Today’s guest is Pacific Northwest Ballet Soloist, Jonathan Batista!
Jonathan started his training at a social project in Rio de Janeiro’s City of God slums. His talent was then spotted by his teacher which took him to a pre-professional dance division at Alice Arja Ballet School where he started his journey in Classical Ballet.
I won’t spoil the story about how Batista went from this humble beginning to performing all over the world – he shares this wonderful story in our conversation – but I will tell you that during 2017-2021 he has performed with Oklahoma City Ballet as a Principal Dancer.
Whilst with the company, Jonathan created two world premieres, winning ‘Best Choreography of the Year’ by the National Destined 2 Dancer Award and in 2021 he won the ‘Art Culture & Music Award’ by the TAF AWARD FOUNDATION for his contributions in representation, activism, work and contributions to the dance community in Oklahoma.
​In this conversation we cover growing up in Brasil, the importance of having an entrepreneurial spirit if you’re going to have a successful career as a dancer and most notable his mission to create more diversity, equity and inclusion in the dance world.
​Batista is a man with a mission and like all humans who want to make a difference in this world, he is incredibly focussed, driven and organised. We cover his insane morning routine and disciplined practices – but of course there’s some balance in there too…
I really loved chatting to Jonathan, in fact when recording was done we spent another few minutes sharing diary recommendations and organisation tips! I have a feeling we’re cut from the same cloth…
I wish Jonathan all the success in the world and would like to thank him for carving out some precious time to share his story with the Balanced Ballerinas community.
As always you can find me on Instagram @thebalancedballerina and you can find Jonathan @jonathanbatistaofficial – I love when people actually comment on the latest podcast tile on the official @balancedballerinas account, so come say hello and let us know what you enjoyed in this episode.
Enjoy my conversation with my new friend Jonathan!
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