The
Dancers

Aaron hails from northern Virginia where he began his ballet training at age 11, studying with renowned ballet teachers such as Violette Verdy, Suzanne Farrell, Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux, and Jacques Cesbron. He completed his training and simultaneously earned bachelor's degrees in Biology and Ballet at Indiana University.

Aaron was invited to join Philadelphia Ballet in 2015 and quickly began performing leading roles there including Basilio in Angel Corella's Don Quixote, Tybalt in Kenneth MacMillan's Romeo & Juliet, and Waltz boy in George Balanchine's Serenade. The formative years of Aaron's career were dominated by opportunities to perform diverse icons of ballet including work by Jerome Robbins, Alexander Ekman, Ben Stevenson, and Christopher Wheeldon.

Aaron joined Alberta Ballet as a soloist in 2021 and is thrilled to be entertaining audiences in his new home in Canada. He is particularly proud of his work as the title role in Jean Grand-Maître's PHI, and the reimagined title role in Annabelle Lopez Ochoa's Botero. Aaron was promoted to Principal Dancer in March 2024.

Alexandra is originally from Glens Falls, NY, USA. She trained at the North Carolina School of the Arts as well as the School of American Ballet and worked with Philadelphia Ballet (formerly Pennsylvania Ballet) as a soloist prior to joining Alberta Ballet.

She has performed many notable roles while in Philadelphia including Principal roles in George Balanchine’s Theme and Variations, Jewels, and Square Dance, William Forsythe’s Artifact Suite, and Jerome Robbins’ Fancy-Free.

While at Alberta Ballet, Alexandra has continued dancing featured roles in ballets such as Nicolo Fonte’s Rite of Spring, Helen Pickett’s Petal, Alyssa Pires’ Skyward, the Fly in Annabelle Lopez Ochoa’s Botero, and Gretel in Loughlan Prior’s Hansel and Gretel.

Throughout her career, Alexandra has also had the pleasure of dancing prominent roles in ballets choreographed by David Dawson, Nacho Duato, Alexander Eckman, Jiri Kylian, Sir Kenneth MacMillan, Cathy Marston, Trey McIntyre, Sir Wayne McGregor, Matthew Neenan, Justin Peck, Twyla Tharp, Christopher Wheeldon, and Yin Yue. Alexandra was promoted to Principal in March 2024.

Mariko is originally from Hiroshima, Japan, and received her ballet training at both the International Ballet Academy in Japan and Canada’s National Ballet School. Before joining Alberta Ballet, she had the opportunity to dance in Germany with Leipzig Ballet as well as with Opera Atelier in Toronto. Now in her Seventeeth season with us, Mariko has brought many wonderful roles to life on stage over the years, including Cio-Cio San in Stanton Welch’s Madame Butterfly, Giselle in Giselle, and Titania in Bruce Wells’ A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Luna is originally from Kanagawa, Japan, and is in her 12th season with Alberta Ballet. Luna began her ballet training at a local school in Japan. At the age of 16, she received a full scholarship to the Houston Ballet Academy and completed her training at Boston Ballet School as a trainee before joining Alberta Ballet in 2013. She has danced many soloist and principal roles while with the company and was promoted to Principal Dancer in 2023. Some of her favourite roles include the title role of Giselle, Juliet in Romeo & Juliet and Suzuki in Madame Butterfly. Her repertoire includes Sugar Plum Fairy and Klara in The Nutcracker, Cinderella and Spring Fairy in Cinderella, Princess Aurora, Princess Florine and Fairy of Joy in The Sleeping Beauty, Alice Liddle in Alice in Wonderland, Red Women and Pink Women in Jiří Kylián’s Forgotten Land, Cordelia in All of Us and more. She has enjoyed the opportunity to collaborate with many choreographers such as Jean Grand-Maître, Ben Stevenson, Stanton Welch, Cathy Marston, Anne Plamondon, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, Helen Pickett, Wen Wei Wang, Yukichi Hattori, Garrett Smith, Christopher Anderson, Alysa Pires, Yin Yue, Nicolo Fonte, and Leiland Charles.