Dancers Yonah Acosta and Alejandro Virelles were promoted to the highest rank of Principal Dancer in the English National Ballet, the second most important ballet company in the UK.
Yonah Acosta, icon Carlos Acosta’s nephew, danced with the National Ballet of Cuba since 2011 and is soloist of the English company that runs the Spanish Tamara Rojo, Benois prize of dance and prima ballerina of the Royal Ballet of London for many years.
In 2007 he won silver medals in the first edition of Beijing Ballet Competition and the Grand Prix at the International Ballet Competition in Cuba. In 2008 he won gold in the Shanghai International Ballet Competition and the Korea International Ballet Competition.
From the beginning of her tenure as director of the company, Rojo trusted Yonah´s innate talent and technique in constant development. Criticis and English audiences saw him shine on the solo The Young and … by Roland Petit at the first gala of the English National Ballet with the Spaniard leading and the advice as artistic director of the Jewel of the Cuban Ballet and Grand Maitre Loipa Araújo . As “the new face of dance” the young Cuban was listed by Debra Craine, dance critic of the British newspaper Times.
Yonah Acosta also debuted along with the newly promoted Shiori Kase in the main roles of Coppélia at the London Coliseum from July 23 to 27, 2014.
Alejandro Virelles, meanwhile, was Principal Dancer with the National Ballet of Cuba and at the time of his contract with the British company he was Soloist with the Boston Ballet of the United States.
Born in Santiago de Cuba, Virelles studied ballet at the Vicentina de la Torre Academy of Dancing Arts in Camagüey and completed the second level in the National Ballet School in Havana under the tutelage of teachers from the likes of Ramona de Saa, Rosa Elena Alvarez and Adria Velázquez.
His meteoric rise was within the National Ballet of Cuba, he played the main roles of the romantic classics of the nineteenth-century and works of contemporary choreographers.
In 2011 he was included with Viengsay Valdes, Osiel Gounod and Dani Hernández, in the list of the hundred best dancers in the world, produced by journalists and critics from publications like Dance Magazine, USA and The Toronto Star, Canada, and specialists from major cities like Lisbon, Tokyo, Paris and New York.
Valued for its slim line and lightweight, in addition to his impressive ability to jumps and spins, Alejandro also presented credentials for Tamara Rojo to give him a contract as Principal in the English National Ballet.