Kathryn Morgan

Kathryn Morgan
Born	Kathryn Elizabeth Morgan (1989-08-17) August 17, 1989 Fayetteville, North Carolina,  United States
Residence	Mobile, Alabama, United States
Education	School of American Ballet
Occupation	Ballet dancer
Years active	2006–present
Home town	Mobile, Alabama, United States
Partner(s)	Eric Young (fiancé)
Website	Kathryn Morgan Online
Former groups	New York City Ballet

Kathryn Elizabeth Morgan (born August 17, 1989) is an American ballet dancer and former soloist with the New York City Ballet.^[1][2]

Early life

Kathryn Elizabeth Morgan was born on August 17, 1989 in Fayetteville, North Carolina.^[3] She was adopted.^[4] Her adoptive father was an endodontic dentist serving in the Air Force and the family moved to the Minot Air Force Base in Minot, North Dakota. She began studying ballet, tap, and jazz dance when she was two years old. When she was five years old her family moved from North Dakota to Mobile, Alabama and she enrolled in the school at Mobile Ballet, deciding to focus only on ballet training. When she was nine years old, Morgan went with her family to New York City and saw the New York City Ballet perform George Balanchine's The Nutcracker, inspiring her to work towards dancing with the company. At age eleven, Morgan was accepted into the regional youth company of Mobile Ballet, where she performed in full length ballets including Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker, the latter of which she performed the role of Clara at age thirteen and Arabian and Snow Queen at age fifteen.^[5] In 2004, at the age of fifteen, she attended the summer program at the School of American Ballet in New York City and in the fall she enrolled as a full-time student. Morgan's mother rented an apartment in New York City and stayed there with her, while her father commuted up to New York from Alabama every other weekend.^[6]

Career

In June 2006, at the age of seventeen, Morgan joined the New York City Ballet as an apprentice. Her first solo performance with the company was as Juliet in Peter Martins' Romeo + Juliet in 2007 while she was an apprentice. In February 2007 she became a member of the company's corps de ballet. She was promoted to the rank of soloist in October 2009. In 2010, Morgan faced serious health issues due to an under-functioning thyroid, and left New York City Ballet in 2012 to focus on her recovery. Her illness had caused her to excessively gain weight, suffer from fatigue, lose muscle strength, caused hair loss, and suffer from depression.^[7] She moved back to her hometown of Mobile, Alabama to receive treatment.^[8] Since 2014, Morgan has returned to the stage performing as a guest artist with ballet companies across the United States, Europe, and Asia.^[9] She has been featured in Dance Magazine, Dance Spirit Magazine, and Teen Vogue.^[10][11] She also teaches dance classes, has created her own mobile app, has a podcast on iTunes presented through the Premier Dance Network,^[12] does public speaking, and has a blog. Morgan's YouTube channel, which focuses on body positivity, healthy lifestyle habits, make up tutorials, and dance tips has tens of thousands of subscribers.^[13]

New York City Ballet

Morgan danced with New York City Ballet for six years, from 2006 to 2012. She was a soloist from 2009 until her departure from the company. While with New York City Ballet, Morgan performed many featured roles. She performed as Marzipan, Dewdrop, and Sugar Plum Fairy in George Balanchine's The Nutcracker. She also performed in other Balanchine works, including Ballo della Regina, the Waltz in Coppélia, Divertimento No. 15, Stars and Stripes, Scotch Symphony, La valse, and Western Symphony. While Christopher Wheeldon was working with NYCB, Morgan performed in three of his ballets; Carousel (A Dance) and Scènes de ballet in 2006, and Mercurial Manoeuvres in 2009. Also in 2009, Morgan performed in Jerome Robbins' 2 and 3 Part Inventions, Dances at a Gathering, The Four Seasons as Winter, Les Noces, and West Side Story Suite as Maria. Morgan performed the pas de deux from August Bournonville's Flower Festival in Genzano. She performed in Sean Lavery's Romeo and Juliet as Juliet Capulet. She performed in Peter Martins' Mirage, Romeo + Juliet as Juliet in 2007, The Sleeping Beauty as Jewel and Princess Aurora, Stabat Mater, and in the pas de trois and pas de quatre of Swan Lake. In 2010, Morgan performed in Benjamin Millepied's Why am I not where you are and 28 Variations on a Theme by Paganini.^[14]

Principal guest roles

After leaving New York City Ballet and recovering from her under-functioning thyroid, Morgan has toured and performed with various ballet companies as a guest artist.^[15] With Mobile Ballet in Alabama, Morgan performed as Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, Odette and Odile in Swan Lake, Sugar Plum Fairy in The Nutcracker, and Snow White in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. She performed in George Balanchine's Who Cares? at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Athens, Greece, in Divertimento No. 15 and Carousel (A Dance) at the Opéra Bastille in Paris, in Les Noces at Santander & Majorca in Spain, in Carousel (A Dance) and West Side Story Suite as Maria at the Orchard Hall at Bunkamura in Tokyo, and in The Red Shoes, Kitri in Don Quixote, and Odile in Swan Lake at the Playhouse Square in Cleveland, Ohio.^[16]

Morgan also performed with Dancing in the Dark Productions as the lead role of Galina in To Dance the Musical.^[17]

In March 2016, through the Cleveland-based program Ballet in the City, Morgan performed a two night show sponsored by Bloch titled Bloch's Evening With Kathryn Morgan at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.^[18]

Awards

• 2006 Mae L. Wien Award
• 2006 Movado Future Legends Award
• 2009 Janice Levin Award

Personal life

Along with ballet, Morgan is classically trained in piano.^[19]

On May 27, 2016 Morgan became engaged to her fiancé, Eric Young, who serves in the United States Coast Guard.^[20] Young was in aviation training at the Coast Guard Air Station Elizabeth City in Elizabeth City, North Carolina when the couple got engaged.^[21]

References