: About Me

Dr. Mike Donnelly, the son of a career Naval officer, decided to follow in his father's footsteps but could not pass the eye test necessary to become a non restricted line officer so he joined the Army. After serving as a Staff Sergeant he entered OCS and was commissioned in Armor Branch. After promotion to field grade rank and graduating from the Command and General Staff College he was medically retired after more than twenty years of active duty. His education includes years of study at The Citadel, graduation from the University of Louisville, GA Southern University, and the Russian Academy of Fine Arts. His degrees include a bachelor's, two Master's Degrees, and a Ph.D. He owns a Russian tour company, a Russian Art House, and serves as the Hermitage Ballet impresario when the ballet is on tour in the United States. Dr. Donnelly has been to Russia multiple times and virtually lived there for five years while attending the Academy of Arts. He speaks passable English, Russian, and German.

He has been married to his educator wife, Cheryl, for forty two years and they have two children, Jimmy and Barbara. Jim Donnelly founded igougo.com and Barbara is a successful author living in Bristol, England.

Arts & Humanities > Performance Dance Ballet dancing: Behind the scenes

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An American Impresario of a Russian Ballet Company In my life I have been privileged to have served as a field grade officer in the United States Army, owned a travel company that specializes in travel to Russia, become the only American ever to graduate from the Russian Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg, and have traveled to Russia hundreds of times. In between those seminal events I enjoyed a great life and thought that basically the only thing left for me was total retirement except for an occasional foray back to St. Petersburg, with a new group of tourists. Little did I know that...

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