In terms of the age at which most professional ballet dancers start dancing, Rachel Ganteaume-Richards considers "I started late at age 13. I was good at track and at one time had visions of going on and doing track as my mainstay. But when I started dancing that was it. It just grabbed my heart."
Married to Gola Wolf Richards, an American philosopher who has just published "The Way to See (w)hole"....Virtue through Acts of Contemplation ....A course in Wisdom for Conflict Resolution, Rachel, who lives in the small town of Denmark in Maine, U.S.A., came home three weeks ago to see her parents, Andy and Semoy Ganteaume, celebrate their golden wedding anniversary.
The former Woodbrook Secondary Government School student, left Trinidad at age 16 "straight after GCE in June. I left in August for what was then the American Ballet Centre and is now the Joffrey Ballet School in Manhattan." She had learned ballet at the Caribbean School of Dance at the time that Marcia Moze was in charge, the current principal Pat Roe was her teacher and another current teacher Joanne Decle came as Rachel was leaving.
After three years at the Ballet Centre, Rachel joined the Joffrey II Ballet, junior ballet company. "There was neither degree nor diploma you just progressed into the junior company, and you could either audition or they promoted you to the main company." Rachel remembers travelling on a tour bus for all one-night stands with Junior II, doing ballets like Confetti from the main company. "The Still Point was one of the premiere ballet we did, there were three movements and a fourth was added specifically for me in that company by choreographer Todd Bolender. I was the main character in "Rush" choreographed by the late Stuart Sebastian, who came back and did a ballet on me called "And Ever More."
Rachel has danced mostly contemporary ballet, not classical like Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty. "We used choreographers of this age to choreograph for the Joffrey. My training though was all classical ballet and that is what was different because I did not learn any modern or tap, and although the ballets were not the classics my training was all classical ballet."
"After just two years with the junior company I was invited to join the main company of the Joffrey Ballet and performed many, many ballets all over the United States but never overseas."
At the end of 41/2 years Rachel married and stopped almost immediately to have her daughter who is now twenty and raise her. "We decided to home-school her. When she was two we moved to Maine so I home-schooled her for six years and then when she was about to enter into Middle School we sent her out to school, and I would help out wherever I was needed at the school."
Rachel then started back taking dance classes "just for my enjoyment. When we moved to Maine I had taught dance for a few years, and when they saw me going back to take classes invited me to teach again at the same school where I was taking classes. Three years ago I was invited to perform so I performed again in The Witches of Salem in Portland, Maine. That was my last bout of performing, now I teach students privately. And help out in the administration of my husband's office. I am going back to continue helping my husband with his endeavour, which right now is getting his new book on the Internet at website www.mottocitizens.com ."