Pirmin Treku

Pirmin Treku (born Fermín Aldabaldetreku Arruti; 13 March 1930 – 13 July 2006) was a Basque-born Spanish ballet dancer, teacher and choreographer. Under the stage name Pirmin Trecu (later Basque-ised as Treku), he became a principal dancer with Sadler's Wells Ballet (later The Royal Ballet) in London, where he was especially noted for his interpretation of the Boy in Andrée Howard's La Fête étrange and for leading roles in works by Ninette de Valois, Frederick Ashton, John Cranko, Kenneth MacMillan and George Balanchine.

A child refugee from the Spanish Civil War, Treku was evacuated from the Basque Country to Britain in 1937 aboard the ship Habana and grew up in exile in England. He trained on scholarship at the Sadler's Wells Ballet School under de Valois and a generation of Russian and European émigré teachers, and in 1948 was reportedly the first foreign-born dancer to be engaged at principal rank by Sadler's Wells Ballet.

After a knee injury ended his stage career in 1961, Treku settled in Porto, Portugal. There he founded the Academia de Bailado Clássico Pirmin Treku and the Grupo de Bailado do Porto (later known as the Companhia de Bailado do Porto), which became important centres for classical ballet in northern Portugal. Over four decades of teaching he trained several generations of Portuguese dancers, including future members and artistic leaders of the Companhia Nacional de Bailado and Ballet Gulbenkian.