This Halloween season, Northern Colorado’s Canyon Concert Ballet (CCB) will bring the haunting and chilling story of Dracula to the stage. The production, choreographed by Artistic Director Michael Pappalardo, offers drama, romance and suspense…perfect for the spooky season. Principal Dancer Natsuho Noguchi will perform the role of Mina, a part that not only demands incredible technique but also rich storytelling.
“The style is dramatic, atmospheric and, at times, almost cinematic, with gorgeous huge sets and projections,” Noguchi says of CCB’s production. “[Mina] is such a dramatically complex role to portray, requiring both vulnerability and strength. She goes through a lot of different and complicated emotions, human and supernatural. It’s both a challenge and a joy to portray her journey.”
Noguchi was born in Japan, and raised in Milan, Italy, where she began her ballet training. Later, she continued her studies at the Ballet Department of Showa University of Music in Japan, training with leading Japanese professors and international guest teachers. After graduating, she started dancing professionally in the U.S. with City Ballet of San Diego and later freelanced in Japan during Covid before joining CCB, where she is now a principal.
Perhaps it is this diverse upbringing which allows Noguchi to bring such depth and realness to complex roles such as Mina in Dracula. “My international background has given me the ability to ‘feel’ the role, giving it reality,” she says. “Especially for a role like Mina, where she goes through every kind of complicated situation in a classical ballet language, having a background of interacting with very different people and cultural situations has helped me give it a deep dramatic range, still rooted in precise classical technique. I really enjoy roles that push me to go beyond the steps, embodying a character fully, and this ballet allows me to explore it.”
Noguchi adds, “Growing up between very different cultures definitely shaped my artistic expression, and it taught me that dance is really a universal language. Discipline, precision and subtleness from Japan, passion and explosive openness of emotions from Italy, and various regions of the U.S. have everything in between. They seem the opposite, but they are both essential in dance. This mix allows me to draw deeply from character and storytelling while staying rooted in strong technique.”
And now, it is Colorado that she calls home. While she admits that she does miss her family, and the cultural richness and the food of Japan and Italy, Noguchi says that Colorado has become a wonderful place to call home. “I truly love the warmth of the people here,” she shares. “It also feels like a full circle moment; the very first place I traveled abroad by myself, for an audition, was Colorado!”
And she is quick to point out that she has brought all of her upbringing’s influences with her into this new chapter of her career. So, her past is with her no matter what she does…or dances.
Noguchi notes that, in fact, there is a lot of diversity at CCB. “Many ballet companies call themselves ‘diverse’ but often still within a very limited preferred range regarding height, body type, culture, style, but here, you can find pretty much every kind of human being.”
Aside from her major role as Mina, Noguchi has danced Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, and Giselle from Giselle, all of which she says have challenged her both technically and emotionally. “Sharing them with our audience has been incredibly rewarding,” she shares.
After Dracula, Noguchi is looking forward to performing in CCB’s The Nutcracker as the Sugar Plum Fairy, followed by Swan Lake and Alice in Wonderland. “I’m so excited to delve into these and deepen my artistry through diverse repertoire,” she says. “I also hope to expand my experience into teaching and workshops, as inspiring the next generation of dancers is something I care about deeply.”
And perhaps with any teaching or coaching that Noguchi does, she can pass on her unique ability to both dance dramatically and technically beautifully while also being a storyteller, and show how a diverse, cultured background – or even just an openness to these things – can inform one’s performance.
“Ballet can sometimes feel exclusive, but especially with photoshop and AI appearing, instead of one ideal standard ‘perfection’, which will be easily made by AI very soon, I think more human diversity, the heart and uniqueness inside, and the human traits of ballet will be more valued,” Noguchi notes. “I believe ballet is an art that is alive and accessible for everyone, and as a dancer, I hope to keep sharing the emotional and human side of ballet — storytelling that speaks to audiences across cultures and generations.”
Canyon Concert Ballet will present Dracula from 31 October – 2 November. For tickets and more information, visit www.ccballet.org/2025-2026season.
By Laura Di Orio of Dance Informa.
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