Portrait of guest instructor Duncan Cooper.

PPAC guest instructor Duncan Cooper with one of his students.

Principal Dancer. Duncan Cooper, Dance Theatre of Harlem. A native of New York and San Francisco

Mr. Cooper started dancing at the age of five, when he began taking ballet classes at Richard Thomas’ New York School of Ballet. At the age of 13 Mr. Cooper received a full scholarship to train at the San Francisco Ballet School. He soon became a recipient of the Robert Kirby Scholarship, as well as the first to receive the Lew Christ Scholarship for best male dancer. In 1989, bypassing the obligatory apprentice year, where in he was made a full company member with San Francisco Ballet. During his five years with San Francisco Ballet, Mr. Cooper danced a wide range of repertoire which included;  Tudor’s Dark Elegies, Bintelys’ Wander Fantasy & Job; Kedulka’s Dreams of Harmony; Rehda’s La Pavane Rogue; De Rebere’s Harvest Moon; Tomasson’s Con Brio, Romeo & Juliet, Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, Nutcracker and La Quattro Stagioni.

In 1995, Mr. Cooper joined Dance Theatre of Harlem as a Principle Dancer. With DTH has danced leading roles in such ballets as Balanchine’s Apollo, Prodigal Son, Agon, Allegro Brilliante; Albrecht in Giselle; Robbins’ Fancy Free; Ashton’s Thais pas de deux; Glenn Tetley’s Sphinx and Dialogues; Smuin’s A Song For Dead Warriors and St. Louis Blues; Limon’s Moor’s Pavane; Doome’s Equus; Alleyene’s Adrian (Angel on Earth), Mitchell’s Manifestations; Holder’s Dougla and Tara’s Firebird.

Notable guest appearances have included being invited to be to be a part of New York City Ballet’s Balanchine Centennial Celebration, in which he danced the part of El Capitan in Stars & Stripes, playing the part of Apollo in Central Park’s Summer Stage Balanchine Centennial Tribute; Ashton’s Thais for Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Ashton & Balanchine Gala; Washington Ballet’s Giselle, Dance Brazil’s Festival in Bahia, Brazil, The lead role of Macbeth in Dances Patrelle Macbeth; BalletNY; Configuration Dance; Lorane Graves and Friends and he remains a resident guest artist with Virginia Ballet Theatre. Recently this year (06), Mr. Cooper was invited as a guest artist to dance with Rebecca Kelly Ballet for her 25 Anniversary season; as well as with Dances Patrelle in their full length productions of “POP”.

Mr. Cooper continues to be a frequent guest teacher and coach across the country when possible. Mr. Cooper most commonly can be found teaching for New York City Dance Alliance’s Convention seasons and their NYC summer intensive program. He also continues dabble occasionally in choreographing; most recently he was invited to choreograph a short work for five of Boston Ballet 2’s senior graduating men. Mr. Cooper is currently in the beginning process of creating a new full-length production with and for the director of Virginia Ballet Theater.