Exemplifies Expertise, Passion for Teaching Ballet
Southold Dance Theatre is pleased to announce that Fiona Cameron-Martin has been appointed to the position of Assistant Artistic Director. Fiona, who joined Southold as faculty member in 2016, will also continue in her roles as the Children’s Coordinator and a faculty member. She also offers private lessons for beginning and pre-professional students. In her position as Assistant Artistic Director, she assists Artistic Director Calin Radulescu with preparing choreography, rehearsals, and presentations of Southold’s annual full-length productions and public performances.
Fiona is eager for success in her new role. Most immediately, she is interested in curriculum development and has a keen sense of incorporating the famous Vaganova Method as a structured and safe way of training dancers. Her long-term vision is to help the school move into a bigger facility and to open a professional training division alongside Southold’s current pre-professional program.
Ultimately, Fiona wants her dance students to know the most important lesson of all, “Before you achieve, you must believe in yourself!”
Fiona credits her own pre-professional ballet training with world-renowned performers for developing a deep commitment to her craft. As a child in Hong Kong and Australia, she began dancing seriously at the young age of five and was surrounded by professional dancers throughout her youth as she trained as a scholarship student with the Australian Ballet School. She recalls the moments of intensity and difficulty during these years as being the primary fuel for her lifelong passion for dance. “That feeling you get when you step on stage is still one of the best feelings in the world,” Cameron-Martin said. With her passion ignited, she realized a career in professional dance would be her path.
After graduation, she journeyed to Europe and performed in galas all over London as a member of the New English Ballet Theater. Later, she danced for the Opera National Bucharesti (Romanian National Ballet in Bucharest) and had the tremendous opportunity to work under Artistic Director Johan Kobborg, a world-renowned choreographer and principal dancer with the “Royal Danish Ballet” and the “Royal Ballet of London.” Through many high-profile solo and couples performances, she established deep connections to the work of faculty members who spent time to train her. She learned the importance of confidence, tenacity, and developed a love of ballet that did not end on the stage.
“If you truly want to succeed as a dancer, you need to dedicate yourself to this art form,” Fiona said. In her teaching, she recommends students learn the music, history, and profiles of legendary dancers in addition to mastering technical training and positions like the tendu and plie.
Inspired by the elite training she received from childhood through her professional career in Europe, she became more interested in passing on knowledge to youth and quickly developed a passion for teaching. Fiona Cameron Martin joined Southold Dance Theater in South Bend, Indiana as a faculty member in 2016. It didn’t take long for her to realize that, “The students can do anything. They are resilient and strong. If you give them enough time they will blow your expectations away!” At Southold Dance Theater, as the Children’s Coordinator, she operates under the philosophy that children can and should learn how to work professionally from a young age and these values will lead them to success in dance, or any other career path they choose.
But for Fiona, dance is more than a serious career, it’s fun too. She believes that part of growing in skill means having the patience to improve and having fun with yourself along the way. Like many new moms, Fiona is devoted to making life fun for both her students and her infant daughter. In a life devoted to dance, she also enjoys summers in the sunshine, the beach, cycling, and everything related to spending time with her family.