Poised for Promise
A ballerina with the St. Louis Ballet prepares for her second calling at MBU.
Ballet is her big love, and she spends more than seven hours a day, six days a week rehearsing. But she also considers herself an old soul who loves black and white movies, knitting, sewing, her King Charles spaniel “Mikey,” old records and reading the classics like “Great Expectations.”
Kimberly Morse is a freshman at Missouri Baptist University studying exercise science. She has also danced with the Saint Louis Ballet for the past three years.
When Morse was growing up in a family with seven children in southern Oregon, she would be the one sitting prim and proper in the middle of all of the chaos caused by her three older brothers.
It was a family rule that no one could get dessert if they got up from their seat, and she was usually the only one to get dessert.
“She always had this Grace Kelly-type poise about her that was really neat,” said her father, Brian Morse. “She did a tap-dancing class when she was about four or five, and it went from tap dancing to taking some ballet classes.”
Both of her parents are basketball coaches. All of her six siblings, which also include a younger brother and two younger sisters, are involved in some kind of athletic sport — basketball, volleyball or tennis.
“We used to joke — oh no ballet, no cheerleading stuff!” her father added. “It was different for our family but also pretty cool because that’s what she loved.”
Morse has been dancing for 12 years straight. She left home at the age of 14 to intensely train at ballet school and moved every couple of years since to pursue her dream.
“There’s just something about performing that is so rewarding — to get on stage and perform and see the audience’s reactions,” Morse said. “A lot of shows will connect with people on an emotional level, and it’s rewarding to give back to others in that way.”
She joined the Saint Louis Ballet in 2015. She was one of 100 applicants that year to audition, and one of only two who received a contract.
“She already possessed such solid technique and carried herself with such elegance as a ballerina at the time,” said Gen Horiuchi, the executive and artistic director of the Saint Louis Ballet. “I saw a lot of potential in her dancing.”
“She has never missed a class or rehearsal and is very dedicated and hard working,” Horiuchi added.
Morse’s most memorable role was last May with the Saint Louis Ballet when she danced as a fairy in “Sleeping Beauty.” The part included a solo.
“It was the first time I got to set myself apart from dancing with a group of people,” Morse said. “I got to put a lot of my personality in it, and I think it was a really big step in my career.”
Morse is realistic with her ballet career and knows that she cannot dance forever. She is 22 years old now, and most dancers dance until about their late 30s.
“I want to honestly dance as long as I can because I love it,” she said. “Ballet is a short career, and I could get hurt tomorrow and that would be it.”
“I wanted to start school now and have something to fall back on,” Morse added. “I love MBU and especially those relationships I’ve built with my professors and the people in the dorms since I live on campus.”
“The hardest part is just finding time for homework and all of the things I need to do,” Morse added.
Morse loves her exercise science classes at MBU and looks forward to using them in her second career as an occupational therapist. She has always been drawn to senior citizens and would love to work with them in an assisted living facility or hospital.
She credits her love of that age group to her “old soul” — they have a lot in common as far as knitting and sewing. When Morse was a child, her favorite performances were in senior citizen centers.
Even today when she has a break from school, she goes to assisted living homes and dances for the residents. She usually brings a record player and dances to a Doris Day song, her favorite actress from the golden age of Hollywood.
She laughs about the day she was passing a sign for Missouri Baptist University on the interstate when she was searching for schools. She went in to visit, and that was it.
“I woke up that morning not knowing what to do, and I went to bed registered for classes,” Morse added. “I fell in love with the campus, and I liked everyone who I met!”
“If I am going to go to school, I wanted to find a way to go somewhere that has a strong Christian background,” Morse added of her decision to attend MBU. “Ballet is very liberal, and I wanted a school that was outside of my dance experience.”
This story was originally published in MBU Magazine: Winter 2017.
