Lawrence Pech is from Denver, receiving his early classical music training in piano and voice. His first choreographic effort was in the fourth grade, to the Beatles’ Something... He began studying ballet at age 14 with the Colorado Concert Ballet. At 16, he won First Prize in the Colorado Council for the Arts Choreography Competition with a piece set to Pink Floyd’s Have a Cigar. The following year (‘77), he received full scholarships to the Joffrey and American Ballet Theatre schools, the School of American Ballet (New York City Ballet), and Mudra (Maurice Bejart’s Ballet of the 20th Century in Brussels).

Mr. Pech accepted a contract from ABT in 1980 directly from the artistic director, Mikhail Baryshnikov. For the next 7 years, Lawrence worked with and was choreographed upon by such masters as George Balanchine, Martha Graham, Anthony Tudor, Agnes DeMille, Jerome Robbins (touring with him to the Spoleto Festival in 1982), Twyla Tharp, Paul Taylor, Jiri Kylian, Karole Armitage, David Gordon, Eric Bruhn, Natalia Makarova, Mark Morris, and others. He danced opposite such greats as Mr. Baryshnikov, Ms. Makarova, Ivan Nagy, Cynthia Gregory, Fernando Bujones, Gelsey Kirkland, Cynthia Harvey, Martine Van Hamel, Kevin McKenzie, and others. He has appeared in numerous Live From Lincoln Center telecasts, and figured prominently with Baryshnikov in the movie Dancer and the Dance (BBC).

In 1986, Helgi Tomasson invited Lawrence to join the San Francisco Ballet, where he was promoted to Principal Dancer in 1990. There, he was choreographed upon by James Kudelka, David Bintley, Val Caniparoli, Mr. Tomasson, and Lisa deRibere, as well performing principal roles in ballets by Balanchine and others. In 1991, Mr. Pech was the subject of a KQED special entitled Blue Lair, a ballet about his victory over cancer. It was awarded a 1991 Emmy for Best Choreography. In 1993, Lawrence became co-founder and Artistic Director of the Diablo Ballet, a position from which he resigned in 1995.

Mr. Pech has choreographed over 26 ballets and has produced, directed and performed in three separate programs of original creations for The Florence Gould Theater at the Palace of the Legion of Honor’s Summer Arts Series, The Neptune Society at the Columbarium, and the CalArts Summer Program (Valencia). He is on a leave of absence from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he is earning a Bachelor of Music degree in Composition. He has written seven musical scores, including a three-movement piano suite, a song cycle for 16 a capella voices, and various chamber works. He has choreographed and performed in eleven musicals around the Bay Area (such as Mountain Play’s Oklahoma!, which garnered him the Bay Area Theater Critic’s Circle Awards for Best Supporting Actor in a Musical as Will Parker and Best Choreography, 1992). He continues to choreograph for the Belasco Children’s Theater, and teaches ongoing master classes for Pacific Ballet Academy and the San Francisco Dance Center. Mr. Pech choreographed the Opening Night Gala for the Gershwin Theater’s tribute to Ira Gershwin, dancing with Wendy Van Dyck, and directed by Albert Takazaukas.

Mr. Pech is serving his fifth season as Ballet Master and Resident Choreographer for the San Francisco Opera. During his tenure, he has choreographed Rossini’s Guilliaume Tell, Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, Massenet’s Manon, Puccini’s Turandot, Verdi’s Don Carlo, helped stage the latest Wagner Ring cycle, Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera, Donizetti’s Favorite, Charpentier’s Louise, Rimsky Korsakov’s The Tsar’s Bride, Verdi’s Luisa Miller, Moore’s The Ballad of Baby Doe (also choreographed for the New York City Opera’s 2001 season), Lehar’s The Merry Widow (also for the Utah Opera), filmed for PBS, and will this season put his mark on Giulio Cesare and Turandot. Mr. Pech’s theatrical work includes the Spreckles Performing Arts Center’s The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, and Jesus Christ Superstar.

This season will see the premiere of his Angels: Fallen and Otherwise to an original commissioned score by Bay Area favorite Kurt Erickson for chamber ensemble, chorale, and boy sopranos, dedicated to his late partner, Bruce Torell.