Australia Dancing - Welch, Stanton (1969

Welch, Stanton (1969 - )

McFarlane, Jim: Portrait of Stanton Welch, 1995

Stanton Welch began his dance training in 1986 at the relatively late age of 16. He was taught initially at the dance school run by his parents, the renowned Australian dancers Marilyn Jones and Garth Welch. He then spent a year as a scholarship student at San Francisco Ballet School before being accepted into the Australian Ballet in 1989 where he rose to the rank of leading soloist. With the Australian Ballet his solo roles included the Adolescent in Beyond Twelve, Alan Strang in Equus, the Blue Boy in Songs of a Wayfarer, the Man in Four Last Songs, two roles in Return to a Strange Land, Des Grieux in Manon, two roles in The Competition, Camille in The Merry Widow and Lensky in Onegin.

Welch's choreographic abilities surfaced early with his first piece, Hades, during the first year of his dance training. It won a collection of eisteddfod prizes, was bought by the Queensland Youth Ballet and was praised by Maina Gielgud, then artistic director of the Australian Ballet. In 1990 he received his first choreographic commission, which resulted in A Time to Dance for the Dancers Company of the Australian Ballet. Of Blessed Memory for the Australian Ballet followed in 1991 and by 1995 Welch had been appointed a resident choreographer with the Australian Ballet, a position which he continues to hold. His first evening-length work, Madame Butterfly, originally made for the Australian Ballet in 1995, has been staged by a number of other companies including Atlanta Ballet, Boston Ballet, Houston Ballet, National Ballet of Canada, Singapore Dance Theatre and Royal New Zealand Ballet. Shorter works created for the Australian Ballet include Corroboree (1995) made for the UNited We Dance program to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the United Nations charter, Divergence (1994), Red Earth (1996), and Velocity (2003). His other full length works created on the Australian Ballet are Cinderella (1997) and Sleeping Beauty (2005), both designed by Kristian Fredrikson. Welch has also made numerous works for international companies including American Ballet Theatre, Atlanta Ballet, BalletMet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, Royal Danish Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, Texas Ballet Theater, Tulsa Ballet, Cincinnati Ballet and Colorado Ballet and has worked in Moscow with Nina Ananiashvili and principals of the Bolshoi Ballet.

Following a short period of time as artistic associate with BalletMet Columbus, Ohio, Welch was appointed artistic director of Houston Ballet and took up his appointment in 2003. The website of the Houston Ballet contains a comprehensive list of Welch's choreographic repertoire.

Bibliography:

Edited extracts from Welch's oral history interview for the National Library of Australia, and a list of his choreography from 1990 to 1997, have been published as 'Boundless dreams' in Michelle Potter, A Passion for Dance (Canberra: National Library of Australia, 1997), pp. 135-143.

Research Materials

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Other resources

Find more about Welch, Stanton in:

Internet - Google
Articles - New York Public Library Dance Collection
Pictures - Picture Australia
Collection - OzLife