STARS GALA
artists

Young danced with the Korean National Ballet and Universal Ballet Korea, both in Seoul. He entered the Dutch National Ballet as a member of the corps de ballet in 2011. In 2013, he was promoted no less than twice: first to coryphée and later in the year to soloist. He then danced leading roles in Don Quixote and Cinderella, among others. On the first of January 2016, immediately after his debut as the prince in The Nutcracker and The Mouse King, he was promoted to principal.
Young also frequently performs as a guest principal dancer with leading international companies.
Young has received several awards.
2017, Alexandra Radius Award.
2010, Boston International Competition, 1st.
2010, Ballet Competition (Varna, Bulgaria), 1st.
2007, Youth America Grand Prix (New York City, United States), 1st.

Former Principal Dancer with StaatsBallett in Berlin
Before coming to Oslo, she danced with the Cuban National Ballet, where she was given the highest accolade of primera bailarina. She was also the Principal Dancer of the StaatsBallett Berlin. Then Yolanda came to Oslo and became a Principal Dancer with the Norwegian National Ballet.
She has received several awards:
1999 Winner of the “International Meeting of Ballet Academies”
2010 “Grand Prix Giuliana Penzi”
2012 “Premio Positano”: best female newcomer
2014 “Wilhelmsen Holding ASA Company Award for Opera and Ballet”
2014 Nomination “Benois de la Danse” as best female dancer
She has also been guest artist in many international companies: Royal Swedish Ballet Stockholm, Ballet of Teatro di San Carlo Napoli, The Kremlin Ballet Moscow, Ballet of Kazan, Compañía Nacional de Danza Madrid.
Her vast classical and contemporary repertoire includes among others:
Snow Queen and the Sugar Plum Fairy. Dina Bjørn’s Nutcracker
Odette-Odile. Alicia Alonso’s Swan Lake
Kitri. Alicia Alonso’s Don Quixote
Aurora. Cynthia Harvey’s Sleeping Beauty
Tatiana. Cranko’s Onegin
Giselle. Alicia Alonso’s Giselle
Juliet. Cranko’s Romeo & Juliet
Cinderella. Ben Stevenson’s Cinderella
Medora. Grigorovich’s L’Corsaire
Esmeralda. Grigorovich’s L’Esmeralde
Duato’s Multiplicity
Tiger Lily
Stepping Stones
Tetley’s Voluntaries

Later on, James trained with the Goh Ballet Academy in Vancouver; a period of tough, completely Chinese-oriented training that he says formed him. The final year of James’s training was spent at The Royal Ballet School in London.
Partly due to his great admiration for the former star principal Sofiane Sylve, James decided to join Dutch National Ballet in 2007, where he was promoted to soloist in season 2012-2013. Since 2018, James has been a principal with Dutch National Ballet; his promotion came immediately after his performance of the role of Tristan in David Dawson’s Tristan + Isolde. James succeeded in reaching the finals of ballet competitions in Varna, Hong Kong and Beijing.

Former soloist of Mikhailovsky Theatre
Gold Medal at the Grand Prix of Ulanova in 2008
Anna was born in Siberia. She started to dance at 5 years old and graduated from the Krasnoyarsk Ballet School in Siberia.
Anna started her career with the Siberian State ballet (Krasnoyarsk, Russia) as a soloist. Later she became a guest-principal dancer with Mikhailovsky theatre (Saint-Petersburg) and Tatarstan state ballet (Kazan). Since 2012 Anna joined Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre ballet company as a principal dancer. During this period of dancing with Russian ballet companies her repertoire was very diverse.
At 2015 she joined Dutch National Ballet as a principal dancer. Since that moment Anna became an international guest-principal dancer .She worked with Teatro Colon (Argentina) for “La Bayadere” by Natalia Makarova, with Semperoper Dresden ballet for “Manon” by K.McMillan. Currently Anna is working with Staatsballet Berlin as a guest.
Anna’s repertoire is very diverse. During her carrier she dances principal roles in almost all well known classical ballets as “Nutcracker” , “Sleeping beauty”, “La Bayadere”, ”Gizelle”, “Copelia”, “La fille mal gardee”, “La Sylphide” , “Snow Maiden”, “Don Quihote”, ”Romeo and Juliette”, “Swan lake” and others. Her repertoire also includes main roles in lots of neoclassical ballets by such a famous choreographers as K.McMillan, J.Robbins, J.Kranko, G.Balanchine, A.Ratmansky, C.Wheeldon , Hans van Manen ,D.Dawson,Y.Grigorovich, Rudi van Danzig ,Ted Brandsen and others. In a different time her partners on stage were Sergei Polunin, Ivan Vasiliev, Leonid Sarafanov and others.
In a studio legendary Natalia Makarova, Guillaume Graffine, Alexey Ratmansky, Michael Messerer , Patricia Neary, Patricia Ruann , Karl Burnett, Olga Evreinoff, Yukari Saito,Yannick Boquen ,Larissa Lezhnina, Rachel Beaujean and many others helped her to improve her skills of dance. At 2008 and 2010 she won gold medals on International ballets competitions in Krasnoyarsk and Perm. She is a winner of «Dance Open 2018- miss virtuosity» prize in Sankt Petersburg.
Currently Anna is working successfully with Dutch National ballet as a principal dancer and participates lots of Ballet Galas around the world.
Invited guest to Stars Gala
She has appeared as a guest dancer in many European Countries and overseas.
During the season 2013/14 she joined the Ballet de l'Opéra National de Bordeaux, the Slovenské národné divadlo, the Teatro dell ‘Opera di Roma and the Tokyo Ballet as a guest soloist.
In March 2016 (London Coliseum) she had the honor to take part in the Ave Maya Gala in memory of Maya Plisetskaya.
For the ORF DVD production of “Der Nussknacker'' in the choreography of Rudolf Nureyev she danced the main role of Clara.
She has received many awards and honors:
3rd Place in the competition “Young Russian Ballet” in Krasnodar (2004).
Special Price from the Serge Lifar Ballet Competition in Kiev (2006).
2nd Place in the International Ballet Competition KIBC in Seoul.
1st Place in the ÖTR-Contest in Vienna (2007)
1st Place in the Ballet Competition “Premio Roma” (2007).
Premio Capri Danza International (2018).
In June 2019 Liudmila Konovalova was honoured by the Russian Embassy in Vienna for her merits of the cultural relation between Russia and Austria.

Ex first soloist of Mikhailovsky Theatre
Ex principal dancer of Eifman Ballet
At the same time Svetlana took part in numerous international ballet competitions where she used to win leading first prizes.
In 2011 she became soloist of St Petersburg State Academic Eifman Ballet Theatre (her tutor was Tatiana Kvasova).
Svetlana´s repertory in Eifman ballet:
Me - Don Quijote (Kitri),
Russian Hamlet (Imperess Ekaterina II),
Chaikovsky (the wife of Chaikovsky),
Red Giselle (Olga Spesivtseva),
Who is who (Linn),
Onegin online (Olga),
Anna Karenina (Kiti) etc
As part of the ballet company Eifman Ballet Svetlana toured around Europe, Asia, Australia and USA.
From 2013 and up to now Svetlana Bednenko is a soloist of the ballet company of one of the best ballet theatres in the world - the Mikhailovsky Theatre ( St. Petersburg).
She dances leading solo parties in classical ballets such as “The Swan Lake”, “Don Quijote”, “La Bayadère “, “Le Corsaire”, “The Flame of Paris”, “Cipollino”, “The Sleeping Beauty”, “The Nutcracker” , “Romeo and Juliet” and many others
Former soloist of the Ballet Nacional del Sodre
In 2004 he entered the SODRE National Dance School where he graduated, complementing his studies in Buenos Aires. Later he became a member of the Joven Ballet de Uruguay company.
In 2009 he entered the Sodre Dance Corps with the second best qualification of all alumni. Next year Nelson López joined the Argentine company Ballet Concierto de Iñaki Urlezaga, giving performances in Argentina and in various parts of the world.
In 2011 he returned to his country, Uruguay, to join the Ballet Nacional del Sodre as a dance group under the direction of Julio Bocca.
In 2019 Nelson López ventured into stage and costume design, playing this role for the dance company Telón Arriba, a resident of the Solis Theater. A year later he joined the German company Deutsche Oper am Rhein as a soloist under the direction of the choreographer Demis Volpi, where he remains to this day.
Nelson López has covered both the classical and contemporary repertoire, participating in works by Balanchine, John Cranko, Jirí Kylián, Nacho Duato, Boris Eiffman, Twyla Tharp, Sharon Eyal, Roland Petit, among others, performing roles in the dance troupe as well as soloist and major.

He studied at the Royal Ballet School in London and performed in such ballets as Don Quixote, Sleeping Beauty, Giselle and Le Corsaire before joining the Norwegian National Ballet 2 in the autumn of 2016. In 2017, he went on to the main company becoming a principal dancer.
After Ricardo Castellanos' debut in the leading role of Solor in La Bayadère, ClassicalMusic.com wrote the following: «He achieves a weightless height in his leaps, almost seeming to hang in the air, his pirouettes are dead-on and last impossibly long. He conveys the dramatic story with technique and feeling and it is harder to imagine a stronger debut than this.»
He has danced the role of Rothbart in Holmes’ Swan Lake, the Nutcracker Prince in Boyadjiev’s The Nutcracker, the leading male role in Balanchine’s Allegro Brillante and soloist in the 1st movement in Balanchine’s Symphony in C, Prince Albrecht in the 2nd act of Giselle, Romeo in the balcony pas de deux from Romeo and Juliet and Prince Siegfried in a pas de deux from Swan Lake. He has also danced in MacMillan’s Manon and Kylián's One of a Kind.
His repertoire includes:
Albrecht in Giselle
Flames of Paris Pdd in A Night of Dance x 12
Giselle 2. akt - Albrecht in Norwegian National Ballet
Le Corsaire Pdt in A Night of Dance x 12
Onegin in Onegin
Romeo og Julie: Romeo in Lyset på Nasjonalballetten
Solor in La Bayadère
Voluntaries Pas de trois in A Night of Dance x 12
etc.

A freelance dancer
Dancer who performed with several ballet companies worldwide
Throughout her career Luisa María Arias has danced in companies such as:
- the National Dance Company;
- Netherlands Dance Theater;
- National Ballet of Nancy et la Lorraine;
- Opera National du Rhin.
She has worked with choreographers such as Nacho Duato, Jiri Kylian, Mats Ek, W. Forsythe, Johan Inger, Ohad Naharin, Paul Lightfoot, Sol Leon, Cristal Pite, Marco Goecke, W. Vandekeibus, Hofesh Shechter, Alexander Ekman and many others.

Former principal artist of Eifman Ballet
as well as productions of Nacho Duato The Sleeping Beauty, Romeo and Juliet, The Nutcracker, Multiplicity, Forms of Silence and Emptiness, Prelude, Invisible, and White Darkness. Ivan has toured with the Mikhailovsky Ballet Company to Japan, USA, Germany etc.
He start his career from Krasnodar Ballet School in 1997 and while studying he was training at the Yury Grigorovich Ballet Theatre where he performed roles in the ballets Spartacus, Romeo and Juliet, Raymonda, The Golden Age, The Nutcracker, and Cipollino.
In 2002 Ivan graduated from Krasnodar Ballet School and entered the Department of Choreography at St. Petersburg State University for Culture and Arts.
After graduation from the University in 2007, he joined Leonid Jacobson Ballet Theatre in St. Petersburg, where he danced Romeo (Romeo and Juliet), Jose (Passion for Carmen), Siegfried (Swan Lake), Prince (The Nutcracker), Albrecht (Giselle), and Rodin (The Kiss).
After participation in the 11th Moscow International Ballet Competition in 2009, he was invited to join Boris Eifman Ballet Theatre. Ivan´s parties in Eifman Ballet were:
- Basil in Don Quixote,
- Onegin in Onegin,
- Vronsky in Anna Karenina,
- Ekaterina´s son in Russian Hamlet,
- The Prince,
- The Young man & The Joker in Chaikovsky.
More information on the website of the Mikhailovsky theatre.

A dancer, choreographer and teacher
He has been the winner of several competitions in his country and named Revelation Dancer by the Clarín newspaper of Buenos Aires in 1999. That same year, he joined the Contemporary Ballet of the Teatro San Martín. There he specialized in different contemporary dance techniques and worked as a soloist with many choreographers (Mauricio Wainrot, Jean-Claude Gallota, David Parsons, etc.).
In 2002 he moved to Europe to take improvement courses in Lyon, Paris and Barcelona. He danced for the Cía. Metros de Barcelona directed by Ramón Oller until in 2003 Nacho Duato hired him for the National Dance Company where he developed his work as a principal dancer until 2015.
He has performed in the most important theaters and festivals such as the Bolshoi in Moscow, Chatelet in Paris, Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York, Staatsoper in Berlin, Teatro Real in Madrid, Kennedy Center in Greece, International Sydney Festival, National Theater of China, Netherlands Dance Theater in The Hague, Miami International Festival, among others.
He teaches classes and workshops in various professional conservatories around the world. In 2019 he embarked on the "Neanderthal" project for which they received the first prize for Best Show at the FETÉN European Fair. He is currently a member of “was bleibt kollektiv I Gentian Doda”.
As a choreographer, he has premiered "Julietas y Romeos" (2022), "Tribe / Fun Away", "R&S" (2021), "Circle of...", "Sótano de cielo" (2019) ''Buñuel del Deseo'' (2018), “Black Rose”, “Buscando Cervantes”(2017), “Orquestarium”, “Ira”(2016), “Don't give up”(2015), “Dakishimeru-The Hugs”(2014), “Verdi que I love you V.E.R.D.I."(2013), "Ball and Chain", "SIMBIOSIS"(2012), "Andante Affettuoso", "Consequences"(2011), "My town, my house, loneliness...", "The murderer del Rol” (2009), “The water around”, “Coloquémonos” and “Casanova” (2006).

Former artist of the Mariinsky Theatre and The Bavarian State Opera
Former student of Russian Master Ballet Camp
In 2015 she completed her education at the Royal Swedish Ballet School. During her time at the Ballet School, she has been practicing and appeared several times on stage at the Royal Swedish Opera.
Evgeniya is a former student of Russian Master Ballet Camp.
From 2015 until 2018 she was a dancer at the Mariinsky Theater Ballet Company in St. Petersburg.
From 2018 until 2019 Evgeniya was a member of the Bavarian State Opera Ballet Campany.
In 2019, she became a demi-Soloist of the Czech National Ballet in Prague, where in April 2021 she was made a soloist.
Evgeniya has danced at prestigious ballet galas with the Russian Master Ballet Stars Gala, the Veterans Aid Charity in London and the Ballet Summer Estonia Gala.
In 2014, she received the third prize at the International Nordic Baltic Ballet Competition in Sweden, Falun and the Grand Prix at the Jeune Ballet Mediterranean in France, Grasse.
