Dallas Metropolitan Ballet

Dallas Metropolitan Ballet is a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting ballet through performances, education and training. Under the guidance of Ann Etgen and Bill Atkinson, the primary goals of the company are to provide serious training and professional experience for the aspiring dancer and to enrich the cultural development of the community through professional quality ballet performances. The aims and focus of the company have remained consistent, to encourage and support ambitious, talented young dancers pursuing professional careers in ballet and to provide an opportunity for the serious student to continue quality dancing as an avocation.

The company has helped many dancers reach their goal of a professional career in ballet. Alumni of the company have been members, soloists and principals of American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, Ballet West, Boston Ballet, Pennsylvania Ballet, Hartford Ballet, Houston Ballet, Washington Ballet, Tulsa Ballet, Fort Worth - Dallas Ballet, Berlin Ballet, Frankfurt Ballet, Ballet de Wallonie, Stuttgart Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet.

In trying to expose our audience and dancers to the excitement of dance, the Dallas Metropolitan Ballet has brought artist and companies of international stature to the area including Natalia Makarova, Valery and Garlina Panov, Edward Villella, Patricia Mc Bride, Fernando Bujones, Stars of Bolshoi and others.

Dallas Metropolitan Ballet is an honor company of Regional Dance America/Southwest. Three ballets by the directors have been chosen for the National Choreography Plan. They have also received a choreography fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. The company had the honor of representing the Southwest Region in the first Regional Dance America Concert at the International Ballet Competition and this honor was repeated when the Dallas Metropolitan Ballet was chosen to perform in the special performance at the International Ballet Competition in Jackson, Mississippi, June 2002.