posted March 29, 2002 23:18            

One of the country's leading vocational dance academies, Elmhurst, is making a £12 million move to the Midlands to become an associate school of the Birmingham Royal Ballet.

The move, scheduled for September 2004, will end the Elmhurst School for Dance's 80-year association with Camberley, Surrey. It comes with the backing of both Birmingham City Council and the Department for Education and Skills.

Chairman of the school's governors Robert Crossley described the move as a "very significant development" for the institution.

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On their toes for fame bid
by Gary Skentelbery in The Manchester Evening News

TWO teenagers from Warrington are bidding to take the dancing world by storm.

Jenny Corcoran, 19, and Freya Jones, 18, are already qualified ballet teachers at the Kate Simmon School of Dance in the town. Jenny, who has been dancing since she was three, has attained the highest level of ballet at diploma level, and Freya is just a year behind at advanced level.

The girls, who live in Stockton Heath, will take centre stage at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester next month in their dancing school''s production of the wartime show Waiting. They are now hoping to make the big time, with Jenny taking a lead role in Waiting on April 26-27, and Freya in a lead role in the school''s production of Beauty And The Beast at the same venue.

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posted April 10, 2002 12:21            

HE stops short of calling Billy Elliott his idol, but if his career in ballet follows the fortunes of the film character it would be the fulfilment of a dancing dream for Toby Mallitt.

The 14-year-old from Ipswich hopes to become a professional dancer and is celebrating gaining a prestigious placement at the Royal Ballet School in London.

Toby, of Britannia Road, impressed in auditions last month and starts a course of 18 classes in September.

"There are only a certain number of places so I was amazed when I found out I had got in – I just thought 'wow'. I'm really looking forward to it," he said.

posted April 13, 2002 10:07            

SWINDON may have produced the next Billy Elliot or Margot Fonteyn as two young ballet students have been accepted at the world-renowned Royal Ballet School.

Thomas Peacock, 11, of Upper Stratton, and Bethany West, 12, of Stanton Fitzwarren, have both been attending ballet lessons in Swindon since they were three years old. Now, they are among 24 children to have won a place this year at the leading classical ballet school, beating off competition from hundreds of the very best students from across the world.

posted April 14, 2002 02:52            

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THE Royal Ballet has succumbed to the Billy Elliot effect. For the first time in its 76-year history, the establishment that spawned such stars as Dame Margot Fonteyn and Darcey Bussell has accepted more boys than girls.

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Stuart adds: Another story on the same theme,

Boys 'inspired' by Billy Elliot
From the BBC website

For the first time ever the Royal Ballet has taken in more boys than girls thanks to the success of the film Billy Elliot, according to reports.
Two years after the story of a miner's son who becomes a ballet dancer hit movie screens, this year's intake at the Royal Ballet's junior and senior schools comprises 14 boys and 10 girls, reports the Sunday Telegraph.

Billy Elliot was set in a northern town during the 1984 miners' strike. It told the story of a young working class boy who chose not to follow his widowed father's instructions that he should train to be a boxer.

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posted April 14, 2002 19:38            

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'Billy Elliot' Draws Boys to Royal Ballet

Reuters on Yahoo! News

LONDON (Reuters) - Starstruck British boys under the spell of the film "Billy Elliot" have made history at the Royal Ballet by outnumbering girls for the first time in its 76-year history, according to the Sunday Telegraph.

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posted April 15, 2002 04:27            

Boys line up at Royal Ballet School
by James Burleigh in The Evening Standard

Billy Elliot, the film about a miner's son who becomes a ballet dancer, is truly changing the face of classical dance.

Two years after the film's release, the Royal Ballet School has, for the first time in its 76-year history, accepted more boys than girls. This year's intake at both the Royal Ballet's junior and senior schools will be made up of 14 boys and 10 girls and, like the film's hero, Nicholas Jones, 11, from Woodbridge in Suffolk has won a place at White Lodge - the school's junior section for 11 to 16-year-olds.

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Amazing - Billy Elliott and the RBS news even make it into the China Daily News:

LONDON - Boys flock to Royal Ballet

Starstruck British boys under the spell of the film "Billy Elliot" have made history at the Royal Ballet by outnumbering girls for the first time in its 76-year history.

Scroll down to near the botton for the news snippet

posted April 15, 2002 04:31            

Young dancer may lose school chance
By Carl Yapp for The Western Mail


A YOUNG dancer like the boy in the film Billy Elliot is in danger of losing his place at a renowned school of dance unless sponsorship can be found to help pay for his school fees.

Duncan Saul, 11, was accepted at The Arts Educational School, Tring Park, in Hertfordshire, after a successful audition. He is supposed to start at the school's five-year course in September.

However, like the family of fictional 11-year-old Billy Elliot, played by Jamie Bell, Duncan's parents are not in the financial position to afford the £15,000-a-year fees to pay for their son's expert tuition.

posted April 16, 2002 12:55            

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LIFE is imitating art at the Royal Ballet. More boys than ever have enrolled at the establishment's world-renowned school, two years after filmgoers saw Billy Elliot, the film about a ballet dancing son of a miner.

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posted April 16, 2002 06:44            

THE Royal Ballet’s debt of gratitude to the makers of Billy Elliot for making elegant dancing hip — the school accepted more boys than girls this year for the first time in its 76-year history — has yet to be repaid. John Finn, Billy’s producer, is still seething over his abortive attempts to get footage of the Royal Ballet’s White Lodge in Richmond upon Thames.
“They were just so unbelievably unhelpful while we were making Billy,” he told me at the premiere of About a Boy on Sunday. “They sent me insulting letters in response to all our requests and we ended up having to film the supposed longshots of the Royal Ballet School at a country house instead of using the real thing. It’s really ironic that they have benefited from the whole thing. They helped us not a bit.”

posted May 10, 2002 03:50            

THREE of Suffolk's brightest dance stars are hot-footing it to London and Cambridge to take up places at top dance schools.

Abigail Glading is off to London after winning a place in a production by the London Children's Ballet.

Abigail, of Main Road, Woolverstone, will be in their production of Faithful Gelert, which is based on a Welsh folk story about a dog.

Ten-year-old Abigail will be playing a puppy, a fawn and a bridesmaid and her mum said she is really excited.

posted May 11, 2002 23:41            

Ballet school waiting on plans
From the Birmingham Evening Mail


No planning permission has yet been granted for Birmingham's new £12 million ballet academy, it was revealed today.

News that top ballet school Elmhurst was planning to move to the city from Surrey was exclusively revealed in the Evening Mail recently.

But Coun Deirdre Alden was shocked to discover that planning permission for the site on Bristol Road, Edgbaston has not yet been given.

In a letter to Coun Alden, city planning chief Emrys Jones said the announcement was "somewhat premature" since no planning application has yet been lodged.

posted May 11, 2002 23:43            

Ridgeway School pupil Georgina Hows, 11, from Wroughton, has won a place to perform in a specially devised version of Cinderella which is being choreographed by Wayne Sleep.

She will be dancing the role of a mouse at Sadler's Wells Theatre in London, the Grand Theatre in Swansea and the Ashcroft Theatre in Croydon.

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posted May 24, 2002 09:39            

A FORMER star of smash show Stomp has helped to turn dozens of Lothian schoolboys into dance fanatics.

Manchester-based Peter Francis held a series of workshops at four primary schools in East Lothian this week.

Mr Francis, who has a classical ballet background, said: "If you’re not into dancing at a very early age, it often becomes very inaccessible for boys. We’re very similar to Stomp but all of the sounds are created with our bodies.

"We sneak dance into the classroom under of the guise of making noise.

posted June 13, 2002 01:07            

Article from The Scotsman.

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AS MANY boys as girls are to be trained at Scotland’s top ballet school thanks to the hit film Billy Elliot.

The Dance School of Scotland, based at Knightswood Secondary in Glasgow, yesterday revealed that this year’s aspiring dancers, many of whom go on to successful careers with Scottish Ballet and other world-class companies, will be evenly matched along gender lines.

In August, eight boys and eight girls aged 11 will start the rigorous training which they hope will lead to the kind of success enjoyed by the eponymous hero of the film which hit screens two years ago.

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posted June 23, 2002 01:58            

Never Neverland will be the destination for Plymouth youngsters today as they take to the stage in a production of the classic tale Peter Pan.

Performers from the Plymstock School of Dance will become Lost Boys, Indians and pirates in their own interpretation of JMBarrie's popular children's play, which is to be staged at the Athenaeum.

Songs such as Shaggy's Boomshakalak and Nigel and Marvin's Follow Da Leader, currently number 37 in the charts, will feature in the show.

The dancers, taught by sisters Mandy and Michelle Power, will also be performing various songs from the film Hook.

Rehearsals have been taking place since the dance group returned from performing at EuroDisney in April.