Artistic Director, Co-CEO
Mavis Staines
Mavis Staines, born in Quebec's Eastern Townships and raised in Vancouver, received most of her training at Canada's National Ballet School, where she has been Artistic Director since 1989.
Upon graduation from NBS, Staines studied in Paris and London for six months before joining the National Ballet of Canada. After six years, she joined the Dutch National Ballet and danced for three years under the direction of Rudi van Dantzig until an injury cut short her performance career.
On her return to Canada, Staines reinvested her training and experience back into NBS as a teacher. She enrolled in the School's Teacher Training Program, joined the staff as a teacher in 1982, and became Associate Artistic Director under Betty Oliphant in 1984. Six years later, on Oliphant's retirement, Staines became Artistic Director.
Within and beyond the National Ballet School, Staines is now devoted to improving ballet training – to preserve the best of traditional schooling while adding to the curriculum those elements young dancers need today to advance both their careers and their lives. She has been responsible for bringing many renowned dance specialists to NBS, including Hamburg Ballet Artistic Director John Neumeier, Irina Trefimova of the Vaganova Academy in St. Petersburg, American neuromuscular specialist Irene Dowd, and Claude Bessy, Artistic Director of the Paris Opera Ballet School.
Staines served as juror for the Prix de Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1993, 1994, and 1995, and headed the jury as President in 1998 and 1999—the first person in the Prix's 25-year history to head the jury two years in a row. In 1997, Staines was a presenter at the Prix de Lausanne Symposium, and in 1998 was a workshop presenter at the IOTPD (International Organization for the Transition of Professional Dancers) Conference in The Hague, Holland. Staines' Lausanne presentation was published by Dance Magazine in June 1997 under the title "Going Beyond Classical Tradition." In February 2001, Staines accepted the volunteer position of Artistic President Designate for the Prix de Lausanne and in February 2002, assumed the full responsibilities of Artistic President which she held until February 2008.
Staines' ground-breaking work also made an impact on the world's dance community when she chose to celebrate the School's 40th anniversary in 1999 by mounting the historic Not Just Any Body Global Conference to Advance Health, Well-Being and Excellence in Dance and Dancers. Satellite-linked live with the Holland Dance Festival in the Hague (with partners the Dutch Health Care Foundation for Dancers, Theater Instituut Nederland and the Holland Dance Festival), the conference was also pulled down by other satellite locations in Europe and North America, as well as by the participants attending from around the world. Ms Staines continues to speak to these issues on a regular basis through presentations at international conferences in centres such as Amsterdam, Munich, New York City and London, England.
Over the years, Staines has served in various capacities with a number of dance-related organizations, including: DANCE/USA, Philadelphia, 1994; Dance Advisory Committee, The Canada Council for the Arts; The Dance Community of Educators, Toronto; and Kala Nidhi Fine Arts of Canada, Toronto. In 1998 Staines won the Toronto Arts Award for the Performing Arts and in November 2006, she was named by the Women's Executive Network as one of Canada's Most Powerful Women: Top 100. In 2008, Staines was presented with an honorary doctorate from Mount Saint Vincent University.
Executive Director, Co-CEO
Jeff Melanson
Jeff Melanson was appointed Executive Director of Canada's National Ballet School in November 2006. Jeff holds a Bachelor of Music from the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, where he studied opera, Russian art song and choral conducting. Jeff has also pursued vocal studies at the Oberlin Conservatory. He also holds an MBA in Finance, Marketing and Strategy from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo.
From 1998 to 2000, Jeff was the Director of Development for Opera Ontario. In March 2000, he was appointed Assistant Dean of the Community School at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, and at the end of 2001, he was promoted to Dean. In his role as Dean of RCM's Community School, Jeff was instrumental in building the program into the largest community arts school in North America. He expanded the academic content of the program to include the critically acclaimed World Music Centre, DJ technique classes, rock/pop programming, jazz programming and teacher training. He launched a community program to bring music-making to the lives of children, youth and seniors from under-serviced areas. Jeff was also instrumental in building the RCM's growth strategy into China.
In 2006, Jeff was appointed Executive Director & Co-CEO of Canada's National Ballet School. In his current role, Jeff has been instrumental in eliminating a significant annual operating deficit, increasing annual revenues by over 30%, overseeing the completion of NBS' residence renovations, building a dynamic, high performance business team and creating new strategic partnerships with many non-profit and for-profit arts and entertainment corporations.
Jeff is a member of YPO, a trustee with the National Guild of Community Schools for the Arts (US) and has been an invited speaker on the role of the arts in community development at numerous United Nations and UNESCO events. Jeff is a frequent guest lecturer on arts management to arts students and MBA classes from universities across North America and around the world.
Jeff is an adult ballet student at Canada's National Ballet School and he is co-Director of the Cabbagetown Community Choir in Toronto.
Jeff was named a Recipient of Canada’s Top 40 Under 40TM for 2009. Jeff Melanson is the first arts leader to receive this prestigious honour in its history.