Curriculum & Staff
Slavin Nadal Curriculum and Staff
The training at Slavin Nadal School of Ballet reflects the extensive professional background of its founders. During their 17 years directing the Ballet Austin Academy, the Slavins developed a comprehensive ballet curriculum with traditional Russian roots: The Ballet Russe and the Vaganova method. The Slavin Nadal curriculum emphasizes the beautiful art of épaulement from the earliest years of training, ensuring that this critical element of classical ballet is naturally integrated into the dancer’s movement. Additionally, the curriculum incorporates some of the best from the French, English and Danish schools, producing dancers with a refined and versatile technique.
Directors
Joseph Nygren Cox
Joseph Nygren Cox, Director is a native Austinite who trained for ten years and danced professionally with Eugene Slavin and Alexandra Nadal at Ballet Austin/Austin Civic Ballet. He and his wife, Kimberly Nygren Cox, have the honor of being chosen by the Slavins to succeed them as directors of the Slavin Nadal School of Ballet. Mr. Cox holds an M.F.A. in Dance from The University of Iowa as well as graduate and undergraduate certificates in Business Administration. In addition to Ballet Austin, he performed with Cincinnati Ballet, Dayton Ballet, and most notably as a principal dancer with the Louisville Ballet. Over his twenty-five year performing career, Mr. Cox grew intimately familiar with the classical ballet canon and numerous masterworks of the 20th century, and he worked closely with some of the great icons in the dance world, including Sir Frederic Franklin, Suzanne Farrell, Nicholas “Papa” Beriosoff, Andre Prokovsky, and Wendy Whelan.
Prior to returning to Austin, Mr. Cox taught ballet technique and dance history as Professor of Dance at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. While there, he implemented a statewide high school outreach program, significantly expanding performance opportunities for his university students. Mr. Cox also served as a guest ballet master for Ballet Arkansas, directed the second company of the Cincinnati Ballet (CBII), was on the faculty of the Kentucky Governor’s School for the Arts, and served as ballet master for productions with the Cincinnati Opera and The Carnegie Theatre of Northern Kentucky. He has also staged works for international choreographers Val Caniparoli of the San Francisco Ballet and Christopher Fleming of the New York City Ballet. Mr. Cox and his wife, Kimberly Nygren Cox, were the founding directors of the Crossing Lines Project, a team of professional performers dedicated to sharing dance with student artists from around the state of Kentucky. His international credits include performing and teaching engagements in Cuba and Alberta, Canada.
Mr. Cox is a choreographer whose work has been seen on the stages of the Louisville Ballet, the Cincinnati Ballet, the Dayton Ballet, Louisville’s Moving Collective, Austin Contemporary Ballet, and in other venues. He has earned numerous honors for his artistic accomplishments, including the 2009 Kentucky Arts Council “Al Smith” Fellowship for Choreography, the 2011 Iowa Arts Fellowship, and a Governor’s commission as a Kentucky Colonel.
Kimberly Nygren Cox
Kimberly Nygren Cox, Director comes to the Slavin Nadal School of Ballet after an extensive career as a professional dancer, teacher, and choreographer. She performed with the Milwaukee Ballet before beginning her 12-year tenure with the Louisville Ballet,
where she became a Soloist. Mrs. Cox danced an eclectic repertoire ranging from purely classical to dramatic contemporary roles, and was critically acclaimed in Dance Magazine for her performances in Anthony Tudor’s Little Improvisations and Judgement of Paris. She has worked with notable artists including Elyse Borne, Donald Mahler, Sallie Wilson, Judith Fugate, Janek Schergen, Domi Reiter-Soffer, Nikolaj Hübbe, and Wendy Whelan. Mrs. Cox’s performing career has taken her to New Orleans, Penn State, Corpus Christi, Miami, and Cuba. She and her husband, Joseph Nygren Cox, worked closely with Eugene Slavin and Alexadra Nadal in preparation for their performance of the Romeo & Juliet Balcony Pas de Deux in the 2003 Slavin Nadal School of Ballet Spring Recital.
Mrs. Cox has over 20 years of experience teaching dance. Initially trained in the Cecchetti Method, she studied the Vaganova Method of instruction with Denise Schultze and Louis Godfrey while on faculty with the Louisville Ballet School. Mrs. Cox has served as Director of both the Ballet Arkansas Preparatory Program and the 2015 Ballet Arkansas Summer Intensive as well as teaching class for the professional company. She was a dance and fitness instructor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, and holds certifications in Progressing Ballet Technique (PBT), Pilates, yoga, TRX, and Barre, in addition to being a licensed Zumba instructor.
An award winning choreographer, Mrs. Cox has created works for the Louisville Ballet, Moving Collective, Radio Disney Dancers, and Louisville’s World AIDS Day Memorial. Her adjudicated work for the Louisville Ballet Youth Ensemble was chosen to be performed at the 2011 Southeastern Regional Ballet Association (SERBA) Festival. Mrs. Cox and her husband were co-directors of Kentucky’s Crossing Lines Project, presenting several of their choreographed works to young artists from across the state. In recognition of her creative accomplishments, Mrs. Cox was the recipient of the 2011 Kentucky Arts Council “Al Smith” Fellowship
for Choreography.
Faculty
Emily Karnes
Emily Karnes is an accomplished artist and teacher with significant education and experience in dance. She received her early classical ballet training with Rebecca Miller Stalcup, Dennis Poole, Mark Bush, Melinda Tobian, and Laura Hood Babcock, at Arkansas Academy of Dance. She has also attended intensive programs at the Joffrey Ballet and with Doug Varone and Dancers. Ms. Karnes holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Dance from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, where she studied closely with Slavin-Nadal School of Ballet Director, Joseph Cox, as well as Nancy Happel, Rhythm McCarthy, Stephanie Thibeault, and Stephen Stone. In addition to dance technique and performance, her studies included dance pedagogy, dance history, movement analysis, and choreography. In recognition of her academic and artistic excellence, Ms. Karnes was awarded a full scholarship to study dance at the Accademia dell’Arte in Arezzo, Italy in 2012.
Before joining the Slavin-Nadal School of Ballet faculty, Ms. Karnes was an instructor at Arkansas Academy of Dance for five years, where she taught all youth levels of ballet. She was also a resident company member of the affiliated Arkansas Festival Ballet for eight years, performing a number of roles including Dew Drop Fairy, Clara, Sugar Plum Fairy, and Grand Pas De Deux in The Nutcracker, as well as Alice in Alice in Wonderland, Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, and Tinker Bell in Peter Pan. Her local performance credits include work by Celina Chapin in Austin’s Frontera Fest and with Lisa Nicks’ Band of Wild Ponies.
As one of Mr. Cox’s former students, and a highly qualified ballet teacher who has eagerly trained to teach the Slavin-Nadal youth curriculum, Ms. Karnes offers excellent ballet instruction that is consistent with the quality and standards of the Slavin-Nadal School of Ballet.
The Founders
Eugene Slavin, 1935-2014
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Mr. Slavin received his ballet training there at the Teatro Colon, where he began his professional career. In New York, he studied with Anatole Vilzak, who had been First Dancer of the Mariinsky Theatre (now the St. Petersburg-Kirov Ballet), succeeding Vaslav Nijinsky. Mr. Slavin made his American debut at Carnegie Hall and subsequently as a soloist with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet. Shortly after joining the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, where he became a Principal Dancer, he was chosen to partner the legendary ballerina Maria Tallchief in such works as the Don Quixote Pas de Deux, Swan Lake, and George Balanchine’s Ballet Imperial.
With the Ballet Russe and Ballet de Monte Carlo he performed in the United States and Europe, and he also toured internationally with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet
as a Principal Dancer. He served as Regisseur of the Ballet Russe Concert Company, taught at the Ballet Russe School in New York and was Ballet Master of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. He choreographed his first work for the Royal Winnipeg and assisted in the filming of the company for the Canadian Broadcasting Company. Mr. Slavin appeared numerous times as a featured performer at Radio City Music Hall and in the heyday of television variety shows was a guest on the Ed Sullivan, Dinah Shore and Perry Como Shows. He staged ballets for regional companies and taught master classes across the United States, Canada and Australia. He is a past president of the Southwest Regional Ballet Association and taught master classes in ballet and character for Regional Dance America. He and his wife, Alexandra Nadal, were co-founders of Ballet Austin and the Ballet Austin Academy. The pair also shared the role of Artistic Director for Ballet Austin and its predecessor, Austin Civic Ballet, for 17 years, from 1972 to 1989.
Alexandra Nadal, 1943-2015
Born in the West Indies, Alexandra Nadal received her initial training in Chicago from Russian emigre Andre Commiacoff and former Sadler’s Wells Ballet (now the Royal Ballet) soloists Richard Ellis and Christine DuBoulay. In New York she continued training with some of the most influential teachers of the time, including Maria Swoboda and Leon Danielian. At age 17, she was accepted into the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo
for what was to be the company’s last American tour.
Ms. Nadal was also a member of the New York City Opera Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, PrincipalDancer with Ballet de Monte Carlo under the patronage of Prince Ranier and Princess Grace, and a Principal dancer with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. While with the Winnipeg Ballet, she studied with Vera Volkova, who was the most internationally respected expert on and teacher of Vaganova technique long before this teaching method achieved the popularity it currently holds in the West. In addition to performing many of the great 19th Century classics, Ms Nadal was coached in their ballets by choreographers such as Agnes de Mille, Leonide Massine, Anton Dolin and Eliot Feld as well as performing the works of Balanchine, Bournanville, Jerome Robbins and Frederik Ashton. Agnes de Mille wrote of her “….she has the strength and control that only perfect training can give…there is a creamy elegance to her gestures…she is a connoisseur’s dancer…”
Alexandra Nadal was the recipient of the 1987 YWCA’S Outstanding Achievement in the Arts Award. She was the co-founder of Ballet Austin and the Ballet Austin Academy, sharing this achievement with her husband, Eugene Slavin. The two also shared the role of Artistic Director for Ballet Austin and its predecessor – Austin Civic Ballet – for 17 years, from 1972 to 1989. Slavin and Nadal were inducted into the Austin Arts Hall of Fame
in 2009, in recognition of their creation and artistic direction of the first and only professional ballet company in Austin, Texas: Ballet Austin.