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Feb 19,2006 - Feb 26,2006 |
Being Julia: the love of working as an artist
Canadian-Italian choreographer presents world premiere at Harbourfront
By Doreen Iannuzzi
Originally Published: 2006-01-29
Who knew that a tomboy who hated dance classes would grow up to be an award-winning choreographer, performer and highly regarded teacher.
Born in Windsor and raised just outside of Detroit, Canadian-Italian Julia Sasso started dancing at the age of four. Her parents put her in dance classes, and in the beginning Sasso admits she hated it. Growing up with four brothers, she was a tomboy. But then the tomboy wanted to be a ballerina. "It wasn't until 8 or 9 that the penny dropped," says Sasso. "I think it was because I was good at this, and when you're good at something, doesn't matter what it is, a sport, or math, or dancing or playing the piano - when you start to discover you're good and it's bringing attention, it changes and you want to pursue it. I'm glad my folks insisted that I stick with the dancing. Once that shift happened, you couldn't get me out of the studio."
After training with Cecchetti ballet master, Rose Marie Floyd, Sasso continued her training in New York as a scholarship student at the Joffrey Ballet and subsequently as an apprentice with the Harkness Ballet, and performed with the Contemporary Civic Ballet (Detroit) for six years before moving to Toronto at the age of 17, to attend York University's Faculty of Fine Arts (Dance).
Since then, she has performed internationally with Toronto's Dancemakers and was the company's Assistant Artistic Director and principal teacher for a dozen years. Sasso has created more than fifty original dance works including choreography for feature film (Boy Meets Girl, 1998; The Life Before This, 1999), television (Queer as Folk) and theatre. Her work has been commissioned and presented throughout Canada, in the United States and in Europe and has received eight Dora Mavor Moore Award nominations.
After leaving Dancemakers in 2000, Sasso formed her own dance company, Julia Sasso Dances. Perhaps a risky move, but she was excited by the challenge and undaunted by the reality of the decision. "I was 45. I quickly realized that I wasn't changing careers," says Sasso. In 2003, Sasso created the critically-acclaimed Beauty which broke ticket sales at Harbourfront - the highest selling Toronto choreographed dance show in the last six years.
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