José Alves
Born in Brazil, José started ballet at the age of 13 at the Adalgisa Rolim Ballet School. In 2007 he joined the Bolshoi Theatre School in Brazil and graduated in 2008. In 2010 he attended the Youth American Grand Prix in New York, where he was awarded a scholarship to train with the Royal New Zealand Ballet Company. When he was unable to raise the funds to travel to New Zealand, he joined the Ballet Company of the Young (Palace of Arts) in Belo, Brazil where he remained until 2011. During this time, he was also the featured dancer in Ricky Martin’s music video, Samba. In 2012 he joined the Teatr Muzyczny w Łódz in Poland. José joined Ballet Black for the 2012/13 season and was promoted to Senior Artist in 2014. He has danced in original choreography by Javier de Frutos, Will Tuckett, Ludovic Ondiviela and created the roles of Demetrius and Bottom in A Dream Within a Midsummer Night’s Dream by Arthur Pita, and The Son in Mark Bruce’s Second Coming. José then joined Polski Teatr Tańca (Polish Dance Theatre) for a year before returning to Ballet Black in September 2016. In 2017, José was featured in the Company’s revival of Martin Lawrance’s Captured and created the role of Grandma, danced en pointe, in Annabelle Lopez-Ochoa’s Red Riding Hood. He was also one of the lead dancers in the Company’s first live stream on World Ballet Day 2017, dancing in the revival of Dopamine (you make my levels go silly) by Ludovic Ondiviela (2013), broadcast by the BBC. In 2018, José danced the role of Oberon in A Dream Within A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Arthur Pita) and created the role of Philemon in Cathy Marston’s The Suit, for which he won the 2018 Critics’ Circle National Dance Award for Outstanding Male Classical Dancer. Between 2019 and 2021, José danced in new ballets by Sophie Laplane, Mthuthuzeil November, Peter Leung, Will Tuckett and Martin Lawrance. He led live streamed classes for the public throughout the pandemic and is the subject of a biography, A História De Um Bailarino Incomum written by Taís Fernanda Reis published in 2021.