Mayu Tanigaito is currently the longest-serving dancer in the Royal New Zealand Ballet. She joined the RNZB in 2012 after dancing with North Carolina Dance Theater II for one year, and she immediately began performing leading roles, including Blue Girl in George Balanchine’s Who Cares? and Myrtha in Giselle.

During her illustrious career, she has performed leading roles in classical repertoire including title roles in Giselle and Carmen by Roland Petit, Kitri in Don Quixote, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, Swanhilda in Coppélia, Sugar Plum Fairy and Dew Drop in The Nutcracker, Titania in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Queen of the Dew Fairies in Hansel & Gretel.

She has also performed many leading roles in modern works by master choreographers including Petit Mort and Sechs Tänze by Jiří Kylián, In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated and Artifact II by William Forsythe, Allegro Brillante, Serenade and Divertimento No. 15 by George Balanchine, and Waterbaby Bagatelles™ by Twyla Tharp.

Mayu performed Giselle as a guest principal with the Greek National Opera in 2016 and was named as a principal in 2019 when RNZB reintroduced dancer ranks. In 2021, Mayu accomplished a successful comeback from a major knee injury. She performed principal roles in every season including the title roles in Giselle, Paquita and The Firebird and Titania in Liam Scarlett’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Recent highlights include creating the title role in Loughlan Prior’s Cinderella, as well as performing Medora in the Le Corsaire Pas de Trois and featured roles in Alice Topp’s Aurum (2022) and Logos (2023) and Twyla Tharp’s Waterbaby Bagatelles™. She also performed Flames of Paris grand pas deux in the Sydney International Ballet Gala(2022) and Black Swan pas de deux from Act III of Swan Lake and the Wedding pas de deux from Don Quixote in RNZB 70th anniversary Platinum Gala (2023).

Mayu was born and raised in Japan where she received many awards in ballet competitions, including second place in the junior division of the 2002 Youth America Grand Prix in Japan and third place in the senior division in 2004, and she was a finalist in New York both years. She studied full-time at the Royal Ballet School in Antwerp and at the Rock School for Dance Education in the USA.

Mayu is supported by the Pye Foundation.

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Loughlan Prior’s Cinderella secrets

Answering tough questions like "What does happily ever after mean anyway?" helped to modernise this classic tale and make it relevant to today's audiences. The result is a magical journey of self discovery and authenticity, with a big dose of hilarity (and interesting use of lego!).