One of the Santa Cruz Ballet Theatre’s crowning achievements is the annual spring repertory concert, In Concert. This performance gives the dancers a chance to expand their skills with a diversity of dance styles, and the audience benefits.
This year’s offering includes a world premiere by Robert Kelley to music by Sergei Prokofiev. Showcasing the talents of this season’s Senior Company dancers, the piece exhibits why the Santa Cruz Ballet Theatre’s talented director is known throughout the region and the country for his stellar contemporary choreography. Robert has won the Regional Dance America Choreography Award several times in his career, and his dynamic use of this Prokofiev score displays the athleticism of the dancers.
A world premiere by guest choreographer and alumnus Nahshon Marden will be also be featured. Nahshon is currently studying Dance at the Cornish School of the Arts in Seattle. He has constructed a multi-layered modern piece for the Senior Company titled “Atmos; Smokey Black” to a commissioned score by young composer Max Rico. The dancers were given vivid images of smoke in its many different forms to inspire their movements and interpretation of the choreography. It is hauntingly beautiful and showcases the artistic range, commitment and maturity of the Santa Cruz Ballet Theatre’s Senior Company dancers.
A west coast premiere of “10 in Four Movements” rounds out the program with neoclassicism performed by nine Senior Company dancers plus guest artist Skylar Burson. Artistic Director of Utah Regional Ballet, Jacqueline Colledge won the RDA Choreography Award a few years ago with this piece. Skylar dances with Utah Regional Ballet and is an alumnus of South Bay Ballet, another RDA/P company that Robert has worked with over the years. To a lovely score by Handel, the piece showcases swirling technical mastery en pointe of the Santa Cruz Ballet Theatre’s females as well as the partnering abilities of its men.
Fulfilling the future of Santa Cruz Ballet will be performances on the concert by the Junior and Petite Companies. Also choreographed by Robert Kelley, these pieces will exhibit the vision of what is to come. Here are tomorrow’s dancers in performance today. Watch and encourage their growth and development over the next few years… they will become proficient artists before your very eyes. Tickets will be available for In Concert soon through Cabrillo Crocker Theater.
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The Studio & Santa Cruz Ballet Theatre – partners in excellence serving Santa Cruz County for over 30 years. Robert Kelley and Diane Cypher, Artistic Directors; Sandy Nelson, Academy Registrar; Mark Swan, SCBT Board President. Website: www.scbt.org
