The Team

Elena Glurdjidze was born in Tbilisi, Georgia and trained at the prestigious Vaganova Academy in St-Petersburg. In 2002 Elena joined English National Ballet as a Principal ballerina and was promoted in 2007 to Lead Principal ballerina.

Her repertoire included, amongst many others, principal roles in Giselle, Don Quixote, Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty, The Nutcracker, Romeo & Juliet, Cinderella, Coppélia, Manon, The Snow Queen, Chopiniana, Etudes, Schéhérazade, Tchaikovsky pas de deux, The Dying Swan and Alice in Wonderland.

In 2009 Elena was nominated for Best Female Dancer at the Critics’ Circle Awards. Won both the 2007 and 2008 Ballet.co.uk Audience Poll for Best Female Dancer, won Best Partner Award at 7th Perm Open Competition in 2002 and in 1997 won the Bronze Medal at the Moscow International Ballet Competition. In 1998 she won the 8th Paris International Competition of Soloists. In 2009 Karl Lagerfeld, Creative Director of Chanel, created a tutu for Fokine’s The Dancing Swan which he fitted exclusively for Elena at Chanel’s headquarters in Paris forming part of the Company’s tribute to The Ballets Russes staged at Sadler’s Wells.

In 2011 British Fashion Designer Giles Deacon created a tutu based on the Black Swan which once again was exclusively designed and created for her.
Her final performance with English National Ballet was as Odette/Odile in Derek Deane’s Swan Lake at the London Coliseum on 18 January 2015, the role she first danced with the Company in 2002.

Following her retirement from dancing professionally, Elena and fellow Vaganova Academy graduate Olga Semenova, embarked upon an Internationally acclaimed Easter and Summer Intensive programme, based at Sadlers Wells Theatre in London.

In 2017 Elena joined forces once again with Olga Semenova to create a brand new Vocational style ballet school for pupils aged from 4-19 years old, based on the Vaganova Method of ballet training. Pupils at Masters of Ballet Academy train up to six days a week in ballet, contemporary and Pas de Deux.

Their West London school has grown in a year and a half to over 100 pupils, with former pupils in the last year alone gaining places at prestigious schools such as The Royal Ballet School (Richmond, UK & Floral Stree, London), The Vaganova Academy (St. Petersburg, Russia), English National Ballet School (London, UK), Paris Opera Ballet (Paris, France) and Central School of Ballet (London, UK).

Olga moved from St.Petersburg to London when Lady Sainsbury invited her to study at The Benesh Institute of Choreology. There she pioneered an exam based Character syllabus for students up to 18 years old, and trained teachers to implement this.
Olga also helped to develop a Vaganova based Syllabus for the Senior school at Central School of Ballet.

Olga trained as a professional ballet dancer at St.Petersburg's prestigious Vaganova Ballet Academy, Alma Mater of many of today's international ballet stars. Interestingly, her mother was one of the last students to study under the great Vaganova. After a ballet career, Olga completed a four years professional teaching/coaching course at the Vaganova Ballet Academy and was awarded the PDTC Diploma with Distinction and MA ( Hons).

Olga taught ballet for Junior and Pre-graduation classes at The Vaganova Ballet Academy. Her former students are now dancing in leading Russian and International Companies.

In London, she has taught at different ballet schools and professionals ballet companies as a Ballet Mistress.
Olga is a former teacher of the English National Ballet School and Central School of Ballet.

Olga is one of the most highly regarded Character tutors in the UK.

Also, she is a Character and Ballet guest teacher at a different school in the UK and Abroad. Olga is adept in Ballet, Character and Contemporary choreography.

Ambassador of ARBTA (Honorary), Honorary Advisor of Vaganova Method at Hong Kong Youth Ballet Academy.

"Olga Semenova is clearly not only knowledgeable but inspirational".
Amanda Jennings " Dance Europe"

" Olga Semenova's choreography of "Gypsy Dance" showed the impressive skills of the schools' youngest students"
Laura Dodge " Dancing Times"

" ....audience were treated to one or two unusual character dances taught by Olga Semenova"
David Mead, "Ballet Europe Reviews".

Resmi received his ballet training at the Academy of Ballet in Tirana, Albania and upon completion, he joined the National Opera Ballet Theatre in Tirana, and within five years was promoted to Principal Dancer. He continued his career there for the next 15 years, performing in countries including Italy, France, Turkey, Greece, Poland, Croatia, Bulgaria, USA, and Canada. After immigrating to North America, he performed with the USA Ballet, Ontario Ballet Theatre and the Canadian company, Ballet Jorgen. In 2003 Resmi graduated with Distinction from the Teacher Training Program for professional dancers at Canada's National Ballet School (NBS) and subsequently joined the artistic teaching staff later that year. After 10 years with the NBS, Mr. Malko decided to broaden his teaching experience by applying to European schools and immediately was recruited as Ballet Master for New English Ballet Theatre in 2012 and 2013.

He has mentored students to compete in international competitions and TV broadcasts, in addition to his day-to-day teaching duties at the Central School of Ballet in London. He has coached students for the Prix de Lausanne and the now established BBC Young Dancer competition, few of his students reach up to the finals. One student he mentored, went on to win the three Gold Medals, the Margot Fonteyn, Audience Choice Award and the Choreographic Award at the Genée International Ballet Competition in 2017, a first in the competition’s 88 history.

He has also choreographed and staged classical repertoire for the school’s end of year show and for the 3rd Year touring company, Ballet Central. In addition, he regularly guests teach for schools in the UK, Europe and internationally, including most recently in Singapore. He often returns to coach at the National Opera Ballet Theatre, Tirana.

Vlada trained at The Royal Ballet School for seven years. During her years of training at the school, she had many opportunities to perform in productions at The Royal Opera House including A Midsummer Night’s Dream with the Mariinsky Ballet, Wayne McGregor’s Woolf Works and The Nutcracker with The Royal Ballet. At the school Vlada also won several awards including The James Monahan Medal for the Most Promising Choreographer and third place in the Ninette de Valois Choreographic Award. Vlada then continued her training at The School of the Hamburg Ballet before joining Masters of Ballet Academy. She is currently a BSc Dance Science student at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance.
She has always had a passion for teaching and in 2022 she completed the ARBTA Associate Teacher Qualification in Classical Ballet. She is thrilled to be joining the Masters of Ballet Academy faculty this year and is very passionate about inspiring and sharing her enthusiasm with her students.

Vivian Triantafyllopoulou comes from Greece, studied contemporary dance at Trinity Laban in London and continued as a chosen member of the Akram Khan Experiment. Then, she joined Jasmin Vardimon 2 professional development course and performed a national tour with pieces from AΦΕ, Vinicius Salles and Jasmin Vardimon.

Since then, she has performed with Bittersuite, Vinicius Salles, Fernanda Prata, Ben Judd and Dionysios Tsaftaridis, Emily Robinson Dance, Follow Through collective, Olga Spyraki and others. She was also a dancer for Melanie Lomoff in The Lowry and Rambert choreographic project, dancer and choreographer's assistant for Hagit Yakira's community project 'On Falling and Recovery' and rehearsal director for Hagit's project Dance for Platinum at Royal Albert Hall (2018).

She has performed in theatres like Royal Opera House, Richmix, Sadler's Wells, The Place, Nothern Ballet.

She passionately teaches dance, dance theatre and improvisation to kids, adults and professionals. She has taught for leading organisations such as Trinity Laban, The Place, City Lit, Greenwich Dance and others.

Vivian is the founder of workshops; 'Energy and flow', a contemporary dance workshop and 'Movement waves', an outdoors community improvisation workshop-usually happening by the sea!

She created her own dance company in 2019, and her works have been supported by Tripspace, Chisenhale Dance, Arts Council England, Dance Cultural Center and others.

Vivian is very excited to be part of Masters of Ballet Academy and work with the students towards their development and help them bring the best out of them!

Rainy trained as a classical dancer at Central School of Ballet in London.

Whilst training, she performed with the English National Ballet Company in productions such as Swan Lake (The Royal Albert Hall), Le Corsaire (The London Coliseum) and Nutcracker (The London Coliseum), in which she played the role of 'Young Clara'.

In 2019 she decided to take her love of Health and Fitness to a new level by enrolling at YMCA Fit in central London and training as a Level 3 Fitness Instructor and Personal Trainer. She personally trains dancers from The Royal Ballet School, Polish National Ballet School, Central School of Ballet and Ballet Theatre UK.

As well as training our students, she privately coaches students at The Royal Ballet School (Richmond), Central School of Ballet (London), The Vaganova Academy (St. Petersburg), Polish National Ballet School (Warsaw), Ballet Theatre UK (Leicestershire) and London Studio Centre (London).

Rainy thrives on building a strong and productive relationship with her students. She has a warm, fun and motivating approach.

Sara Knight is a graduate of England's Royal Ballet School, an Associate of the Royal Academy of Dance (A.R.A.D.), graduate of the Royal Ballet School Teacher's Training Course (R.B.S. Dip. TTC.) and first British graduate of Russia's Vaganova (Kirov) Ballet Academy. Sara is a recipient of the Royal Ballet Special Award for Excellence personally awarded by Dame Ninette de Valois, founder of the Royal Ballet.

Upon graduation, Sara was accepted to the Eifman Ballet Theatre. She remained in Russia and danced with Leningrad State Ballet Theatre and The Russian Ballet of St. Petersburg. In the West, she danced with England's Northern Ballet Theatre, European Ballet of London, Boston Ballet and was Principal Dancer with Configuration Dance and the Rebecca Rice Dance Company, USA.
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Sara has been invited to teach worldwide including Boston Ballet Company, Boston Ballet School, Tulsa Ballet Center for Dance Education, Cincinnati Ballet School, Laban Centre London, Northern Ballet Theatre of England, Arts Educational School of the UK, Boston Conservatory, and The International Festival of France. Sara has also served as Ballet Mistress for both London's Central School of Ballet and Ellison Ballet of NYC. She was the Artistic Director for the Ballet School of Stamford as well as the Co-Founder and Artistic Director of the Greenwich Ballet Academy.

In September 2010, Sara founded SLK Ballet. “A school for gifted dancers to prepare for a career as a professional dancer”. SLK Ballet has an annual exchange with both Central Ballet and English National Ballet School in London, UK. Sara continues to teach worldwide.

Denis Matvienko is the Ukrainian former Principal Dancer of the Mariinsky Theatre, Mikhailovsky Theatre and Assistant Professor of Classical Pas de Deux at The Vaganova Academy.

Experience:

2020-2022| Assistant Professor at the Department of Classical and Pas de deux at Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet, St. Petersburg. (Russia); 2016-2020 | Artistic Director of the Novosibirsk Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre, Novosibirsk. (Russia); 2013-2016 | Principal dancer of the Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg. (Russia); 2011-2013 | Artistic Director of the Ballet of the National Opera of Ukraine. (Ukraine); 2009-2011 | Principal dancer of the Mariinsky Theatre St Petersburg. (Russia); 2007-2009 | Principal dancer of the Mikhailovsky Theatre, St Petersburg. (Russia); 2002-2007 | Principal dancer of the National Opera of Ukraine in Kiev. (Ukraine)

As a guest principal dancer appeared at:

the New National Theatre in Tokyo (2000-2015), Japan
the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow (2005-2008) Russia
the Teatro Alla Scala in Milan (2007-2009) Italy
the Opéra de Paris (2007) Paris
ABT, New York (2012-2013) USA
the Mikhailovsky Theatre, St Petersburg (2009-2022) Russia

Born in the USA, Nehemiah Kish is a highly accomplished ballet dancer, director, and producer. Nehemiah began his dance training in Michigan before moving to Toronto to study ballet at Canada’s National Ballet School. He quickly rose through the ranks, becoming a Principal Dancer at the National Ballet of Canada, and later joining the Royal Danish Ballet and the Royal Ballet in London. Throughout his career, Nehemiah performed as an international guest artist with some of the world’s most prestigious ballet companies, including the Suzanne Farrell Ballet, The Bavarian State Ballet, The Hamburg Ballet, and The Stuttgart Ballet. He has also been featured in notable performances such as Carlos Acosta: A Classical Selection, The Royal Variety Performance, and the closing ceremony of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.

In 2019, Nehemiah retired from the Royal Ballet and pursued a master’s degree in Arts Administration and Cultural Policy from Goldsmith’s University of London. He has since produced and directed several major dance events to critical acclaim, including “Becoming a Dancer” at the Detroit Institute of Arts, and “Nureyev Legend and Legacy,” a celebration of Rudolf Nureyev in association with The Rudolf Nureyev Foundation at London’s historic Theatre Royal Drury Lane.

Dmitri Gruzdev, a dancer for 25 years with two of the world's finest companies and now passing on his wealth of knowledge and experience to the next generation.

Dmitri trained at the prestigious Vaganova Academy in St. Petersburg and graduated in 1989 when he was offered a position at the world-famous Kirov Ballet. In 1993 he joined English National Ballet and worked his way from soloist to become the company's leading Senior Principal male dancer for many years.

Dmitri retired from ENB in 2016, and he is now renowned and sought after teacher and repetiteur with a full diploma from the Royal Ballet School Teacher Training Programme. Since starting his career as a teacher he has worked with professional students and dancers from such companies as the Bolshoi Ballet, Rambert Ballet School, Schottish Ballet, English National Ballet, and also as a private coach for individuals.

Andrey Klemm was born on 30 April 1967. From 1977-1985, he trained at the Bolshoi Ballet School in Moscow, from which he graduated with an honorary diploma with first-class honours.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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From 1985-1994, he was a solo dancer at the Moscow Classical Ballet Company. From 1992-1994, he was a student at the faculty of ballet teaching, at The State Institute of the Performing Arts (GITIS). From 1994-1997, he was a member of Bonn Opera Ballet Company (artistic director Valery Panov). Since 1996, he has been Master Teacher at the Ballet Intensive summer courses, in the USA (New York, Chicago, Detroit, Florida). Since 1997, he has been a member of the Berlin State Opera Ballet Company. From 2001-2003, he was Pas de deux teacher at the State Ballet School, Berlin. From 2001-2006, he studied and was given a diploma in, ballet teaching at the New Humanitarian University. From 2001-2007, he was a teacher of ballet at the Berlin State Opera Company, and also at the State Ballet, Berlin. Since 2007, he has been a teacher of ballet at the Paris National Opera.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
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He has been guest ballet teacher at the following companies: Stuttgart Ballet, Ballet of Semperoper Dresden, Ballet of Deutschen Oper am Rhein, Dutch National Ballet, Amsterdam, Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow. Pina Bausch company, Wuppertal. Royal ballet London, Viena State ballet. Tokyo ballet, and many others.⠀⠀

Tony Veiler is a classical ballet teacher and choreographer who got his ballet education at the St. Petersburg University Humanitarities and Conservatory Rimsky-Korsakov. During his 30 years of experience, he worked as a guest teacher in Italy, France, the UK, Russia, Lebanon, Bulgaria and Finland and his students became soloists and artists of ballet in different Ballet Theatres and Companies around the world. He was also a member of the jury in several International Ballet Competitions in Italy, Sweden, Estonia and Finland. Tony worked as a guest choreographer at the Vanemuine Ballet Theatre and at the Estonia National Opera, and he is the Artistic Director of the International Ballet Company “Young Ballet Fouetté”. As a choreographer Tony set up to stage classical Ballet Performances like “Le Corsaire”, “Giselle” and “Don Quixote” and he made several original choreography performances like “Dance of Life”, “Drop of Yellow”, “Nocturne”, “Ohla la la”. At the moment Tony Veiler is working as a Senior Ballet Teacher and Artistic Director at the Ballet School Fouetté, Estonia.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀