Yoshihisa Arai began his ballet training at the International Ballet Academy in Japan before he was accepted to The Royal Ballet School in London in 2005. While he was a student at The Royal Ballet School, Arai performed in works by Sir David Bintley, Sir Frederick Ashton and Sir Kenneth MacMillan with The Royal Ballet at Covent Garden, and he was a finalist of the Prix de Lausanne in 2007.

After graduating with honors and receiving the Achievement Award in 2008, Arai joined Northern Ballet in Leeds, U.K. under the direction of David Nixon CBE and ballet mistressYoko Ichino. He began his professional career performing in many original ballets by David Nixon around the U.K. and in opera houses in Far East Asia. In 2011, Arai transferred his career to the United States and joined Tulsa Ballet, where he performed works by William Forsythe, Jiří Kylián Douglas Lee and Edwaard Liang. 

The following year, Arai joined The Joffrey Ballet Chicago under the leadership of Ashley Wheater MBE, where he gained innumerable experiences and the responsibility to perform countless principal and corps roles in world-renowned classical, contemporary and original works by exceptional choreographers including Gerald Arpino, George Balanchine, Val Caniparoli, Alexander Ekman, Lar Lubovitch, Cathy Marston, Wayne McGregor, John Neumeier, Annabelle Lopez Ochoa, Krzysztof Pastor, Justin Peck, Yuri Possokhov, Jerome Robbins, Liam Scarlett, Stanton Welch and Christopher Wheeldon OBE. 

As a choreographer himself, Arai created several successful new works for The Joffrey Ballet, such as Boléro, Élégie and Afternoon Watch, which premiered at The Lyric Opera and Auditorium Theater in Chicago. He has also choreographed a new Appalachian Spring for The Joffrey Ballet Studio Company in collaboration with the Illinois Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra.

In 2023, Arai choreographed and directed his first mini chamber opera, Cåraboo: A Chamber Opera, composed by James M. Stephenson and librettist Matt Boresi and performed by International Chamber Artists. Arai has been invited to create a world premiere in collaboration with Christopher Wheeldon, the Berlin-based composer, designer and Tony Award-winning choreographer, and Alondra de la Parra, founder and conductor of Mexico’s Festival PAAX GNP. In 2024, Arai also created a world premiere interpretation of Boléro for Colorado Ballet’s Masterworks Series.

After a triumphant career as a professional ballet dancer and choreographer around the world, Arai joined Cincinnati Ballet as a rehearsal director of Cincinnati Ballet and director of Second Company–CB2 in 2023. Since then, Arai has staged Prelude in collaboration with the Cincinnati Symphony Youth Orchestra and Poetry in Motion for CB2, choreographed Don Giovanni and La traviata with Cincinnati Opera in 2024 and created Sonata for Cincinnati Ballet’s Kaplan New Works series in 2025. cballet.org