Joseph Caley is an English ballet dancer. He joined the Birmingham Royal Ballet and became a principal dancer in 2011. He left in 2017 to join the English National Ballet and was promoted to lead principal months later. Caley joined the Australian Ballet in 2022 as a principal artist.

Early life

Caley was born in Hull.^[1] He started dancing when his mother sent him to the same dance school his sister went, and had two afternoon sessions per week.^[2] He was then sent to audition for the Royal Ballet Lower School and was accepted. He later progressed to the Upper School.^[2]

Career

In his second year at the Royal Ballet Upper School, Caley was invited by Birmingham Royal Ballet's then-artistic director David Bintley to join the company, but the school's director at the time Gailene Stock convinced him to have one more year of training,^[2] before he joined the company in 2005, and became a principal dancer in 2011.^[1] Among the ballets he danced lead roles in are Giselle, Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty, The Nutcracker and Cinderella.^[1]

In July 2017, Caley announced that he would join the London-based English National Ballet as a principal for "diversity of repertoire."^[2] In the first few months in the company, the roles he danced included Romeo in Nureyev's Romeo and Juliet, James in La Sylphide, The Man in Song of the Earth.^[3] In December that year, his promotion to lead principal was announced at backstage, following a performance of The Nutcracker, in which he danced The Nephew. The promotion was effective the following month.^[3] One of the lead roles he had danced since was Des Grieux in Manon.^[4]

He made an appearance with the Birmingham Royal Ballet in June 2018.^[5] Other guest appearances he made includes Miyako Yoshida's Stars Dancer Ballet in Japan, The Australian Ballet, and at the opening of Hull UK City of Culture 2017.^[3]

In 2022, Caley left the English National Ballet to join the Australian Ballet as a principal artist.^[6]