Double dose of success for rising ballet star (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Double dose of success for rising ballet star Zoe Chinnock

12:00pm Saturday 18th August 2012 in News By Laura Shack

A BUDDING Darcey Bussell is leaping for joy after landing a coveted scholarship for a top performing arts school and a role in a professional ballet production in a matter of months.

Hours of training each week has paid off for 11-year-old Zoe Chinnock, who will perform with the English Youth Ballet in a performance of The Sleeping Beauty this month.

And in September, the young ballet star from South Cerney will wave goodbye to her family and Anne Edwards school friends when she starts at Tring Park School for the Performing Arts.

Mum Michelle said Zoe had beaten hundreds of other promising young dancers for the scholarship, which will help her to pursue her dream job as a professional ballerina.

Michelle said: "It’s absolutely amazing. It’s going to be hard to let her go because it is a boarding school but we are really proud of her and wouldn’t want to take that opportunity away from her." "Zoe doesn’t really realise just how good she is which is the nicest thing. She just loves to dance."

Michelle added it was thanks to the encouragement and teaching at Minety Dance Theatre School that her young daughter had achieved so much.

Now Zoe is looking ahead to the next few weeks when she will take to the stage as one of Carabosse’s Monsters and a Little Jewel in The Sleeping Beauty at the Waterside Theatre, Aylesbury from August 24 to 25.

Zoe said: "I’m really excited about it because the dancing will be amazing and a lot of fun."