Lahna Vanderbush was born in Nagoya, Japan and raised in Eugene, Oregon. She began her training at the Eugene Ballet Academy, later finishing at the San Francisco Ballet School under the direction of Gloria Govrin and Lola de Avila. She began her career in 2007 at The Alberta Ballet where she performed many of director Jean Grande Maitre’s works including The Fiddle and the Drum, Dangerous Liaisons, Mozart’s Requiem and Carmen as well as works by George Balanchine, Kirk Peterson, Christopher Wheeldon and Mikko Nissinen.

In 2009, she was a guest artist with the Norwegian National Ballet and Eugene Ballet Company, later joining Ballet San Jose (which became Silicon Valley Ballet). There she had the opportunity to dance many of the classics such as Swan Lake, Coppélia, Paquita, Don Quixote, Cinderella and Giselle (including the American premiere of Alicia Alonso’s rendition) as well as works by Léonide Massine, George Balanchine, Frederick Ashton, Jerome Robbins, Jorma Elo, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa and Igal Perry.

Vanderbush was also featured in works at Silicon Valley Ballet including Rolond Petit’s Carmen, Paul Taylor’s Piazzola Caldera, Twyla Tharp’s In The Upper Room and Ohad Naharin’s Minus 16. Vanderbush has toured Canada, United States, China and Spain with The Alberta Ballet and Silicon Valley Ballet.

Since joining Milwaukee Ballet in 2016, she has been featured as Claudia in Michael Pink’s Mirror Mirror, Fanny (Belle’s sister) in the world premiere of Beauty and the Beast, Odile in Swan Lake, Marie in The Nutcracker, Titania in Bruce Wells’ A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as well as Swanhilda in Pink’s Coppélia, among other wonderful productions.