Alessandra Ferri

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Lore & Background

Alessandra Ferri was born in Milan, Italy. She began studying ballet at the La Scala Theatre Ballet School, later transferring to the upper school of the Royal Ballet School. She represented the Royal Ballet School in the 1980 Prix de Lausanne, winning a scholarship which enabled her to continue studying at the school. Ferri joined the Royal Ballet in 1980, and in 1982, for her first major role in the ballet Mayerling, she was nominated for the Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding First Achievement of the Year in Ballet. In 1983, she was nominated for and won the Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding Individual Performance of the Year in a New Dance Production for her role in Sir Kenneth MacMillan's Valley of Shadows. In 1983, she was promoted to the rank of Principal Dancer. In 1985, Ferri left the Royal Ballet at the request of Mikhail Baryshnikov to become a Principal Dancer with American Ballet Theatre, under Baryshnikov's own direction. She stated that she needed a more rigorous training program that the company could provide. In 1992, Ferri became a Guest Star of the American Ballet Theatre and began a very close collaboration with La Scala Theatre Ballet, becoming recognised as Prima Ballerina Assoluta of the company. She temporarily retired on 10 August 2007, aged 44, and in 2007 she brought Roberto Bolle to dance opposite her in her farewell performance of Romeo and Juliet. She returned to dance after retirement in 2013, starring in The Piano Upstairs at Spoleto. Performances since have included Lea in Cheri for Signature Theatre, The Raven for Gotham Chamber Opera and in Woolf Works with Royal Ballet. In June 2017, she appeared at the Royal Opera House in the ballet Marguerite and Armand. She has reprised her role in Woolf Works at the Royal Ballet in 2023 and at American Ballet Theater in 2024.

Reader's Guide

Alessandra Ferri's career spanned four decades and three major ballet companies. Her early success with the Royal Ballet included an Olivier Award win for Valley of Shadows in 1983 and promotion to Principal Dancer the same year. Her move to American Ballet Theatre in 1985 at the request of Mikhail Baryshnikov was driven by her need for a more rigorous training program. Her long association with La Scala Theatre Ballet began in 1992, where she was recognised as Prima Ballerina Assoluta. She created roles for choreographers including Kenneth MacMillan, Roland Petit, and Wayne McGregor, and was particularly known for story ballets by MacMillan, Petit, John Cranko and John Neumeier. Her temporary retirement in 2007 included a farewell performance of Romeo and Juliet with Roberto Bolle. Her return in 2013 included new roles such as Lea in Cheri and The Raven, and reprisals of Woolf Works at the Royal Ballet in 2023 and at American Ballet Theatre in 2024. Ferri's legacy includes her collaborations with major male dancers including Rudolf Nureyev, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and Julio Bocca, as well as her influence on the companies she danced with.

Did You Know?

• Ferri won the Prix de Lausanne in 1980 as a student at the Royal Ballet School, earning a scholarship.
• She was nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award in 1982 for her first major role in Mayerling.
• In 1983 she won the Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding Individual Performance of the Year in a New Dance Production for Valley of Shadows.
• She brought Roberto Bolle to dance opposite her in her farewell performance of Romeo and Juliet in 2007.
• Ferri has two daughters, Matilde (born 1997) and Emma (born 2001), who joined their mother on stage at her farewell performance.

A Career Spanning Three Great Companies

Born in Milan on 6 May 1963, Ferri first trained at La Scala's ballet school before transferring to the Royal Ballet School's upper division. A scholarship she won at the 1980 Prix de Lausanne kept her in London, where she joined the Royal Ballet that same year. By 1983 she had been elevated to Principal Dancer, earning a Laurence Olivier Award for her work in MacMillan's Valley of Shadows and a nomination for her debut in Mayerling. In 1985, Mikhail Baryshnikov personally recruited her to American Ballet Theatre, a move she explained as a need for the more rigorous daily training the company offered. She remained with ABT through 2007. Beginning in 1992 she also forged a deep, ongoing partnership with La Scala Theatre Ballet, where she was recognised as Prima Ballerina Assoluta. Her concurrent affiliations with both companies continued until her temporary retirement on 10 August 2007, at the age of forty-four. Certain publications have since elevated her to the distinction of prima ballerina assoluta.

A Prolific Catalogue of Created Roles

Ferri's repertoire of created parts stretches across more than three decades and includes well over twenty-five premieres. Her earliest highlights came with the Royal Ballet: MacMillan's Chanson in 1981, Corder's Invitation au Voyage in 1982, and MacMillan's Valley of Shadows and Different Drummer in 1983 and 1984. Her ABT period yielded MacMillan's Requiem (1986) and Maillot's In Volo (1997). At La Scala she tackled Spoerli's Armide (1996), Vespri Siciliani (1997), and Europa Riconosciuta (2004), alongside Forsythe's Quartetto (1998). She also created roles for Roland Petit, Daniel Ezralow, Amedeo Amodio, and Oscar Araiz across companies in Marseille, Milan, and Buenos Aires. After her 2013 return she added McGregor's Woolf Works (2015), Neumeier's Duse (2016), and McGregor's Witness (2017) and Afterite (2018). She even stepped behind the curtain to choreograph her own piece, The Piano Upstairs, for the Spoleto Festival that same year.

Partnerships and International Guest Work

Ferri's list of stage partners reads like a roll call of twentieth-century ballet. She danced opposite Rudolf Nureyev in Los Angeles for his fiftieth birthday celebration in 1988, appeared alongside Baryshnikov in the 1987 film Dancers, and shared the stage with Anthony Dowell, Patrick Dupond, Maximiliano Guerra, Manuel Legris, and Carlos Acosta among others. She has singled out Julio Bocca as her favourite partner; the two performed the Romeo and Juliet pas de deux together in 1998. As a guest artist she brought her artistry to the Paris Opera Ballet, the Kirov Ballet at the Mariinsky, the National Ballet of Canada, the Tokyo Ballet, the Cuban National Ballet, the Hamburg Ballet, the Stuttgart Ballet, and the Ballet National de Marseille. Her particular strength lay in narrative ballets by MacMillan, Petit, Cranko, and Neumeier, productions in which her dramatic intensity and technical command were most fully realised.

Farewell, Return, and Life Beyond the Stage

Ferri stepped away from full-time company work on 10 August 2007, at forty-four, bringing Roberto Bolle on stage for a final Romeo and Juliet. For six years she was absent from the professional stage, but in 2013 she re-emerged at the Spoleto Festival with her own choreography, The Piano Upstairs. Since then she has embraced a varied slate of projects: Lea in Cheri for Signature Theatre, The Raven for Gotham Chamber Opera, and McGregor's Woolf Works with the Royal Ballet. In June 2017 she danced Marguerite and Armand at the Royal Opera House, and she reprised Woolf Works in 2023 with the Royal Ballet and again in 2024 with ABT. Offstage, she is the mother of two daughters, Matilde (born 1997) and Emma (born 2001), whose father is Italian photographer Fabrizio Ferri, founder of the Università dell'Immagine art school in Milan. The girls joined her on stage for her farewell performance.

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