Marcelo
Gomes

Benois de la Danse laureate

Marcelo Gomes, a native of Brazil, began his dance studies at the age of 5 at the Helena Lobato and Dalal Aschcar ballet schools in Rio de Janeiro. Upon winning the Revelation Prize at the Festival of Dance in Joinville in 1993, he traveled to the United States to continue his training at The Harid Conservatory in Boca Raton, Florida, as well as at the schools of the Boston Ballet, Houston Ballet, and Cuballet, where he studied under Alicia Alonso. Mr. Gomes was awarded second place at the National Society of Arts and Letters in 1994, and was the recipient of the Hope Prize at Lausanne in 1996, after which he spent a year at the school of the Paris Opera Ballet.

Mr. Gomes joined American Ballet Theatre in 1997 as a member of the Corps de Ballet, and rose quickly through the ranks, being promoted to Soloist in 2000 and Principal Dancer in 2002. He has performed in virtually every full-length classical ballet in the company's repertoire, including Romeo in Romeo and Juliet, Albrecht in Giselle, Prince Siegfried, Benno, and von Rothbart in Swan Lake, Solor in La Bayadere, Prince Desire in Sleeping Beauty, Franz in Coppelia, Espada and Basilio in Don Quixote, Prince Charming in Cinderella, Onegin and Prince Gremin in Onegin, Conrad, Ali the Slave, and Lankendem in Le Corsaire, the Cavalier in The Nutcracker, the Moor in Othello, Jeanne de Brienne and Abderakman in Raymonda, and Lescaut and Des Grieux in Manon. Mr. 

Gomes has performed leading roles in the works of George Balanchine, Mikhail Fokine, Antony Tudor, Jerome Robbins, Sir Frederick Ashton, John Cranko, and Martha Graham, and has worked with, as well as created roles for, Twyla Tharp, William Forsythe, Paul Taylor, Mark Morris, Jiri Kylian, Lar Lubovitch, James Kudelka, Nacho Duato, Stanton Welsh, Jorma Elo, and Christopher Wheeldon.

Mr. Gomes' performances have been seen throughout the world. In addition to his touring with American Ballet Theatre, he has appeared at many international dance festivals, including the World Ballet Festival in Japan. He has been a guest artist with the Dutch National Ballet, the National Ballet of Canada, the Houston Ballet, the Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, and the Teatro Municipal Do Rio de Janeiro. Most recently, he accompanied Alessandra Ferri on her farewell tour in Japan and Italy.

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