Proud mum: Ballet dancer Siobhan Adams (left) recently returned from the World Dance Championships in Frankfurt, Germany, where she and the rest of Team Canada scored the world cup for ballet. Adams’ mother, Suzanne Ouellette, right, was a professional dancer, is now Adams’ teacher and was the rehearsal director for the B.C. dance team that went to the competition.
Photograph by: Larry Wright , THE RECORD
Local dancer Siobhan Adams is still rev-eling in her golden moment after winning the top prize for ballet this month.
She and the rest of the 40-odd members B.C. dance team came in first at the World Dance Championships in Frankfurt, Germany.
Hundreds of dancers from about 40 countries were selected this year to go the biggest dance competition in the world.
For 16-year-old Adams, it was a dream come true.
"The first day, in ballet, we won everything. . I still can't believe it," she said. "The whole trip was just the most memorable experience of my whole life."
The Grade 12 student at New Westminster Secondary has been dancing since she was five.
After trying a variety of sports when she was younger, including softball, Adams finally decided dancing was her true calling.
"The thing that really pulled me to dance was the amount of emotion you could express, and my mom was a huge influence for me," she said. "When I was younger, it was kind of the dream to be like her."
Adams' mother, Suzanne Ouellette, is a senior ballet teacher at the Richmond Academy of Dance, where Adams trains.
Ouellette danced professionally in Europe and later with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and Ballet B.C., and she was the rehearsal director for team Canada for the competition in Germany at the worlds.
She wasn't able to go with her daughter to see her dance live, but said it was important for Adams to have her own experience.
"I'm very proud of her, and of all the kids," she said.
Though she has been to New York and Los Angeles to train, this was Adams' first competition outside the Lower Mainland.
It was a good opportunity to see what dancers are doing in the rest of the world, she said.
To make the team, she had to send in a video of her dancing to the Canadian judges this summer, who asked her to return for a second audition.
The competition was strong, she said, but she managed to rise to the occasion and secured a spot to represent Canada in Germany.
Earlier this year, Adams said she wasn't totally sold on a career in dance, but winning the world cup has helped her make up her mind.
"This has changed everything that I thought I was going to do," she said.
After she graduates from high school next year, she plans to attend a university that offers a double-major in dance and an academic subject, either in Eastern Canada or Europe.
For now, though, she is just enjoying her team jack-et and getting some time with the cup and, of course, just being in her element.
"The feeling of being able to go to the studio and just leave stress and school work and things that happen in social life, things like that, (you) just leave it all behind," she said. "Then you're able to step into a studio and work for something that makes you happy."
