Gran, 81, shows you’re never too old to do ballet
BRITAIN’S oldest ballerina has achieved the highest accolade possible from the Royal Academy of Dance, while celebrating her 81st birthday.
Sprightly Barbara Peters has received the top grade eight award with a pass rate of 73 per cent – with no concession made for her age.
The grandmother-of-eight was granted the award 79 years after she started dancing at the age of two. She took her first dance exam at nine.
And she did her exam on the same day that her granddaughter, Mia, 11, achieved her grade two.
Barbara, from Halifax, West Yorks, said: “As I was coming out of my exam, Mia was going in. I felt so proud. It’s the first time a grandma and granddaughter have done their exams on the same day.”
Barbara won a place at the Royal Academy to train as a ballet teacher in 1956 and opened her own school at just 24. When she gained grade seven last year the Academy told her she was the UK’s oldest ballet dancer. Ballerina Barbara Peters and, inset, at age 10