Tamara Rojo CBE (1985-). Spanish ballerina, director and choreographer

The Spanish ballerina Tamara Rojo was actually born in Montreal, Canada, where her parents were living at that time. Returning to her native Spain, she started ballet lessons from the age of five. Rojo went to the Royal Professional Conservatory of Dance in Madrid when she was 11 and joined the Ballet de la Communidad de Madrid in 1991. In 1996 Galina Samsova invited her to dance with Scottish Ballet, where she performed leading roles in such works as La Sylphide. In 1997 she moved to English National Ballet, where Derek Deane created roles for her in his Romeo and Juliet and The Nutcracker, before she joined The Royal Ballet as a principal in 2000. There, she danced most of major roles in the repertoire.

In 2012, Rojo became artistic director of English National Ballet (ENB). Among her achievements were the company’s relocation to purpose-built premises in London City Island, the invitation for ENB to perform at the Paris Opéra for the first time, and the commissioning of Akram Khan’s version of Giselle in 2017. In 2022, she created a new version of Raymonda. In 2022, Rojo was appointed artistic director of San Francisco Ballet. She was appointed CBE in 2016 for services to ballet.