Nina Goldman

Nina is the associate choreographer for The Phantom of The Opera, which includes staging for the 2013 US national tour, Sydney Opera House and the Raimund Theatre in Vienna. She assisted choreographer, Arthur Pita, on Casse-Noisette at the Paris Opera Ballet and for the Joyce Theater’s premiere of The Tenant. Nina is presently an Assistant Professor and Academic Advisor at Hunter College

Performance credits include The Garsington Opera’s Death in Venice, Susan Stroman’s The Little Dancer at The Kennedy Center. Broadway credits include Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Contact, Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake, The Red Shoes and The Phantom of the Opera. Off-Broadway appearances at Lincoln Center, City Center and The Public Theater.

Nina originated the role of Mrs. Samsa in Pita’s The Metamorphosis at London’s Royal Opera House. National and international performances include The Shape She Makes at ART and Bourne’s Swan Lake, The Car Man and Edward Scissorhands. Other work at Signature Theater, Baryshnikov Arts Center, NY Theater Workshop, Great Lakes Theater Festival, Manhattan Theater Club, The Altogether Different Series, Les Ballets Jazz de Montréal, Feld Ballets/NY and The National Ballet of Canada. Television credits include the Fame TV series, the OSCAR and TONY telecasts.

Other assisting work includes Susan Stroman’s ballets for NYCB and PNB, Morphoses/The Wheeldon Company and The Cedar Lake Dance Company.

Teaching credits include Hunter College, Sarah Lawrence College, Princeton University, The Juilliard School, Barnard College, Gibney Dance Center, Peridance and Joffrey Ballet School, Gibney Dance Company, the Joyce Theater’s Ballet Festival, Metropolitan Opera Ballet, Alvin Ailey, Brooklyn Ballet, Cedar Lake Dance, Random Dance, Rambert and New Adventures Dance Companies.

Nina received a Masters degree from Hunter College’s Arnold Graduate Dance Education Program and a Bachelor of Arts from Empire State College.

Class Description
Coming from a varied professional career in multiple dance disciplines, ballet has always been my go to for maintaining strength and flexibility, working through injuries and preparing my body for the day.

The main objective in my ballet classes is that all dancers find their way into the form. It is important to create an environment where each dancer, no matter where they come from or what their goals are, to find an ease and freedom of movement within this specific dance style. It is my goal to help each dancer have a personal experience within the community of the class.

Some of the areas I emphasize in my class are proper alignment so that the muscles can be used most efficiently, listening to the body and not working to extremes that create unnecessary stress and hinders movement potential, paying attention to the transitions, exploration of phrasing, working within one’s own ability and not trying to fit in to a perceived ballet ideal.
I strive to make ballet more accessible to dancers from various dance backgrounds by encouraging the students’ individual qualities, energy and joy of movement.

Photo by Nir Arieli