Jane Elliott

Biography

Repetiteur, Choreographer, Benesh Choreologist & Classical Ballet Teacher

Jane Elliott is based in London and works freelance. Following an injury as a professional dancer, she graduated with distinction from the Royal Academy of Dancing’s Professional Dancers’ Teaching Course in 1978. Since then she has gained an international reputation as teacher and repetiteur. She has been Senior Classical Ballet Teacher at the Hammond School in Chester since 1999

Jane lived in Cairo 1981-84, teaching the National Ballet. In 1984 she returned to England to take up a post as ballet mistress to London City Ballet. This was followed by a season with Vienna Festival Ballet. In 1986 and 1990, she taught at the Maya Sofou School in Athens. In 1988 Jane attended the diploma course at the Benesh Institute and became a professional choreologist.

She first worked with Kenneth MacMillan on Sea of Troubles, which he created for Dance Advance, then with the Royal Ballet on Winter Dreams. For Scottish Ballet, she re-staged MacMillan’s Sea of Troubles in 1991. In 1992, MacMillan asked her to be his associate for the Royal National Theatre's production of the musical Carousel and she restaged it in The West End, New York and for the US National Tour. She staged two further productions in Japan and an edited version of this ballet at the Royal Ballet for a Covent Garden Gala, with Carlos Acosta and Sarah Lamb in 2016. While working with the Royal Ballet, she notated Rubies (Balanchine), La Bayadère (Makarova), Frankenstein (Eagling), Enclosure (William Tuckett) and Winter Dreams (MacMillan). She also worked with Peter Schaufuss on his production of The Nutcracker for London Festival Ballet. In 1998 she was invited as guest ballet Mistress to the Royal New Zealand Ballet, taking the company on its first nationwide tour in 30 years. In 2016 Jane worked with Yorke Dance Project, reviving MacMillan’s Sea of Troubles and worked with Sir Peter Wright on the restaging of his ballet ‘Giselle’ to open the 2016/2017 Season at the Bayerisches Staatsballett in Munich.

In 1997, Jane began working with Alexander Grant on staging La Fille Mal Gardée for the Scottish Ballet and since then has staged and restaged this ballet for more than 10 European companies, most recently a restaging for the Stuttgart Ballet in March 2018.

Seville, April 2018