Company History

OUR HISTORY

Carolina Ballet is one of America’s premier arts organizations, programming traditional ballets by legendary masters and new works by contemporary choreographers. The Ballet was launched as a professional company in 1998 under the direction of Founding Artistic Director Robert Weiss. In 2019, Zalman Raffael became the company’s second Artistic Director/CEO.

Carolina Ballet grew out of the vision of local community leader Ward Purrington for Raleigh Dance Theatre to become a professional ballet company. After an extensive national search, Robert Weiss was named Founding Artistic Director in April 1997. Formerly the Artistic Director of the Pennsylvania Ballet, Weiss joined the New York City Ballet at age 17 and rose to the rank of Principal Dancer under the training and mentorship of the legendary George Balanchine.

Carolina Ballet premiered in October 1998 with 16 dancers and 5 apprentices. The Ballet celebrated its 25th Anniversary in 2022-2023 with 47 professional dancers.

The Ballet offers an annual subscription series of classical works, traditional story ballets and innovative new choreography, as well as an annual Nutcracker program each December. Each season, Carolina Ballet gives approximately 80 performances, including student matinees.

Carolina Ballet has presented thousands of performances to millions of people over our 25-year history. the Ballet has produced close to 200 world-premiere works created by Weiss, Raffael, Lynne Taylor-Corbett and other distinguished choreographers.

We have reached more than 100,000 children (Pre-K to high school) through outreach. Annually, the Ballet offers matinees to approximately 5,000 students and donates over 5,000 tickets to community service and educational nonprofits.

Our education program, Dancers In Schools, presents hands-on ballet demonstrations by professional dancers to students attending low-resource elementary schools across the region. Our Ruth B. Shur Summer Intensive has grown into one of the top ballet training programs in the country.

In 2018, the Ballet launched the School of Carolina Ballet (SCB), offering year-round professional dance training for ages 6 and up. In 2023, Jan Burkhard (Chair of SCB Faculty) and Nicholas Fokine (Administrator of School Operations) started a financial aid program to allow children and families of all socio-economic backgrounds to participate in the school’s curriculum. SCB is also working with Wake County Child Welfare Services to provide weekly classes to foster children.

In May 2017, Weiss named Zalman Raffael, the Ballet’s Co-Artistic Director, as his successor. Raffael assumed the full duties of Artistic Director/CEO on July 1, 2019. Under Raffael’s leadership, Carolina Ballet continues to thrive. In Summer 2023, the company moved its offices and studios to a new 24,000-square-foot space. We have also launched a capital campaign to secure funds to help with the Ballet’s relocation and for the purchase or construction of our own building within the next five years.

Carolina Ballet has garnered critical praise from local, national and international media, contributing to the positive reputation of the region and ever-increasing quality of life found in Raleigh, the Triangle community and the State of North Carolina.