Faculty

A Co-Founder of Goh Ballet Academy, Choo Chiat Goh is an ambassador in the art of classical ballet. Under his leadership, the Goh Ballet Academy has flourished to become an internationally renowned institution, with alumni dancers advancing professionally worldwide and winning prestigious competitions. The Academy has collaborated with ballet luminaries, such as Anna–Marie Holmes, Evelyn Hart, and Rex Harrington, and has toured and arranged collaborative productions with other ballet companies in Canada, China, France, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, and the United States.

Mr. Goh began his training as a dancer on a scholarship at London’s Royal Ballet, where he studied with the great pioneers of ballet, Harold Turner and Madame Legat. At age 16, he was invited to join the London Festival Ballet, but declined in favour of studying in Beijing with the Russian ballet master, Pyotr Gusiev. He graduated from the Beijing Dance Academy in 1959 and immediately joined the Central Ballet of China, becoming Principal Dancer. His dancing repertoire includes leading roles in Le Corsaire, Giselle, La Fille Mal Gardee, Les Sylphides, Sleeping Beauty, The Fountain of Bakhchisarai, Swan Lake and many other classics. During the Cultural Revolution, Mr. Goh broke new group by creating lead roles in The Red Detachment of Women and The White Haired Girl.

In 1976, Mr. Goh immigrated to Canada with a dream of starting his own ballet company. In 1977, while also serving as Ballet Master with the Anna Wyman Dance Company, he started the Goh Ballet Academy with his wife, Mrs. Lin Yee Goh. They embarked on a mission to establish a ballet academy of the highest standards, recognized all over the world. Through passion, talent, faith and hard work, this was achieved, cementing the school as one of the best in the world.

Mr. Goh’s celebrated choreographic works include Earth/River, and Lost Love. Both he and Mrs. Goh were presented with the 2003 City of Vancouver Civic Merit Award and the 2006 BC Community Achievement Award.

Mrs. Lin Yee Goh is a Co-Founder of one of the most successful and most-honoured of ballet academies in Canada. While her training reaches back to Russia’s great ballet masters, she upholds both the discipline and excellence of classical ballet’s roots, and constantly reaches forward to the international future of dance.

Mrs. Goh’s early training was at the Beijing Dance Academy, under Russian masters Elenna Sergeivitski and Nikolai Romancheva, using the Vaganova method. There, she was taught the art of teaching. Upon graduation, she was invited to join the Central Ballet of China, where she danced for nearly two decades and became one of the Company’s Ballet Mistresses.

She immigrated to Canada in 1977, and joined her husband, Choo Chiat Goh, on a quest to establish a prestigious ballet academy in their new home. Together, they founded Goh Ballet Academy in 1978. During this time, she cultivated and fine-tuned her ballet instructor skills by attending courses at Royal Academy of Dance. In the late 1990s, Mrs. Goh returned to China to complete her studies in the Vaganova Method with Ms. Romancheva, truly bringing her teaching skills full circle.

The Goh Ballet Academy reflects her deep love of classical ballet and extensive training background. Mrs. Goh introduced the Royal Academy of Dance curriculum to the school, instilling in her students the highest discipline and skills required to rise to the top. Twenty of the Academy’s students have reached Solo Seal, the highest honour of the Royal Academy of Dance. The school has single-handedly put Canada at the top of the most prestigious ballet competitions.

In recognition of their accomplishments and contributions, both she and Mr. Goh were presented with the 2003 City of Vancouver Civic Merit Award and the 2006 BC Community Achievement Award.