Yasmine Naghdi

Yasmine Naghdi,[1] started her vocational training at The Royal Ballet School in 2004, she was a Royal Ballet School junior associate before joining The Royal Ballet School at White Lodge. During her training she was recognised as an exceptionally gifted student, and she was awarded "Most Outstanding Classical Dancer" at the age of 16. As a student, she worked with The Royal Ballet company and first appeared on the Royal Opera House stage, aged 11, in Cinderella, aged 12 in Swan Lake, and later on in Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker.[2] She featured in the 2007 BBC One documentary The Magic of Swan Lake in collaboration with Darcey Bussell. In September 2008 Yasmine Naghdi progressed into The Royal Ballet School's Senior Section/Upper School; in March 2009 she was awarded first prize in the "Young British Dancer of the Year" competition.[3] She was fast-tracked and in January 2010, aged 17, she was offered a contract by Dame Monica Mason, then director, with The Royal Ballet.

Naghdi joined The Royal Ballet in April 2010 and was promoted to the rank of first artist by the end of 2011–2012 season. She was made soloist at the end of the 2013–2014 season, first soloist at the end of the 2015–2016 season and by the end of the 2016–2017 season she was promoted to The Royal Ballet's highest rank and became a principal ballerina aged 24.[1][4]

Her performances at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, have received high critical acclaim and praise by various dance critics in the UK press, in UK and international dance magazines. Her classical style of dancing has been described as exceptionally pure and crystal clear, she combines her artistry and musicality with an extraordinary ease of dancing, her outstanding technique always executed with immense control and strength.

Since joining The Royal Ballet she has danced in China, Tokyo, Okinawa, Osaka, Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, Taiwan, Shanghai, Barcelona, Milan, Madrid, Monaco, Bogota, Colombia, New York, Washington, Chicago, San Francisco, Bermuda, Bahrain, Sydney, Brisbane, Toronto, and Denmark. She was invited in 2014 to perform in Bogota, Colombia, on the occasion of the re-opening of the restored Teatro Cristobal Colon, in the presence of the Colombian president. In March 2019 she was invited as a guest ballerina by the San Francisco Ballet to dance the role of Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty. Aged 22 she danced her debut as Juliet in Romeo and Juliet; The Royal Ballet was celebrating 50 years since Sir Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet premiered at the Royal Opera House in 1965.[5] Aged 24 she danced her debut as Odette/Odile in Swan Lake.

Her major roles with the Company include Odette/Odile (Swan Lake), Aurora (The Sleeping Beauty), Giselle, Juliet (Romeo and Juliet), Gamzatti (La Bayadère), Kitri (Don Quixote), Tatiana (Onegin), Swanilda (Coppélia), Sugar Plum Fairy (The Nutcracker), The Firebird, Mathilde Kschessinska (Anastasia), Apricot (Dances at a Gathering), Irina (Winter Dreams), Young Girl (Two Pigeons), Florence Billington (The Unknown Soldier), Stop Time Rag and Bethina Waltz (Elite Syncopations), and the Girl (The Invitation).

She appeared in cinemas worldwide, live relayed from the Royal Opera House stage in Covent Garden, London, including Juliet in Kenneth MacMillan's Romeo and Juliet, Macmillan's Concerto- 2nd Movement , Blubird Variation in The Sleeping Beauty and Jerome Robbin's Dances at the Gathering.

Her performances have been recorded for DVD by Opus Arte: "Symphonic Variations", "Corybantic Games", "Giselle" (pas de six), "Swan Lake " (Four Cygnets)

• First prize "Classical Excellence", The Royal Ballet School
• "Most Outstanding Classical Dancer" award, 2007
• First prize "Kenneth Macmillan Choreographic Competition", The Royal Ballet School.
• First prize Young British Dancer of the Year, 2009.[3]
• Nominated "Best Female Dancer" at the National Critics Dance Awards, 2018

• http://www.roh.org.uk/people/yasmine-naghdi
• https://www.instagram.com/yasmine_naghdi/