MIREILLE HASSENBOEHLER, PRINCIPAL

Birthplace
New Orleans, Louisiana

Dance Training
Harvey Hysell
San Francisco Ballet School
Houston Ballet's Ben Stevenson Academy

Joined the Company
1992

Promoted to Principal
2000

Favorite Role
Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty

Review
"Mireille Hassenboehler attacked the featured role, originally created for the rubber-jointed French star Sylvie Guillem, with super-charged aplomb. She and Phillip Broomhead plugged into an amazing energy force in a pas de deux that brought the piece to an electrifying climax." -Molly Glenzer (Houston Chronicle review of the ballet In the middle, somewhat elevated)

One defining moment...
Performing as a last minute replacement for opening night of Giselle with Carlos Acosta.

A native of New Orleans, Mireille Hassenboehler trained with Harvey Hysell until the age of seventeen.  After studying at the San Francisco Ballet School and Houston Ballet’s Ben Stevenson Academy, Ms. Hassenboehler joined Houston Ballet in 1992 and was promoted to principal in 2000.   Her classical repertoire includes: the Sugar Plum Fairy in The Nutcracker, Aurora and Lilac Fairy in The Sleeping Beauty, Odette/Odile in Swan Lake, Giselle and Myrtha in Giselle, Kitri in Don Quixote, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, title roles in The Firebird, Cleopatra, Cinderella, and Madame Butterfly, Coupava in The Snow Maiden, Manon and Lescaut’s Mistress in Manon, and the ballerina in Harold Lander’s Etudes.  She has had featured roles in both classical and contemporary works, including: Adam’s Ketubah; Balachine’s The Four Temperaments, Theme and Variations, Serenade, Apollo, and Western Symphony; Bruce’s Ghost Dances, Sergeant Early’s Dream, and Rooster; Forsythe’s In the middle, somewhat elevated; Kylian’s Sinfonetta and Forgotten Land; Lefar’s Suite en Blanc; McIntrye’s Skeleton Clock, Bound, and Second Before the Ground; McMillan’s Elite Syncopations; Morris’s Sandpaper Ballet; Tetley’s Lux in Tenebris and Rite of Spring; Stevenson’s Alice in Wonderland, Peer Gynt, Four Last Songs, Twilight, and Five Poems; Welch’s Swan Lake, Indigo, Bruiser, Divergence, Nosotros, Velocity, Play, Tales of Texas, Garden of Mirth, and Maninyas. 

Headshot by: Jann Whaley

Photo: Drew Donovan