Johanne Gingras

Teacher Training Program Director

Bio

Since 1984, Johanne Gingras has been an integral part of Canada’s Royal Winnipeg Ballet School after joining the Artistic Faculty as a ballet teacher. She was instrumental in developing the RWB School Teacher Training Program curriculum and was named Director of the program in 1997. Ms. Gingras’ goal continues to be instilling a passion for technique and artistry in the next generation of dance teachers. Alongside her role as Teacher Training Program Director, she also teaches ballet, pointe, character and repertoire to students of the RWB School Professional Division, and conducts auditions and teaches master classes during the annual RWB School Audition Tour.

Ms. Gingras had the wonderful opportunity to perform with the RWB School Professional Division in their production of La Sylphide, where she worked on the character role “Madge” with the brilliant Eva Evdokimova. She then performed professionally with the RWB Company as Juliet’s nurse in their production of Romeo + Juliet.

Originally from Chicoutimi, Québec, Ms. Gingras began her dance training at the Académie de Danse du Saguenay where she performed in a multi dance discipline troupe, dance and sang in several operettas before following her passion for teaching. She is a graduate of Canada’s National Ballet School Teacher Training Program and she holds Licentiate teaching qualifications with Cecchetti Canada and the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing.

Ms. Gingras has been invited to teach across North America and in Japan. In 2003, she travelled to South Africa to teach on behalf of the RWB School. For the past twenty years Ms. Gingras has also been in high demand as an adjudicator for festivals and competitions across Canada and internationally; most recently for the prestigious Youth American Grand Prix in New York and Prix de Lausanne in Switzerland.

After more than thirty five years of teaching, Ms. Gingras’ greatest joy is to see the students she nurtures graduate and go on to dance careers in companies around the world, or, as teachers who carry on her work by sharing their enthusiasm for instructing technique and artistry to the next generation of artists.