Mourning the Loss of NBS Alumnus Elizabeth Keeble

It is with great sadness that Canada's National Ballet School shares the news of the passing of NBS alumnus Elizabeth Keeble.

Elizabeth loved dance from childhood and graduated from NBS in 1964. Following her graduation she was a much admired professional dancer with the National Ballet of Canada, and a soloist with the Royal Swedish Ballet. Later in life Elizabeth channeled her artistic talent into teaching, both at Canada's National Ballet School and The Australian National Ballet School.

Fellow NBS graduate and National Ballet company member Vanessa remembers admiring Elizabeth in their student days as not only a truly lovely dancer but also for being a wonderful writer; "I will always have a memory of a tall beautiful, intellectual strawberry blonde" Vanessa recalled.

NBS extends its heartfelt condolences to Elizabeth's family, which includes her sister-in-law, NBS alumnus Catherine Rathbun.

Memorial & Remembrance

A memorial and remembrance will be held at the First Unitarian Congregation of Ottawa on Cleary Ave, Saturday, January 14th, 2012 beginning at 10:00am. For more information, please see the Ottawa Citizen Legacy Postings.

NBS Mourns the Passing of Long-Time Friend Wallace McCain

Canada's National Ballet School has lost a great friend with the passing of Wallace McCain. Wallace and his wife, Margaret Norrie McCain, are amongst NBS' most generous supporters, and were Co-Chairs of NBS' Project Grand Jeté Capital Campaign.

As Co-Chairs of NBS' Project Grand Jeté, the McCains were entrusted with raising $50 million from the private sector to help create NBS' state-of-the-art facilities. They were immensely proud of the buildings, which to date have won 14 international architecture awards, but were even more proud of their ongoing relationships with NBS staff and students.

"Serving as Artistic Director of Canada's National Ballet School is a great privilege because I interact daily with wonderful colleagues and the most inspiring group of students on the planet. Through this role I also am blessed to have become friends with Margaret and Wallace McCain. Without their tireless dedication to NBS, we quite simply would not be the school we are today. NBS went from having the worst facilities in the world, to having the best and most beautiful. Thanks to their tireless and impassioned support, NBS students' exploration of their exceptional talent now has a fitting home. At NBS, we refer to Margaret and Wallace as the School's Angels; I know Wallace's spirit is smiling on all of us here, proud of his years spent with us," stated Mavis Staines, Artistic Director and Co-CEO of NBS.

"At the National Ballet School we mourn Wallace's passing deeply, and we will miss his friendship, wit and passionate support," said Jeff Melanson, Executive Director and Co-CEO of NBS. "Wallace touched us all, made us reach higher for our goals and helped us to recognize just how much we can achieve when we believe and persevere."

NBS joins the McCain family in asking you to visit the tribute website they have created, wallacemccaintribute.ca.

Celebrating Glenn Gilmour

May 7, 2011

Canada's National Ballet School was honoured to work with Glenn's family – Colleen, Michael and David – to bring together this tribute to Glenn, in joyful memory and appreciation for his contribution to our lives as students, dancers, teachers, friends and family.

On behalf of the Gilmour Gang (Colleen, Michael and David, Craig Wingrove, Michel Faigaux and Tess McLean), we want to thank everyone who participated in the celebration on May 7. It was a special day and brought together members of NBS' communities to share their thoughts and memories..

Warm regards,
Mavis

Hello dear NBS alumni, students, parents,

I have some very sad news to share related to Glenn Gilmour, much loved and admired NBS ballet teacher for the past four decades.

Glenn Gilmour was very ill recently; we all hoped he would respond to treatment and recover. Sadly, this was not the case – Glenn passed away Saturday, February 5 in Toronto. Since Glenn had been extremely uncomfortable during his last week, we are grateful he is no longer suffering.

As you can imagine, his wife, Colleen and his two sons, Michael and David, are presently dealing with the shock of losing Glenn so suddenly and unexpectedly. We all are.

Once we have further information, particularly in terms of what the family has decided as far as a memorial service is concerned, we will let you know. When I spoke with David, he explained that Glenn was adamant about not wanting a church funeral.

In the meantime, please keep Glenn's family in your thoughts and prayers. We know they will appreciate it. Please forward this message to anyone you can think of who should be aware of Glenn's passing. If you would like to send a message or condolences, NBS will be collecting them to pass along to the family – please email or mail to:

Canada's National Ballet School
400 Jarvis Street
Toronto ON M4Y 2G6
Canada

Warmest wishes to you all and please take good care of yourselves. Life is very precious and so are you!

With sadness,
Mavis

The greatest mentor, and influence in my life...

To write about Mr. Glenn Gilmour, is to write about the man who was the greatest mentor, and influence in my life. The words I now write have played over in my head over the years, ready to be expressed as an ode for a retirement, or a thank you. It is tragic that I did not have the opportunity to thank him directly.

Glenn was quite simply the person who shaped the course of my professional life. I know this feeling is shared by my classmates twenty two years after we graduated. He was our champion and pushed and pulled and moulded our abilities out of our young keen lives. I was a member of the largest group and class of boys to ever pass through the school. With five girls and eleven boys in our grade five class, we outnumbered the girls for most of our NBS octet. Glenn was charged by a cohort of eager males sometimes 16 to a class. He did not follow the ballet hierarchy of favourites. Favourites were earned and deserved, and we all desired to be one. He made no accommodation for bad behaviour or prima donnas. If you worked hard, you had his respect. There were famous comments such as "No sockies, no classies, get out now!" He was uncompromising, if you could not do an exercise due to injury, that was it, you sat down. You are injured, enough, no explaining. Glenn was clearly not a fan of the way so many young men's bad behaviours were tolerated so that they had not completed high school. Thankfully, Academic Prinicpal Mora Oxley had arrived by then. At the end of class in my Grade 11 year he asked one of the Grade 12's if he was graduating. Of course, Bob replied and offered that all five boys were graduating. Hallelujah! was the expression on Glenn's face.

Of course he was always Glenn to us, but never in his presence. Mr. Gilmour was the type of mentor whose authority was total. Though we loved him dearly, the thought of spending a solo moment outside of the studio was frightening. Riding an elevator alone with would have been a tongue in your mouth stammer.

Throughout our years at the school, Glenn sought ways to promote, push and inspire us. In Grade 9, he choreographed a spectacular boys demo for the senior boys, another followed and a pas de deux demonstration. There was simply not enough rep for his boys, so he found it or made it himself. In Grade 12 it was a resurrection of One in Five, another way to show case the boys. The year after I graduated, he created a spectacular piece based on the Lord of the Flies.

Glenn's presence was giant. We all remember him circling the room, ready to push you over at the barre as he snuck up from behind. "Hold yourself, strong, proud." Do not hold back was his constant message. I recall his many literary moments. "Boys do you know what bovine means." Then a breath later he would stare at me, "well Paul?" "Like a cow" I would answer. "DON'T CHEW YOUR CUD BOYS, you are performers!" Or, "Do you know what tenacity means?...Paul?"... He grabbed a chair in his hand. He slid it along gently: " I can move this chair, or I can move it with tenacity", as it glided across the studio, sliding into the corner

I learned a key lesson in life from Glenn. "What are you saving your energy for?" he would ask. "It is a gift. The more you use, the more you get back." This very lesson, I wish I could shout out at to every teenager I see. Why would you do anything half heartily, when great effort brings back rewards on itself.

Glenn had so much to give. I so clearly recall one day as a senior student sitting with two teachers for the dreaded feedback and the other teacher began the all too critical approach of pointing out your flaws and weaknesses. I knew well that I did not have the physique that brought praise and attention. As is his way, Glenn eased in and changed the tone to one of someone who knew me wholly and instead discussed my current trajectory and turned it into a route to inspire. "If you continue to improve as you are you will make it." So simple, so thrilling. As an aside I recall this general paucity of praise and why we craved it: In Grade 12, after a school show run through of Coppelia pas de deux, Betty Oliphant, the other leader who shaped my life, said to me. "Paul you dance beautifully, but you run like hell! What did you say miss O? I said you run like hell, no no the first part, about my dancing?"

It is hard to quantify the desire he instilled to do our best. The simple Diagonal from the corner; the Chasse-pas-de-bourre-tour-en-l'air combo we did every day. "Nina," he was say to his constant pianist, "Swine Lake, softly", and she would play a tinkle of barely audible ivory in the highest notes so that every landing could be heard. There was a sequence of praise that quantified your landings. "Hmm, better, coming, good, GOOD BOY, THAT IS THE BEST YOU HAVE EVER DONE IT!" Oh the joy in those words – The pride, the accomplishment. It was a two hour smile.

Glenn even made the Cecchetti exams about challenge and growth. For the Advance Syllabus exam he hated the music, so he pitched it and asked Nina to play his favourites. So few classes of boys of our size had ever been present to make it worthwhile to do the exams, so who would notice? As the boring tediousness of the daily running of the exam pieces went on, Glenn grew quiet, the comments stopped, the corrections were gone. It was the most depressing dance episode of our lives. What is wrong, we asked each other, we craved his feedback. We were angry. Then, one day he simply turned to Nina and said. "I have nothing to say, they are all going to make it, they will all be dancers." Can you stop and imagine for a moment and ask yourself, how often in your training did someone say something so hopeful, so definitive, so credible. We flew that day, the grins unabashed, we believed it, and it was true we all had the potential to have careers.

Shortly after, my apprenticeship with the National Ballet began, but lasted only a couple of weeks during summer school before a hiatus. The company did not need the male apprentices until the fall, we were disappointingly told. I was called suddenly home from New York by Mavis Staines – someone had left the company, "Reid Anderson needs to see you." Two days later, in company class, Reid was surprisingly Glennish, with a Sautee-Temps-Leve sequence, a tours diagonal and a pirouette diagonal. I was shocked when Reid pointed out how my front foot sprung off the floor to everyone. That was years of Glenn's insistence. I ran from King Street to the school without stopping, or likely touching the ground, an hour later as a member of the Corps, I sat in Mavis's office, "Why me" I asked, still shaking. I was certainly far from being the class star. "Because we felt you were ready, your potential realized."

Glenn's way of polishing our ability and pushing our boundaries served to make us not rivals competing for his affection. As a group we seemed to crave it for each other. My Advanced exam partner was Johan Persson, one of the most loved male dancers to go through the school and company. For the exam solo we were each assigned a variation. We were told we were not ready to have the prince variations. Johan was given Colas; that silly farmer's dance that begins with the thumbs in the armpit. Many years later I had the proud overwhelming joy of watching Johan, who was now a Royal Ballet Principal dancer at Covent Garden, dancing this very lead role in its birthplace. I had already moved on from my career, and let me tell you, when his thumbs were tucked in his pits, we were all there in his perfect tours and grinning confidence. Johan was, in fact, quickly cast in the role, new in the company. Don't worry he said, as his rehearsal period was virtually non-existent, I have danced Colas before. Johan had danced the buffoon Alain while at the National, but such was his identity with the dapper farmer that he bluffed his way through.

I recall one day that word was leaked that it was Glenn's Birthday. 50!! Louis, Mike, Johan and I ran to the art room. Our TTC student cards could easily pick the lock of any classroom door. Yes, what geeks. Late in evenings after Makeup class we would break into studios and do grand allegro, or go to the art room, or read! We made a giant banner and ran to the Betty O, for our Cecchetti class. The stage manager flew it into the rafters. But not soon enough, two of us had to keep the door pulled closed as he pulled and pulled and finally emerged flustered and red, "What is going on?..." Later, with barre over, Nina played happy birthday and our banner descended, we were so proud. He was speechless.

Throughout my career, Glenn's class and Nina's music were with me. Whenever, I did my own class or needed to do an extra warm up, I played Nina's tape and did Glenn's Barre. Or if there was little time I hummed his twelve minute warm-up, that burned the thighs and dripped sweat. Later as a teacher, I often modelled my classes on Glenn's, though I lost the austere confident affect, which was not my style. Many others will surely admit to copying his class.

My dancing days are now quite far away, but twenty-two years after graduating, my three closest buddies are from that group. We are all fathers now, well one on the cusp. I remember the birth of David, the only time Glenn missed our boys dem performance to rush to the hospital. We still talk about Glenn on our too infrequent get togethers, so dispersed are we. We each have had little regular contact with Glenn after leaving the school, as I said it was a deferential relationship. However, to him we are grateful.

I have a new profession now, a physician specializing in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. It seems little wonder after writing this that I chose a career whose motto is Maximizing Potential and Restoring Function. For years he told me to get my heels down in jumps, now I utilize extensive measures to achieve a heel strike so that my patients can achieve a functional gait.

Glenn I thank you, and I miss you.

Paul Winston
Victoria BC