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Ballet San Angelo jetés into a new season

In addition to their annual productions, a number of new classes are being offered.
Credit: Randall Case

SAN ANGELO, Texas — Summer is winding down and that means Ballet San Angelo is just getting started. Since its inception in 1983 (as San Angelo Civic Ballet), the organization has been steadily growing, offering new productions and classes, and this year is no exception.

“We have a big season ahead of us, thankfully,” former BSA student and current Artistic Director Erin Lane said. “We’ve got our biggest event of the year, The Nutcracker. We start working on that at the beginning of the semester because it takes so long. We’ve got our Contemporary Works show in February, we have a children’s ballet, we have our showcase, and of course a bunch of classes and fun things in between.”

At this point, The Nutcracker in San Angelo every year is as sure a thing as pumpkin spice at Starbucks, but Lane said she plans on giving the production a more contemporary, “Pixar-like” feel.

“My vision is that stereotypically I feel like Nutcracker can be a ballet, or it can be a whole event. So we’ve got live music, we’ve got humor, we’ve got things for the whole family. So it’s not just for your kids. It’s an experience for everyone. I hope to engage audiences of all kinds,” Lane said.

For the second year in a row, The Nutcracker will feature live music. “It hadn’t been done in a long time. We were able to pull it off last year, even during COVID, safely, and so this year we plan on doing it even bigger and better.”

BSA’s home at Stephens Performing Arts Center is already buzzing with activity. In addition to exercise classes like yoga and PiYo, this year they will offer Soul Fusion, which Lane described as a mix between yoga, Pilates and weights. “So it’s kind of the best of all worlds,” she said. “We’ve actually added a lot to our program this year. We have what’s called BSA 2, it’s more a like a recreational route, we’re offering musical theater dance classes, we’ve got tap again, we’ve got contemporary dance, we’ve got ballet for those that don’t want to be here for 15 hours a week.”

After a long 2020, Lane said BSA is happy to get back to work while still maintaining safety protocols.

“We were all very excited to come back. Dance is a great way to work through hardships, to feed the soul, the mind, the body, in a way that can be very healing. So, to get back to that form of almost-therapy has been such a relief. We’re all so excited that we can keep our doors open. We had a successful year being safe in this building so we hope to do that again this year.”

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