A Statewide Celebration of Classical Ballet and Modern/Contemporary Dance!
REGISTER NOW
February 26 - March 3, 2024
- February 26 - 29, 2024: Virtual Information Sessions with recruiting institutions
- March 1, 2024: Audition Classes for current high school juniors and seniors
- March 2 - 3, 2024: Master Classes for current 4th-10th graders, Teacher Workshops, Competition
Ballet students, ages 10-19, are invited to compete for cash prizes and participate in master classes, audition classes, and a dance recruiting fair during Grand Jeté, presented by the SC Governor's School for the Arts and Humanities Dance Department. All events are open to both competitors and non-competitors.
Participants compete by age group divisions:
- Pre-Competitive (Ballet only) - ages 10-12
- Junior Division (Ballet and/or Modern/Contemporary) - ages 13-15
- Senior Division (Ballet and/or Modern/Contemporary) - ages 16-19
This year’s Grand Jeté will take place over six days on February 26 - March 3, 2024, and will be in person for South Carolina student competitors and non-competitors, adjudicators, audition, and master class teachers. Recruiters can participate in person or virtually.
Registration Deadlines
- Early Registration - November 17, 2023
- Final Registration - January 19, 2024
There is a discount for Early Registration. See 2024 Guidelines for fees.
Adjudicators
- Andrew Carroll
Andrew Carroll holds a BFA in Dance, and an MA in Arts Administration. Mr. Carroll has an extensive background in the performing arts, which includes performing nationally and internationally for nine years as a soloist with the Pennsylvania Ballet Company in Philadelphia, and a principal with the Ohio Ballet prior to that. His repertoire included: Prince Siegfried in SwanLake, The Cavalier in The Nutcracker, principal roles in the Balanchine ballets of Square Dance, Serenade, Allegro Brilliant, The Four Temperaments, Agon, Western Symphony and Symphony in C among others, as well as principal roles in the works of Marius Petipa, William Forsythe, David Parsons, Paul Taylor, Anthony Tudor, Christopher d’Amboise, Alvin Ailey, Robert Joffrey, Gerald Arpino , Lynn Taylor-Corbett and Doug Varone. His career spanned performing throughout the United States, including The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and The Joyce Theatre in Manhattan, The Spoleto Festival in Spoleto Italy and Charleston South Carolina, as well as appearing throughout South America, China and Europe. In 1994, he was named one of six cultural ambassadors to the City of Philadelphia.
In 1996, Mr. Carroll joined the School of Dance, Theatre, and Arts Administration at The University of Akron, where he was awarded tenure and promotion to Associate Professor in 2003. At UA, he taught advanced levels of Ballet, History and Choreography and was the Director of The University of Akron Dance Company for 13 years. He also helped to organize and plan numerous campus residencies and outreach programs, including The David Parsons Dance Company, Alonzo King’s Lines Ballet, Doug Varone and Dancers, Taylor II and Jennifer Muller/The Works. He has been a master teacher, choreographer and guest artist at Towson University, Grande Valley University, Verbs Ballets, The Rock School, The Ohio Ballet and The Canton Ballet.
In 2010, Mr. Carroll joined USF, and received tenure and promotion in 2016. He now teaches all levels of ballet, history and partnering. Mr. Carroll is an international speaker, and has presented at conferences in Austria, Hungary, Greece, Portugal and Hawaii, and has published articles in ArtsReach, World Arts Today, Art Times Journal and DanceUSA’s e-journal among others. He has collaborated and choreographed with the Florida Orchestra, as well as for the Metamorphosis Dance Company in Trinidad. He is a sought after guest aritst teacher, and has taught numerous Master Classes in ballet at The Florida Dance Festival, The Patel Conservatory, The Rock School, and Le Centre, L’Abbaye de Pontevoy, France.
- Deborah Hess
Deborah Hess is an internationally renowned ballet teacher and coach. A faculty member at Canada’s National Ballet School, she also leads the School’s Student Exchange Program.
Ms. Hess is a frequent guest teacher at companies and schools around the world and is a sought-after juror for major international ballet competitions. She had a rewarding international performing career dancing a wide range of roles from Odette in Swan Lake, to neo-classical works by choreographers such Bronislava Nijinska and contemporary works by choreographers like Lar Lubovitch, to name a few. She toured throughout Europe, North and South America with such luminaries as Rudolf Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn.Deborah was always interested in teaching and began pursuing her passion for teaching while she was the Assistant to the Director at the San Francisco Ballet School, Greatly influenced by her own teachers, Valentina Pereyaslavec, Kathleen Crofton, Asaf Messerer, Jorge Garcia and Anna-Marie Holmes, to name a few, she values most highly the artistic possibilities of dance and strives in her teaching to bring out the individuality of each student, highlighting musicality, generosity of spirit and dynamic range, while respecting the purity of form.
She is delighted that so many of the dancers she had the privilege of teaching are now dancing so successfully on stages around the world.
- Momar Ndiaye
Momar Ndiaye is an international performer, choreographer, teacher, and videographer from Senegal. Momar received his MFA in Dance from the University of Illinois in 2017 and was awarded with the prestigious Bruno Nettl Award for excellence in choreography for his thesis work, “Point 0” upon graduation.Ndiaye has created and toured several staged dance performances along with choreographies for music videos with his own company, “Cadanses” since 2004. Momar Ndiaye was also a full-time dancer in the international dance company “Premier Temp” (2008-2014).
As a teacher, Momar Ndiaye has taught African dance forms, Improvisation, street dance, and contemporary dance in major dance festivals in Africa, Europe, and America. Momar has also been teaching at university level in the US since 2014. He has taught at the University of Illinois as graduate student; UNCA, Denison University, and Ohio Wesleyan University as lecturer.
Momar is currently a full-time assistant professor in the department of dance at Ohio State University. His scholarly and choreographic research focuses on Negritude, Interculturalism, Globalization, and Colonialism in the way they condition African’s/Senegalese’s “performance of daily life”, traditional and contemporary dance.
Momar Ndiaye has received de the ImPulsTanz’s Danceweb scholarship in 2012, Aex.corps/Residences et creations 2012, Pamoja (réseaux panafricain de résidence et de production) in 2014, Afrique Caraïbe Pacifique en creation in 2015, Movement research in 2016, and the European Union creative funds for the project Share-Creative-Africa in collaboration with Exodos (Slovenia) in 2020.
Current List of Recruiters
We are thrilled to have the following recruiters joining us for Grand Jeté 2024! We are expecting to add many more to this list in the weeks to come.
> Coker University
> Louisville Ballet
> Indiana University
> National Ballet School of Canada
> Ohio State University
> Peabody Conservatory from John Hopkins University
> University of South Carolina
> University of South Florida
- Grand Jeté 2023 Winners
CONGRATULATIONS to the exceptional dancers who placed in Grand Jeté 2023!
SENIOR BALLET
> 1st Place - Lillian Mozie, International Ballet
> 2nd Place - Kayla Breedlove, The Academy of Lexington Youth Ballet
> 3rd Place - Sophia Brown, International Ballet
> Honorable Mention - Natalie Sevel, SCGSAH
SENIOR MODERN/CONTEMPORARY
> 1st Place - Lillian Mozie, International Ballet
> 2nd Place - Natalie Sevel, SCGSAH
> 3rd Place - Ella White, Columbia Ballet School
JUNIOR BALLET
> 1st Place - Elizabeth-Gray Rivers, Ann Brodie’s Carolina Ballet Center For Dance Education
> 2nd Place - Kelsey White, DanceArts Greenville
> 3rd Place - Annabel Caplea, Palmetto City Ballet
> Honorable Mention - Isabel Fernandez, Palmetto City Ballet
> USC Summer Dance Conservatory Scholarship - Elizabeth-Gray Rivers, Ann Brodie’s Carolina Ballet Center For Dance Education
JUNIOR MODERN/CONTEMPORARY
> 1st Place - Marjolein Howard, English Theatre Arts
> 2nd Place - Kelsey White, DanceArts Greenville
> 3rd Place - Genevieve Grunenwald, DanceArts Greenville
STUDENT CHOREOGRAPHY
> Brooke McCollam, Okatie Youth Ballet
PROMISE AWARD
> Paige Griswold, Ann Brodie’s Carolina Ballet Center for Dance Education- Previous Adjudicators
Kurt Douglas - Boston Conservatory at Berklee
Lorna Feijoo - Cuban National Ballet
Francie Huber - Paul Taylor
Christy Corbitt Krieger - Louisville Ballet
Yazzmeen Laidler - Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre
Stéphane Léonard - Canada’s Royal Winnipeg Ballet
Sirui Liu – Cincinnati Ballet
Jorden Morris - Orlando Ballet
Olivier Pardina - Nice Opera House
Akua Noni Parker - Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater
Stephen Pier - The Hartt School, University of Hartford
Sarah Wroth - Indiana University
- Previous Recruiters
Adelphi University
Charlotte Ballet Academy
Coker University
College of Charleston
Columbia College
Joan Phelps Palladino School of Dance at Dean College
Kennesaw State University
Marymount Manhattan College
New World School of the Arts
Ohio State University
Palmetto City Ballet
Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University
Point Park University
Radford University
Royal Winnipeg Ballet
Texas Christian University
The Hartt School at the University of Hartford
University of Missouri, Kansas City
University of North Carolina, Charlotte
University of Oklahoma
University of South Florida
University of Utah
For questions, contact:
Adair Kempf, Event Coordinator
grandjete@scgsah.org
