Today we’d like to introduce you to Valentin Voronov And Anna Pelypenko.
Hi Valentin Voronov and Anna Pelypenko, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
We met in Los Angeles during dance tryouts and soon after moved to Toronto, where we began our journey together as a professional dance couple. Anna is originally from Kharkiv and was already living in Toronto, while Valentin is originally from Moscow and moved to Toronto to pursue his dance career.
We officially began competing together in 2017. Throughout our competitive career, we became two-time Canadian Professional Latin Champions, finalists at all major U.S. competitions, World Professional Latin semifinalists, and Blackpool finalists.
In 2023, we retired from competitive dancing and began a new chapter focused on coaching, creating, and sharing our experience with others. At the beginning of 2025, we opened our own dance studio in Toronto.
During the COVID pandemic, we also started our social media journey. What began as a creative way to stay connected with people grew into a large online community across several platforms.
Today, ANNA & VALENTIN combine our experience as professional dancers, coaches, studio owners, and content creators, continuing to share our passion for dance both in person and online
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It definitely hasn’t been a smooth road. When two very talented and ambitious dancers come together, there are naturally a lot of expectations — from ourselves and from the people around us. We expected results to come quickly, but they didn’t.
Our journey was extremely bumpy. There were disappointing results, difficult moments, changes in the people around us, and situations that felt like betrayals. There were many times when another couple might have decided to split up and go separate ways. We didn’t. We stayed together, kept pushing, and kept believing that we could become the dancers we wanted to be.
We took our dancing to another level simply through consistency and hard work. We came to the studio every day and practiced relentlessly. Eventually, the results started to reflect the work we had been putting in for years.
Then COVID hit, and for around a year and a half there were no competitions and no normal dance life. We had to completely adapt. We continued working in the studio when possible and focused heavily on building our online presence and connecting with people through social media.
We got through that chapter together as well. And even today, the road is still not always smooth — but we’ve learned to see that as part of the journey. Every challenge forces us to grow, evolve, and find a new level. That is what makes the journey so meaningful, and we are still continuing it together.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
We are a professional Ballroom Latin dance couple known for our distinctive, authentic style, creativity, and original choreography. One of the things that has always set us apart is our ability to create new movements and concepts that feel ahead of their time. We love experimenting, breaking traditional boundaries, and bringing our own personality into everything we do.
Beyond our competitive career, we have built a strong presence on social media, where people know us for our educational dance content, energetic Jive videos, innovative choreography, and funny, relatable videos about life as a dance couple. We love showing both sides of our world — the discipline and artistry behind professional dancing, but also the humor, chemistry, and real-life moments that happen between two people who dance, work, create, and build a life together.
We are especially proud that our audience connects with us not only because of our achievements, but because of who we are. Our goal is to make dance exciting, modern, accessible, and entertaining while sharing love, joy, and positivity with people every single day. We want our content to make people smile, inspire them to move, and bring a little more happiness into their lives.
Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
If we told you our secret, it wouldn’t be a secret anymore 😂
But maybe the most surprising thing about us is that behind all the polished performances, viral videos, and big smiles, we are actually very simple people. We work incredibly hard, we laugh a lot, we argue like any real couple, and we never take ourselves too seriously.
A lot of people see the final result, but they don’t always see how much discipline, repetition, stubbornness, and teamwork happens behind the scenes. And maybe that’s our real “secret” — we keep choosing each other, keep creating, and keep moving forward together
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/voronovpelypenko
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/voronovpelypenko
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@voronovpelypenko
