Edson Barbosa was raised in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and began his training in ballet, jazz, and tap at age 10 at Grupo Cultural de Dança, Ilha, with Patricia Marques. He was voted Best Male Dancer at the Festival de Danca de Joinville in 2012 — the largest dance competition by number of dancers, as documented by Guinness World Records. He received a full scholarship to study at the Miami City Ballet, Stuttgart Ballet, Washington Ballet, The Harid Conservatory, and Princess Grace Academy. He was also a Top 12 finalist at the Youth American Grand Prix in New York in 2010 and 2012, Top 6 finalist at the Beijing International Ballet Invitational for Dance Schools in China, and performed at the Opening Ceremony as a guest artist at the Danzamerica in Argentina. 

Barbosa was a prize winner at the prestigious Prix de Lausanne in Switzerland, where he was voted the best male dancer of the 40th edition in 2012, receiving a scholarship to be a trainee at the San Francisco Ballet School under the direction of Patrick Armand. While in the school he worked in contemporary workshops with Antoine Vereecken and Wayne McGregor, performed lead roles in ballets choreographed by renowned artists in the dance world, such as Christopher Wheeldon, Val Caniparoli, Myles Thatcher, Parrish Maynard, and the main company's director, Helgi Tomasson. Barbosa has had the opportunity to work in the main company's productions of Ramyonda, Giselle, The Nutcracker, and Romeo & Juliet, as well as Serge Lifar's Suite en Blanc, John Cranko's Onegin, Christopher Wheeldon's Cinderella, and Yuri Possokhov's Firebird.  

With The Joffrey Ballet, Barbosa has performed Balanchine’s Prodigal Son; Possokhov’s RaKu and The Miraculous Mandarin; Tudor’s Lilac Garden; Wheeldon’s Swan Lake, Fool’s Paradise, and The Nutcracker; Robert Joffrey’s The Nutcracker; Ekman’s Tulle, Episode 31, and Joy; Caniparoli’s Incantations; Welch’s Son of Chamber Symphony; Peck’s In Creases and Year of the Rabbit; Lopez Ochoa’s Mammatus; Neumeier’s Sylvia; Thatcher’s Body of your Dreams; Ashton’s Cinderella; Arpino’s Round of Angels; as well as The Red Boy in Welch’s Maninyas, Young Couple in Blanc’s Evenfall, The Dude in Kudelka’s The Man in Black, Spanish Solo in Arpino’s Viva Vivaldi, the White Pas de Deux in Kylián’s Forgotten Land, Tybalt in Pastor’s Romeo & Juliet, and Solo in McGregor’s Infra. He also originated the Man Duet role in Page’s Tipping Point.