Our Teachers
NINA RUBINSTEIN ALONSO is the principal teacher and school director. Trained primarily with Boston Ballet, she performed there and also taught a wide range of classes. Her teachers there included E. Virginia Williams, Bruce Wells, Shana Bereska, Violette Verdy, James Capp, and Sydney Leonard. She studied in New York with Richard Thomas and Barbara Fallis, and in Boston with David Shields, beginning teaching at his school when injuries following an auto accident interfered with dancing. She is well known as a highly experienced, sensitive teacher who finds creative and personal methods to support the growth of each student.
Nina founded Fresh Pond Ballet in 1987 after teaching at Boston Ballet for 11 years. Fresh Pond Ballet offers an inclusive program, aiming to develop confidence, joy, and musicality in ballet, the foundation technique of dance, in a non-competitive environment.
She has trained a number of well known dancers, including Jennifer Gelfand, a principal dancer with Boston Ballet; Antony James Rizzi, choreographer and dancer with Frankfurt Ballet in Germany and others; and Eoin Gaj, who started his ballet training with FPB and performed with Ballet West. Nina is also proud of students who have gone in directions other than professional ballet. Tanya Dennison graduated from Boston University and applied her ballet background to ballroom dancing, a field where she competed with great success.
The discipline of ballet gives mental as well as physical gifts to dancers, including ability to focus attention, strength, coordination, a quick memory, balance and fine posture.
LARA RIEHLE has danced her whole life with Fresh Pond Ballet and then Boston Ballet, where she both studied and performed. At Fresh Pond Ballet, Lara has taught all ages, ranging creative movement and elementary children's ballet through beginning and advanced adult ballet. Currently, Lara teaches Level 5/6 on Tuesday & Thursday nights, teaches private lessons, and manages virtual learning. Lara is a graduate of the University of Vermont, and currently works as a Jewish professional.