Born in Cincinnati on August 16, 1945, Roberta Sue Ficker began studying ballet at the age of eight. She continued those studies while attending Catholic parochial schools, and in 1960 she won a scholarship to the School of American Ballet, the training school of the New York City Ballet. She made her first New York appearance in a minor role in the New York City Ballet╒s annual Christmas production of The Nutcracker in 1960. She joined the company╒s corps de ballet in 1961, by which time she had adopted the professional name Suzanne Farrell. In 1962 she became a featured dancer and made her first appearance in a featured role in Serenade during the company╒s summer tour.
Farrell╒s first solo performance was in the premiere of John Taras╒s Arcade in March 1963. In April she created the lead role in George Balanchine╒s Movements for Piano and Orchestra. While mastering various roles in the company╒s repertoire╤La Valse, Concerto Barocco, Agon, Liebeslieder Walzer, Donizetti Variations, A Midsummer Night╒s Dream, Ivesiana, Glinkaiana, Stars and Stripes, Prodigal Son, Symphony in C, and many others, mostly Balanchine works╤she created roles in Meditation in December 1963, Clarinade in April 1964, and Don Quixote, in which she attained stardom in May 1965. A short time later she was named principal dancer in the New York City Ballet. Often thought of as the ╥Balanchine ballerina par excellence,╙ she combined a light, gentle presence and a certain cool assurance with flawless technique to create her stage persona. Subsequent major roles were those in Variations, which premiered in April 1966, Bugaku, The Four Temperaments, The Jewels, which premiered in April 1967, Ballet Imperial, Metastaseis & Pithoprakta, which premiered in January 1968, and a new version of Slaughter on Tenth Avenue in April 1968.
In 1969 Farrell left Balanchine and the New York City Ballet, and in 1970 she became the principal dancer in Ballet of the 20th Century, a Brussels-based company whose repertory was largely the work of Maurice BÄjart. She created roles in BÄjart╒s Sonate, 1970, Les Fleurs du mal, 1971, Nijinsky, Clown de Dieu, 1971, Ah, vous dirais-je Maman, 1972, Golestan, 1973, Farah, 1973, and I Trionfi, 1974. In 1975 she returned to the New York City Ballet, where she created roles in Balanchine╒s Tzigane, 1975, and Union Jack, 1976, and Jerome Robbins╒s Piano Concerto in G, 1975, and continued a principal exponent of what appeared to be a renaissance of interest in ballet.
She retired from performing in 1989 following hip surgery, but remained with the New York City Ballet until 1993 as a teacher and coach for dancers re-creating Balanchine roles. She was named Artistic Director of the Fort Worth Ballet and also worked with the Balanchine Trust, formed after his death in 1983. She published an autobiography, Holding On to the Air, in 1990. She received a Dance magazine award in 1976, the New York City Award of Honor in 1979, an Emmy in 1985, a Golden Plate award from the American Academy of Achievement, and the New York State Governor's award in 1988.
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