Video | How New York and London created style of choreographer Christopher Wheeldon

Ballet choreographer Christopher Wheeldon lives between two worlds, and that’s helped to forge his unique style, he says.

British-born Wheeldon – whose short ballet Rush is being performed as part of the Hong Kong Ballet’s Wheeldon, Ratmansky, McIntyre and The Beatles programme next month – began his career as a dancer at the Royal Ballet in London. Then in 1993, at the age of 19, he moved to the US to dance at the New York City Ballet, where he became the resident choreographer in 2001. He currently choreographs for ballet companies around the US, as well as the Royal Ballet, where he is the artistic associate.

“I’ve spent a lot of time living in the US,” Wheeldon says, “but I’ve also been back to the UK for long periods, working for the Royal Ballet. I think that my style is an amalgam of my years in New York at the New York City Ballet and my upbringing in the Royal Ballet.”

The audience will notice this blend in Rush, he says: “There is a lot of quick footwork in Rush – it’s very fast moving – and that’s a quality I have picked up from living in New York. Living there, you are always going somewhere, you are always on your way to a place – there is a flow of people as soon as you go out of your front door. Those qualities have crept into my work,” he says.

Although Rush reflects the fast pace of New York’s streets, it was inspired by laid-back California, the 45-year-old choreographer says.

“I like to give myself new challenges, and when I was commissioned to make a new piece for the San Francisco ballet, I wanted to capture some of the Californian spirit of the company,” he says. “Czech composer Bohuslav Martinu ů wroteSinfonietta La Jolla when he was living in the US, and it has breezy energetic brightness to it. I’m trying to capture some of that openness in the movement of the dancers.”