishing and finance, working with companies like Time Out and Virgin Money. Why did a dance organisation feel like the logical next step? We also explore Tim’s current training as a psychotherapist, not to mention his unexpected glory as an almost-...
Episode 1 - Tiler Peck
February 23, 2023 01:00 - 37 minutes - 60.9 MBTiler Peck, one of the world’s great ballerinas, opens the new season of Why Dance Matters. The California-born dancer is a reigning star at New York City Ballet, where she has been a principal since 2009, and is also a director and choreographer in her own right. Feted for her innate musicality and formidable work ethic, audiences respond to her warmth and enthusiasm. She commissions her own programmes of dance, working with great choreographers like William Forsythe and Michelle Dorrance. ...
Episode 7 - Benjamin Zephaniah
November 24, 2022 01:00 - 34 minutes - 48 MBBenjamin Zephaniah In the last episode of this series of Why Dance Matters, we meet a poet – the resonant, rousing, heart-stopping Benjamin Zephaniah. Benjamin’s specific dance connection is that he’s recorded the narration for Rambert’s acclaimed new stage production based on Peaky Blinders, the cult period crime drama. As a celebrated performance poet, he’s used to making language, voice and physicality fuse in the most memorable of ways. His writing for young people as well as adults ...
Episode 6 - Dr Kathrina Farrugia-Kriel
November 17, 2022 01:00 - 40 minutes - 56.3 MBDr Kathrina Farrugia-Kriel Why Dance Matters has benefited hugely from encouragement and inspiration from Kathrina Farrugia-Kriel in the Faculty of Education at the Royal Academy of Dance, so it’s high time she was a guest. Born in Malta, Kathrina has been with the Faculty since 2005, and her books include Princess Poutiatine and the Art of Ballet in Malta and co-editing The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Ballet, a brilliant survey of choreographers shaping the art of ballet. Dance educ...
Episode 5- Jay Jay Revlon
November 10, 2022 01:00 - 40 minutes - 55.2 MBJay Jay Revlon Ballroom culture was celebrated in the tv drama Pose, set in New York during the 1980s and 90s. It originated in Harlem, where queer people of colour came together in act of self-expression and resistance, and is now international. A key figure in London’s scene is DJ, community activist and impresario, Jay Jay Revlon. Jay Jay has serious dance training, and found a home for his talents in ballroom – often with his mother on the door at his events! As father of the House o...
Episode 4- Charlotte Edmonds
November 03, 2022 01:00 - 39 minutes - 54.5 MBCharlotte Edmonds Unusually, Charlotte Edmonds began her career as a professional choreographer while still a teenager. The RAD spotted her talent for making dance when she was just 18: she was Commissioned Choreographer for the RAD’s Genée International Ballet Competition (now named The Fonteyn) in 2015, and also became The Royal Ballet’s inaugural young choreographer. She continues to navigate a varied freelance career, often making her own creative opportunities. About Charlotte ...
Episode 3- Zack Frongillo
October 27, 2022 00:00 - 36 minutes - 50.7 MBZack Frongillo The Savannah Bananas is not what you might expect from a US baseball team; players break off to twerk, or do a TikTok challenge, and the Entertainment Director, Zack Frongillo, is a trained classical dancer. We love seeing dance sneak into unexpected places. In this episode, we hear from Zack who tells us how the Savannah Bananas in Georgia are making a double play with dance and baseball, and bringing more fun to their fans in the process. If you thought the team might b...
Episode 2- Dame Monica Mason
October 20, 2022 00:00 - 42 minutes - 58.5 MBDame Monica Mason May you live in interesting times may be an ancient curse, but Monica Mason has voyaged through some very interesting times and places. She spent most of her career at The Royal Ballet, eventually as its artistic director – but was born in South Africa, moving to London in the 1950s to ignite her astonishing career. She later toured through segregated America, behind the Iron Curtain, and to Cuba and China. As a Vice-President at the RAD she was a key figure in realisi...
Episode 1- Akram Khan
October 13, 2022 00:00 - 37 minutes - 51.9 MBThe opening guest in the new series of Why Dance Matters is a star among contemporary dance artists. Akram Khan is a dancer, choreographer, director and dreamer, whose work has shaped the international landscape of dance. He came to attention early as a virtuoso in kathak, the Indian classical dance form, and at 13 appeared in Peter Brook’s landmark Mahabharata. His own work explores kathak, contemporary dance and increasingly classical ballet, driving deep roots into myth and his own person...
Episode 8 - Dame Darcey Bussell
April 13, 2022 00:00 - 22 minutes - 30.9 MBIn this episode, we meet dance royalty – Dame Darcey Bussell, who is President of the Royal Academy of Dance. Darcey has been a warm and inspiring figurehead for dance as an artform and for the RAD in particular – whether it’s through her glittering career as a principal ballerina with the Royal Ballet at Covent Garden, or as a broadcaster, or as a judge for seven years on Strictly Come Dancing. Speaking in the RAD’s purpose-built new home in London, we ask if dance feels like a home to her?...
Episode 7 - Harper Watters
April 06, 2022 00:00 - 39 minutes - 53.8 MBHarper Watters is a highly accomplished dancer with Houston Ballet – but that’s not what got him noticed on social media. The combination of a quick-running treadmill in the gym and a pair of towering pink heels made Harper something of a sensation. His subsequent eye-catching films have won him a serious following on social media and given him a platform to discuss race, sexuality and dance. Harper tells us how he combines a busy life on social media with dancing in one of America’s most pr...
Episode 6- Jordan Thomas
March 30, 2022 00:00 - 31 minutes - 43 MBOn Why Dance Matters we enjoy meeting people whose work isn’t obviously connected to dance. As a teenager in California, Jordan Thomas was being groomed as a political fixer, but instead broke away to study choreography at one of America’s leading modern dance schools, before beginning a remarkable legal career. He is now America’s leading attorney representing whistleblowers, exposing wrongdoing in some of Wall Street’s biggest companies. Whistleblowers have also prompted revelations from t...
Episode 5 - Hofesh Shechter
March 23, 2022 01:00 - 34 minutes - 47.7 MBTwenty years ago, in the early hours of new year’s day, a young artist tumbled off the Eurostar, ready to begin a new life in London. Hofesh Shechter grew up in Israel but had been living in Paris, and considered making dance as a showcase for his music. Instead, his unmistakable dance pieces – visceral and propulsive, witty and vulnerable – have made him one of the most distinctive modern choreographers, bringing the energy of a gig to often solemn contemporary dance. Political Mother, the ...
Episode 4 - Kathryn Morgan
March 16, 2022 01:00 - 39 minutes - 54 MBWith American ballerina Kathryn Morgan we cover some challenging subject matter – Kathryn’s journey through dance has clearly brought her joy but she has also had to deal with issues around physical and mental health, and especially around body image. With a large and devoted following on social media, she speaks with rare honesty about her experiences. In October 2020, she posted a YouTube video describing why earlier that year she left Miami City Ballet, where she was a soloist. Kathryn’s ...
Episode 3 - Barbara Peters
March 09, 2022 01:00 - 34 minutes - 46.9 MBBarbara Peters, a life-enhancing RAD teacher from Yorkshire, has been teaching for over 60 years. She has travelled the world as an RAD examiner, and continued teaching throughout the pandemic over Zoom, attracting some devoted international students. A couple of years ago, in her 80s, she passed the RAD’s Grade 7 and 8 exams, attracting much media interest, and has now been recognised by a fellowship of the RAD and the British Empire Medal. Dance is crucial to the way she approaches the wor...
Episode 2 - Joyce DiDonato
March 02, 2022 01:00 - 40 minutes - 55.9 MBThe American mezzo soprano Joyce DiDonato has won deserved acclaim in the world’s great opera houses – in Rossini, Handel and brand new works – and she’s a passionate communicator. Growing up in Kansas she originally planned to become a music teacher. Even after committing to a singing career, the breaks only followed a whole heap of rejection. A very present, physical performer, the temperature always rises when she comes on stage. She tells us about art and activism, including her work in ...
Episode 1 - Carlos Acosta
February 23, 2022 01:00 - 38 minutes - 52.9 MBCarlos Acosta has an electric connection to audiences – a combination of elegance, fire and rare charisma. Starting life in one of Havana’s poorest neighbourhoods, the Cuban dancer became a favourite at The Royal Ballet and the Bolshoi. His inspirational effect has been widely recognised – including, in 2018, by the RAD’s Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Award. He now leads his own contemporary company, Acosta Danza, and is director of Birmingham Royal Ballet (BRB). He describes how he came to ...
Episode 7 - Ralph Heimans
November 11, 2021 01:00 - 28 minutes - 38.8 MBThis week we meet portrait artist Ralph Heimans as the RAD prepares to celebrate a landmark in its 100 year history - a move to a new purpose built headquarters - with a brand new portrait competition. The competition will invite artists of all abilities to create a portrait of world famous ballerina and founding President of the RAD Dame Adeline Genée. Ralph sits on the judging panel of this competition and will be responsible for selecting the new commission, which will hang pride of place...
Episode 6 - Hannah Martin
November 04, 2021 01:00 - 33 minutes - 46.1 MBAt just 19, Hannah Martin has already achieved remarkable things. In September 2021, the young ballet dancer won a medal in the RAD's flagship event, The Margot Fonteyn International Ballet Competition. And before that, she was a top flight gymnast, the youngest official member of the England team at the 2018 Commonwealth Games when she was only 15. It is rare to shine in two disciplines at an elite level, competing with some of the very best international dancers and gymnasts. Now an appren...
Episode 5 - Leanne Benjamin
October 28, 2021 00:00 - 37 minutes - 51.7 MBAustralian ballerina Leanne Benjamin is a self-declared perfectionist - difficult in ballet, where the perfect performance is a tantalising impossibility. Her career took her from rural Queensland to the heights of The Royal Ballet in London. She conquered the great 19th-century ballets, created challenging new work, and revelled in the complex stories of Kenneth MacMillan. Leanne revisits her career in a new memoir, Built for Ballet (written with Sarah Crompton) and discusses her love of co...
Episode 4 - Libby Clegg MBE
October 21, 2021 00:00 - 34 minutes - 47.7 MBLibby Clegg loved dance and ballet when she was little, but became a multi-medal-winning Paralympic athlete. She won five medals games, capping her amazing career in Tokyo with a silver medal for Team GB in the 100m relay - then announced her retirement from the track. Last year she returned to dance in the tv competition Dancing on Ice, reaching the final. Libby, who has Stargardt macular dystrophy, is also candid about struggles with her mental health, even at what should have been her gre...
Episode 3 - Gerard Charles
October 14, 2021 00:00 - 28 minutes - 39.7 MBGerard Charles arrived at the Royal Academy of Dance as its new Artistic Director in 2018, having been in leadership positions at some of America's liveliest ballet companies. As the RAD prepares to move to a new purpose-built headquarters in London's Battersea, we ask Gerard how a new home will help it grow, and reach into the community. As a seasoned director, how did he reconfigure the RAD's flagship event, The Margot Fonteyn International Ballet Competition, as an online experience? And ...
Episode 2 - Yami 'Rowdy' Löfvenberg
October 07, 2021 00:00 - 35 minutes - 48.6 MBThe hip-hop choreographer, dancer and teacher Yami Löfvenberg is also known as 'Rowdy'. As that name suggests, hers is a wonderfully confident, engaged presence - but growing up in Sweden, she was racially bullied and called stupid, because she struggled with maths. Only later did she realise she had dyscalculia: a deep-seated difficulty in understanding numbers. Discovering a talent for dance transformed her life. As well as creating choreography, she's worked in schools with the RAD's Step...
Episode 1 - James Whiteside
September 30, 2021 00:00 - 27 minutes - 37.5 MBJames Whiteside is not only a principal at American Ballet Theatre, dancing all iconic classical princes as well as ambitious contemporary work, but also has two alter egos: musician JB Dubs and the drag queen Uhu Betch. He has always worked to break down the mystique that surrounds classical ballet: he has a strong social media presence and frequently collaborates on digital work. Center Center, his eye-wateringly candid new memoir, is a rollercoaster through his professional and emotional ...
Fonteyn Special - Ashley Page
September 08, 2021 00:00 - 38 minutes - 52.8 MBThis one-off special episode of Why Dance Matters marks the final of The Margot Fonteyn International Ballet Competition, the RAD’s flagship event. Talented young dancers from across the world test themselves in challenging solos, including work by a leading choreographer. This year, the Commissioned Choreographer is Ashley Page – formerly a dancer and dance maker with The Royal Ballet, then Artistic Director of Scottish Ballet and now creating work for leading international companies. His w...