South African Ballet Theatre

South African Ballet Theatre (SABT) (2001-2012) was a dance company.

About the company

Formed in 2001 by six dancers who were retrenched by PACT Ballet, the founding members were Dirk Badenhorst, Kimbrian Bergh, Karen Beukes, Fiona Budd, Iain MacDonald and Angela Malan and the first Board comprised all founding members in addition to Don MacRobert (Chair), Michael Dove and Annzie Hancock.

In 2002 it opened its associated school and in 2004 moved from Pretoria to a new, purpose-built facility in the Johannesburg Civic Theatre (now called the Joburg Theatre).

In 2006, founding CEO Dirk Badenhorst left the company to explore new ventures, including the establishment of a small dance company, Mzansi Productions. For the next three years SABT and Mzansi Productions operated independently of each other as two professional companies based in Johannesburg.

In 2012, SABT and Mzansi Productions merged to create South African Mzansi Ballet. This brought Dirk Badenhorst and Iain MacDonald, two of the original six founders of SABT, back together as CEO and Artistic Director of the new company which, like SABT had been, was based at the Joburg Theatre.

In June 2013, the City of Johannesburg announced a funding grant for the company in terms of which the name was changed to Joburg Ballet.

For more information, see PACT Ballet and Joburg Ballet.

Productions

Largely performing the 19th-century classics, it also presents some new work including Ed Wubbe's Schlager (2004) and Kenneth Greve's Hamlet (2005).