Riccardo began his studies in the Neapolitan school of Gino Lemaire, the former soloist of the San Carlo Theater and trained under Zarko Prebil, a student of N. Tarasov. He danced with the company of the San Carlo Opera House in Naples, Italy from 1985 to 2022 working with Carla Fracci, Vladimir Vasilyev, Ekaterina Maksimova, Rudolf Nureyev, Roland Petit, etc. He studied ballet with renowed dancers such as Zarko Prebil, Sulamith Messerer, Michail Messerer, Anatoliy Nisnievitch, Michail Lavrovsky, Alla Sizova.

In 1995 he graduated as maitre de ballet at the Vaganova Ballet Academy in St. Petersburg, Russia. Mr. Riccardi started organizing instructional courses for ballet teachers in the Vaganova Method across Italy soon after. In 2007, Mr. Riccardi translated and published the book “The Russian School of Classical Dance“ of V.S.Kostrovitskaya, A.A. Pisarev (Gremese 2007).

Starting in 2011, in collaboration with the international trade and show dance event “Danzainfiera“ (Italy) Mr. Riccardi organizes Ballet Master Classes with the Vaganova Ballet Academy. In 2015 he collaborated with the Vaganova Ballet Academy on publication of the book Maestro Enrico Cecchetti.

In 2017, 2018 and 2019 Mr. Riccardi was invited to the prestigious Forum of Cultures organized by the Ministry of Russian Culture. 2018 marked the year when he published the book “I temps lies del metodo Vaganova“ (Joker 2018) with reviews by Nikolai Tsiskaridze and Marina Vasilieva. In 2018 and 2019 he participated in the Update Courses of the Vaganova Academy for courses lower, intermediate and higher. From 2019 Mr. Riccardo started teaching at the Kirov Ballet Academy in Washington as a guest master teacher. Recently Mr. Riccardi participated in DUCON, Singapore as a master teacher.

Info and images provided by Mr. Riccardo Riccardi