Guillaume Côté

Guillaume Côté (born 1981) is a Canadian ballet dancer and choreographer. He is currently a principal dancer and a Choreographic Associate at the National Ballet of Canada.[1]

Guillaume Côté
Born (1981-09-17) September 17, 1981
Lac Saint-Jean, Quebec, Canada
EducationCanada's National Ballet School
Occupation
Years active1998-present
Spouse(s)
​
(m. 2010)​
Children2
Current groupNational Ballet of Canada

Early life

Côté was born in Lac Saint-Jean, Quebec. Both of his parents are schoolteachers, who invited a teacher to start a ballet school in Lac Saint-Jean. Côté, his sister and several cousins started ballet at that school. At age 11, despite not speaking English, he entered Canada's National Ballet School in Toronto.[2][3]

Career

In 1998, at age 17, Côté joined the National Ballet of Canada as an apprentice. At age 19, he made his debut as Prince Siegfried in Swan Lake, making him the youngest person in the company to dance that role. In 2001, he danced Romeo and Romeo and Juliet.[3] In 2004, at age 23, Côté became a principal dancer.[1][4] His repertoire include The Sleeping Beauty and Nijinsky. He had originated the role Romeo in Alexei Ratmansky's version of Romeo and Juliet.[1] Côté celebrated his 20th anniversary at the National Ballet in 2019, after a performance of Apollo.[5]

As a guest artist, Côté had performed with La Scala Theatre Ballet, English National Ballet, The Royal Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, The Hamburg Ballet and Stuttgart Ballet, as well as in Kings of the Dance, The Vision of Manuel Legris and Roberto Bolle and Friends. With English National Ballet, he originated the role of Gene Kelly in Strictly Gershwin.[1] In 2018, Côté made a guest appearance in Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow, making him the first dancer from Quebec and one of the few Canadians to have danced in Bolshoi.[6] In 2020, he made his debut at the New York City Ballet, dancing Swan Lake with Sara Mearns, in order to replace an injured Tyler Angle.[7]

Côté was appointed Choreographic Associate of the National Ballet in 2013. He had choreographed a number of one-act ballet for the company. He won the Audience Choice Award at the Erik Bruhn Prize for Enkeli, received the third prize at Ballet Society Hanover’s 25th International Competition for #24. He had also choreographed and starred in short film Lost in Motion, and its sequel, Lost in Motion II.[1] His first full-length work, Le Petit Prince, based on the novella of the same name, premiered in 2016.[8] He collaborated with set designer Michael Levine and composer Kevin Lau, and consulted Antoine de Saint-Exupéry authority Adam Gopnik for Le Petit Prince.[3] Côté had also choreographed for Olympic-winning ice dancing duo Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir.[9]

In 2014, Côté became the artist director of Festival des Arts de Saint-Sauveur, a dance festival in Quebec.[10]

Personal life

In 2010, Côté married fellow National Ballet principal dancer Heather Ogden.[11] The couple has two children.[12]

Côté grew up playing piano, clarinet and classical guitar. In later years, he learned to play cello and studies composition at The Royal Conservatory of Music[3]

References
  1. "Guillaume Côté". National Ballet of Canada. Retrieved 19 May 2020.
  2. "Guillaume Côté". The Canadian Encyclopedia. 16 February 2012.
  3. "Guillaume Côté's Moment: The Artist, the Man and Le Petit Prince". Dance International. 25 March 2016.
  4. "National Ballet principal dancer Guillaume Cote wears many hats". Toronto Star. 15 February 2015.
  5. "Onstage This Week: TWB Presents a New "Sleeping Beauty," NBoC Celebrates Guillame Côté, ENB Returns to the U.S. After 30 Years, and More!". Pointe Magazine. 25 February 2019.
  6. "Guillaume Côté Joins The Bolshoi Ballet as a Guest Artist in Romeo and Juliet". Broadway World Toronto. 12 December 2018.
  7. "Principal Dancer Guillaume Côté to Make New York City Ballet Debut". Ballet News. 30 January 2020.
  8. "A New Canadian Classic: Guillaume Côté's Le Petite Prince". Pointe Magazine. 3 June 2016.
  9. "Guess Who's Choreographing Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir's New Ice Dancing Show". Dance Magazine. 3 July 2019.
  10. "NBoC's Guillaume Côté to Become Artistic Director of the Festival des Artes de Saint-Sauveur". Pointe Magazine. 13 August 2014.
  11. "Pas de deux: National Ballet of Canada principal dancers wed". National Post. 19 July 2010.
  12. "Ballerina Heather Ogden on fitness, pregnancy and the importance of body positivity". Elle. 9 May 2018.
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