Cameron Smith Purandare hails from Portland, Oregon where she was trained in the Royal Academy of Dance method under Marjorie Soriano. She also trained extensively in tap and jazz at June Taylor’s School of Dance in conjunction with her technical ballet training.

Cameron has had an impressive professional dance career spanning 14 years. She worked her way through the ranks to soloist with Houston Ballet. Later she danced as a principal with Ballet Memphis and Ballet Florida. During her career she danced a wide range of both contemporary and classical roles by some of the dance worlds most renowned choreographers like Glenn Tetley, Paul Taylor, George Balanchine, Ben Stevenson, Sir Kenneth MacMillan, Christopher Bruce, William Forsythe, James Kudelka, Trey McIntyre, Stanton Welch, Vicente Nebrada, Lila York, Mark Godden, and Peter Martins.

After retirement from the stage in 2007 she returned to the Northwest and started working with Northwest Dance Theater and June Taylor’s School of Dance. During her tenure there she served as an assistant artistic director, co-artistic director, and choreographer, creating their Dance Education Outreach Program. Cameron has received teacher training in R.A.D. syllabus at the Advanced and Intermediate levels as well as I.S.T.D advanced jazz teacher training. She has also taught dance classes through Dance for Parkinson’s Oregon.  Cameron lives in Vancouver, WA with her husband and two children.