Zakynthos Ballet
and Wellness Retreats 2024
Lisa-Marie Probert
Lisa-Marie Probert was born in Somerset and trained at both the Royal Ballet's lower and upper schools.
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She danced professionally for 17 years with companies such as London City
Ballet and Peter Schaufuss Ballet before joining English National Ballet in 2000. During her career as a dancer Lisa danced many soloist and principal roles including the role of Juliet with National Ballet of Ireland.
Her favourite roles being Clara in The Nutcracker, Alice in Derek Deane's production of Alice in Wonderland, and the role of Gerda in Michael Corders Snow Queen.
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After retiring from professional dancing Lisa retrained as a teacher and is a fully qualified level 6 Classical ballet teacher- the highest teaching diploma.
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Lisa teaches freelance in London and also gives workshops teaching classical repertoire to young and aspiring dancers.
Lisa is also the Artistic Director of The London Performance Company and Zakynthos Ballet Retreat.
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She is also a fully qualified Pilates teacher.
Denzil Bailey
Denzil Bailey started to dance aged 17 in a weekly Jazz class in a church hall in Cricklewood. Encouraged by his teacher to take ballet, he joined the London School of Classical Dance. After 3 years he was chosen to join the internationally prestigious English National Ballet where he danced for 10 years, touring the world.
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Following some time freelancing and raising his son Jacob, Denzil was approached by Cassa Pancho, a dancer writing her dissertation on the lack of black classical dancers. Together they founded 12 years ago the renowned Ballet Black.
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This led to numerous requests to teach and Denzil unintentionally became a ballet teacher, which he calls his “dream job”. In addition to his 2 three weekly classes at Danceworks, Denzil teaches at Central Ballet School, The Place, London Studio Centre, Middlesex University, London Theatre School and Pineapple. He also teaches for dance companies such as Rambert, Random, Neo Ballet, Tavaziva and Skanes Danse in Sweden – and of course, Ballet Black.
Cesar Latorre
Born in Gijon, Spain, Cesar started his musical studies at the age of 3, as his sister, two years older, didn’t have any other entertaiment at home but to give solfege lessons to the little one of the family.
He has studied classical and jazz music in Spain, The Netherlands, Germany and USA. His teachers have been Roberto Méndez, Karel Boehlee, Rob van Bavel, Kriss Goesens, Hal Galper, Wolfang Kolher and he also received classes from Jason Moran and Ethan Iverson. Other direct influences during his studies were musicians like John Taylor and Kenny Werner.
Cesar’s piano sound is round and profound. He evokes a modern impressionism in his playing, complementing it with a great use of harmony. His compositions are very elaborated and they are impregnated of references from contemporary music to flamenco, always with a personal use of conversational playing, what defines all his projects.
Cesar participated in the international competitions YPF Jazz Piano Competition, Hoielaart Jazz Contest, Jazz Na’Odra, Granada Jazz Competition and Audiciones Madrid. His performances were awarded and received great support from juries and public.
He has performed with Michaell Mossman, Antonio Hart, Marcos Baggiani, Simin Tander, Pere Loewe, Lucia Martinez, Marcel Kröemker and Tomas Merlo among others. In 2015, his trio with Petros Klampanis and Artis Orubs released a new album.