Jaroslav Slavický

After graduating from the dance department of the Prague Conservatory (1967), Jaroslav Slavický furthered his studies with Alexander Ivanovich Pushkin, at the Agrippina Yakovlevna Vaganova Academy in what was then Leningrad. He entered into his first engagement, with the ballet company of the National Theatre in Prague, in 1968, and then pursued his career as soloist at the Théâtre Municipal de Strasbourg (1969/1970), and the Stadtheater Basel (1970 – 1972). In 1972 he returned to the Prague National Theatre, becoming a member of its ballet company, initially as soloist, from 1975 as first soloist, and from 1990 – 1998 ballet master and teacher. He has to his credit a gallery of around 80 ballet roles and solo parts on the National’s stage (including among others the Prince and Rottbart in Swan Lake, Albert in Giselle, Romeo and Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, the Prince in The Sleeping Beauty, Crassus in Spartacus, Adam in The Creation, or Faust and Satan in Doctor Faust). As a choreographer and ballet master, he has been involved in numerous National Theatre productions (Swan Lake, Don Quijote, The Sleeping Beauty, Giselle, La fille mal gardée/Polovtsian Dances, Choreographies from the Netherlands, Americana, and others).

From 1972, he taught classical dance, and stage and performing practice at the Dance Conservatory in Prague. In 1987 he graduated from a course in dance teaching at the Academy of Music in Prague, where he then taught from 1987 – 1996. Since 1996, he has been head of the Prague Dance Conservatory (PDC), and artistic director of the PDC Bohemia Ballet. His stagings for the PDC include The Nutcracker (1993, also mounted by the theatre companies at Liberec and at Ústí nad Labem), and Polovtsian Dances (1998, incorporated into the repertoire of the National Theatre). Elsewhere, he has staged Don Quijote (1996), the Czech premiere of La Bayadère (2003), and Raymonde (2008), for the National Theatre in Brno; and The Nutcracker (2001), for the National Theatre of Moravia-Silesia in Ostrava. Internationally, he staged The Sleeping Beauty for the Theatro Municipal do Rio de Janeiro (1998, and again in 2005).

He has toured extensively, either with the National Theatre company or on his own, in many European countries (Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Finland, Bulgaria, Russia), as well as in Cuba and in Canada. From 1988 – 1992, he was artistic advisor to the Newfoundland and Labrador Ballet in Canada. He has likewise been active as a teacher, in Bordeaux, Edinburgh, Rio de Janeiro, Bloomington, VA, etc., as well as sitting on international ballet competition juries, including those of Varna, Bulgaria (1998), the Prix Carpeaux in Valenciennes, France (2000 – 2007), the Rudolf Nureyev Competition in Budapest (2008), the Tanzolymp in Berlin (2009), Gdansk, Poland (2009), and Szczecin, Poland (2007 – 2010).

Figuring among his students are, among others, Jiří Bubeníček, Otto Bubeníček, Václav Kuneš, Daria Klimentová, Michal Matys, Jiří Jelínek, and Lukáš Slavický.