Robin’s bob-bob-bobbin’ along
After years with the Omaha Theater Ballet, Robin Welch prepares to open her new dance school.
By John Pitcher
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
Robin Welch’s career seemed to be over last fall, when the Rose Theater announced that it would close the Omaha Theater Ballet at the end of the 2009-10 season. Welch had founded the ballet at the Rose in 1999 and led it as artistic director and choreographer for 10 years.
On June 1, the dancer begins the latest act of her life, opening a new school called Robin Welch Dance Arts and Core Training, located at 8801 F. St.
We recently asked Welch about her career, the folding of her ballet company and her new school.
Q. What was your first professional dance experience?
A. I became a member of the original Harkness Ballet when I was just 17 years old. Harkness was headquartered in New York City but did many of its performances abroad. So the first thing I did after I was hired was go buy a big trunk. Then I headed straight for Monte Carlo and spent a year dancing in Europe. The great thing about being in Harkness was that the dancers always got a cosmopolitan experience. For me, it was a dream come true.
Q. What brought you from the East Coast to Omaha?
A. After Harkness, I went to Connecticut and danced with Connecticut Ballet for a while. My ex-husband, Robert Vickrey, landed a great job as artistic director of Ballet Omaha, so we moved the family in 1985. The thing I’ll remember most about ballet in Omaha is “The Nutcracker.” Robert and I brought our version to Omaha in 1985. After Ballet Omaha closed in the mid-’90s, I brought “The Nutcracker” with me to Omaha Theater Ballet at the Rose Theater. In 2007, Omaha Theater Ballet launched “Imperial Nutcracker,” which we danced until the company folded. So I spent 25 years in Omaha either dancing in or choreographing “The Nutcracker.”
Q. Was there anything that could have been done differently that might have saved Omaha Theater Ballet?
A. I’m still too upset to talk about that. I might have been able to stay on at the Rose for another year as a dance teacher, but there was no guarantee it would have lasted more than a year. And I couldn’t go through another year like this past one. But at the same time, I couldn’t just leave all of my former students high and dry, which is why I used much of my savings to start a new school.
Q. What’s your teaching philosophy?
A. I believe it is very important to train students to use their creative imaginations. It’s not enough for dancers to just go through the physical motions. They need to have a sense of the image they are trying to create. If you don’t learn that skill early on, it’s hard to develop it later. I also believe it’s important for the dance teacher to pay attention to all the students and not just to the skinniest little girls in the class. You’d be surprised how often that doesn’t happen.
Q. Who are the teachers at your new school?
A. Well, it will be me and my daughter, Rachel Vickrey, who many people know as the Sugar Plum Fairy from “Imperial Nutcracker.” Deborah Carr, Omaha Theater Ballet’s former ballet mistress, will also teach. For our opening summer session, we’ll have Liz Reiter, the director of the dance program at St. Gregory’s University, to teach jazz dance.
Q. There’s a Heartland Youth Ballet associated with your new school. What is this group?
A. The mission of the school is to develop the full potential of our dancers through technical training, artistic development and performance opportunities. Heartland Youth Ballet will be the part of the school that provides our young dancers with performance opportunities. Among other things, they will present workshops and perform in residencies in the Omaha area throughout the year. The best education any dancer can get is the experience of dancing in public.
Contact the writer:
444-1076, john.pitcher@owh.com
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