Lynn Seymour: Canadian Ball Dancer

In the early development of ballet in Canada, there were no companies for the emerging professionals to dance in, which lead to many dancers finding work abroad. Two notable examples of Canadian ballerinas who “rose to international stardom dancing in American ballet companies” during the 1950s are Patricia Wilde from Ottawa and Melissa Hayden from Toronto. Lynn Seymour is another Canadian who gained recognition for her talents as a member of England’s Royal Ballet and “came to be hailed as one of the century’s greatest dramatic ballerinas.” Although ballet in Canada struggled with funding, schools such as the National Ballet of Canada and Royal Winnipeg Ballet have trained dancers to win “international acclaim without the need the join foreign

Her accomplishment lead to her promotion to principal rank the same year and introduced her to Frank Augustyn. Kain and Augustyn danced many acclaimed performances and won numerous awards, especially with the help of Soviet-trained dancer Rudolf Nureyev. He took a “special interest in Kain and Augustyn, and helped accelerate their rapid ascent to fame as Canada’s favourite dance partnership, ‘the gold-dust twins’.” From 1973 and 1984, Kain toured the world with Nureyev and appeared in several “guest engagements.” Her successful dancing career lasted longer than most ballerinas, and Kain continued performing after the age of 40. She produced a farewell tour across Canada and retired as a full-time principal dancer in 1996. Two years later, she returned to the National Ballet, with the title of artist-in-residence, and in 2000, became artistic associate. She “focused her efforts on coaching the dancers, staging select works from the repertoire, fundraising and contributing generally as a member of the senior executive management team.” Kain was named Artistic Director soon after James Kudelka resigned from the position in May of