Born in Brooklyn, New York, Raffa received her early training with Madame Gabriella Darvash. In 1980, she became the youngest and first American female to win the Gold Medal at the Prix de Lausanne competition in Switzerland. The same year, Raffa joined Makarova and Company on Broadway and, at age 16, became a member of the corps de ballet of American Ballet Theatre. She joined Ballet de Santiago in 1985 as a principal dancer and was also a principal dancer at Ballet National Française de Nancy. In 1992, she became a principal dancer with Miami City Ballet.

Raffa began her teaching career as an adjunct faculty member in Miami at the New World School of the Arts. In 1994, she joined the staff of the Miami City Ballet School (MCB), becoming the coordinator for the School’s summer intensive program and Ballet for Young People program. She also held the position of MCB’s Summer Intensive Program and MCB’s Apprentice Program. In 2005, Raffa returned to her native New York and was appointed Director of American Ballet Theatre’s Summer Intensive program, as well as Company teacher, Ballet Mistress for ABT II and faculty member for the American Ballet Theatre Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School. Among her many awards, Raffa was twice awarded a special teacher’s recognition from the National Foundation for the Advancement in the Arts and won a grant from the United States Information Services to act as a cultural ambassador and teacher for the company and school in Honduras.

Raffa was appointed Ballet Mistress with American Ballet Theatre in June 2007. In addition to her duties as Ballet Mistress, Raffa co-created the role of Carabosse with Alexei Ratmansky for his new production of The Sleeping Beauty in 2015. She also performs roles in Cinderella, Giselle, Onegin, On the Dnieper, Romeo and Juliet, Swan Lake and La Sylphide.

At ABT, Raffa has assisted Ratmansky on nearly all of his work since his appointment at Artist in Residence in 2009. She has staged several of his works for leading ballet companies including On the Dneiper and Firebird for Het National Ballet; Seven Sonatas for Atlanta Ballet, San Francisco Ballet and the Paris Opera Ballet; Shostakovich Trilogy for San Francisco Ballet.

Raffa assisted Twyla Tharp in the workshop production of Tharp’s Tony Award-nominated Broadway show Come Fly Away. More recently, in 2010, she staged Tharp’s Push Comes to Shove for Tulsa Ballet Theatre. Raffa served as Honorary Judge at the 40th Anniversary of the Prix de Lausanne competition in 2012 and also judged the Youth America Grand Prix in Japan, Mexico, Brazil and New York. She delivers Master Teacher classes by request and has taught all over the United States, Europe, South America and Japan.

Raffa holds an Ace certification in exercise physiology and graduated magna cum laude in 2002 with a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from St. Thomas University in Miami.

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