From a young age, Janet Panetta studied ballet with Margaret Craske, Antony Tudor and
Alfredo Corvino at the Metropolitan Opera Ballet School. At 14, she became Margaret
Craske’s teaching assistant, which served as on-the-job training for her lifelong
career in dance education. Janet joined American Ballet Theatre in 1968, and later
began her foray into modern dance as a member of Paul Sanasardo’s company. She went
on to work with Robert Kovich, Neil Greenberg, Susan Salinger, Peter Healey, and
countless other modern companies, while continuing to teach. In the 1980s, she began
working internationally, and in 1984 the French asked Janet to be the only ballet
teacher at their newly created school for contemporary dancers. Her class consisted
of twenty students, all of whom went on to professional careers, including the
renowned choreographer Jerome Bel. In her 1989 New York Times article, “Why Certain
Performers are a Breed Apart,” Jennifer Dunning of the New York Times called Janet’s
performing, “Quietly indelible, intense and sharply focused, with a smoky, smoldering
aura.” She definitely got that right! Janet currently works with P.A.R.T.S. and with
Pina Bausch Tanztheater Wupperthal. In addition, she teaches at Impulstanz in Vienna
each summer, and maintains her own New York Studio, where she serves as artistic
director of International Dance Dialogues, a program that hosts many European artists
workshops and lectures.
