Born in Kansas City,
Missouri and raised in San Pedro, California, Misty Copeland began her ballet
studies at the age of 13 at the San Pedro City Ballet. At the age of fifteen she won first place in
the Music Center Spotlight Awards. She
then began her studies at the Lauridsen Ballet Center. Copeland has studied at the San Francisco
Ballet School and American Ballet Theatre’s Summer Intensive on full
scholarship and was declared ABT’s National Coca-Cola Scholar in 2000.
Copeland joined ABT’s
Studio Company in September 2000, then joined American Ballet Theatre as a
member of the corps de ballet in April 2001 and was appointed a Soloist in
August 2007. Her roles with the Company
include Gamzatti, a Shade and the Lead D’Jampe in La Bayadère, a leading role
in Birthday Offering, Milkmaid in The Bright Stream, the Fairy Autumn in
Frederick Ashton’s Cinderella, Blossom in James Kudelka’s Cinderella, Swanilda
and the Mazurka Lady in Coppélia, Gulnare and an Odalisque in Le Corsaire,
Mercedes, Driad Queen, the lead gypsy and a flower girl in Don Quixote, Duo
Concertant, the Masks in Christopher Wheeldon’s VIII, the Firebird in Alexei
Ratmansky’s Firebird, Flower Girl in Gaîté Parisienne, the peasant pas de deux
in Giselle, Lescaut’s Mistress in Manon, Clara the Princess, Columbine and one
of The Nutcracker’s Sisters in Alexei Ratmansky’s The Nutcracker, a Gypsy in
Petrouchka, the Lead Polovtsian Girl in the Polovtsian Dances from Prince Igor,
the Saracen Dancer in Raymonda, Cowgirl in Rodeo, a Harlot in Romeo and Juliet,
Princess Florine in The Sleeping Beauty, Odette-Odile, the pas de trios, a
cygnet and the Hungarian Princess in Swan Lake, the Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux, a
leading role in Bach Partita, and roles in Airs, Amazed in Burning Dreams,
Baker’s Dozen, Ballo della Regina, Birthday Offering, Black Tuesday, The
Brahms-Haydn Variations, Brief Fling, Company B, Désir, Gong, Hereafter, In the
Upper Room, Overgrown Path, Pretty Good Year, Private Light, Raymonda
Divertissements, Sechs Tänze, Sinatra Suite, Sinfonietta, Thirteen Diversions,
Within You Without You: A Tribute to George Harrison and workwithinwork.
Copeland created the
Spanish Dance in Ratmansky’s The Nutcracker, the Fairy Fleur de farine (Wheat
flower) in Ratmansky's The Sleeping Beauty and leading roles in C. to C. (Close
to Chuck), Dumbarton, Glow – Stop, One of Three and With a Chance of Rain.
Copeland received the
2008 Leonore Annenberg Fellowship in the Arts and was named National Youth of
the Year Ambassador for the Boys & Girls Clubs of America in 2013. In 2014, President Obama appointed Copeland to
the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition. She is the winner of a 2014 Dance Magazine
Award. Copeland is the author of the best-selling memoir, Life in Motion and
the children’s book Firebird.
Ms. Copeland's
performances with American Ballet Theatre are sponsored by Valentino D. Carlotti.
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