Cristal is from Albuquerque, New Mexico and has trained with DTSW, New Mexico Ballet and Interlochen Arts Academy. She joins MCB’s corps de ballet.

Look for Cristal onstage!

Click here to see the entire Company.

Click here to see our newly promoted dancers and those who have recently joined the Company.

Maya, a San Francisco native who has trained at City Ballet School and School of American Ballet, has joined the corps de ballet. She has most recently danced with New York City Ballet.

Look for Maya onstage!

Click here to see the entire Company.

Click here to see our newly promoted dancers and those who have recently joined the Company.

Liam Scarlett’s new ballet premieres in January 2012 at Adrienne Arsht Center, followed by performances at Broward Center and Kravis Center. Click here for more information.

Promoted to Soloist:

Sara Esty (Photo © Leigh-Ann Esty)

Kleber Rebello (Photo © Kyle Froman)

Promoted to Corps de Ballet:

Andrei Chagas

Suzette Logue

Promoted to Company Apprentice:
Chloe Freytag
Lexie Overholt
Kara White

Welcome back Jeremy Cox!

Jeremy returns for Programs I and II as a principal dancer after performing in Paris with MCB.

New to MCB:

Shimon Ito joined the Corps de Ballet and danced with MCB in Paris. He joins us from Ballet San Jose.

Jonathan Batista – School Scholarship Apprentice
Jovani Furlan – School Scholarship Apprentice
Sara McCahill – School Scholarship Apprentice

Promoted to Soloist:

Jennifer Lauren (Photo by Leigh-Ann Esty)

Renan Cerdeiro (Photo by Kyle Froman)

Promoted to Corps de Ballet:

Adrienne Carter (not pictured)

Nathalia Arja

Alexandre Ferreira

Skyler Lubin

Kleber Rebello

Promoted to Company Apprentice:

Andrei Chagas

Reyneris Reyes, Principal Dancer
Emily Bromberg, Corps de Ballet
Adriana Piercy, Corps de Ballet
Alex Davison, Company Apprentice
Suzette Logue, Company Apprentice
Chase Swatosh, Company Apprentice
Andrei Chagas, School Apprentice
Joshua Brown, School Apprentice
Chloe Freytag, School Apprentice
Christina Spigner, School Apprentice
Kara White, School Apprentice

There are also some familiar faces who have returned to MCB:
Isanusi Garcia-Rodriguez, Principal Dancer
Yann Trividic, Principal Dancer
Suzanne Limbrunner, Corps de Ballet

Photo: Several new dancers gather for a photo op -- Back row: Chase Swatosh, Joshua Brown, Alex Davison, Renan Cerdeiro (not new, but he jumped in the photo!), Emily Bromberg, Chloe Freytag, Suzette Logue, Adriana Piercy; Front row: Andrei Chagas, Kara White, Christina Spigner

Go out and get your copy to find out how she and her sister Jeanette ended up working together at MCB, why Patty had a bone removed from her foot, and why Edward Villella thinks she’s perfect!

Added bonus: catch a glimpse of corps member Sara Esty in the “Step Up Your Training” piece to read about her experiences at Miami City Ballet School intensive programs!

We’ve shared pictures of Amanda at the Vail International Dance Festival in a previous post.

Come see Amanda dance this weekend at Broward Center. Don’t miss your last chance to see Program II.

As a ballet student, you never think that the day will actually come when your career as a dancer might become a thing of the past. Caught up with the rigorous challenges of training, you are more anxiously conscious of wanting your career to begin. Then, you find yourself in a company, dancing every night, waking early to take class and rehearse, and time goes by. In the middle of it all, another ten years seem to be so much time to enjoy what you love to do, and with all the work to accomplish- the ballets to learn, the performances to prepare for, the endless strings of Nutcrackers, it doesn’t seem possible as you dance through your twenties and into your thirties that a career could ever end. Suddenly, though, the day comes when you realize it is time to move on, and you are left with years of memories, and the realization that time and careers do pass.

This is where I find myself at this moment, part way through my twenty-first season here with Miami City Ballet. I decided, a few months ago, that I would retire from the stage at the end of this season. I have spent the dancer’s equivalent of a lifetime here; indeed, I feel that, here, as an artist, I was “born,” grew up, matured, and am now facing what feels like the death of my life as a ballet dancer. Somewhere I read that dancers experience two deaths: the “death” of their careers and then their true death – and now I understand. Maybe death is a strong word, but for me, it acknowledges the completion of a journey and the chance to move on.

What can I say after two decades of dance? I have had an amazing time. I have been lucky to enjoy the career I have had- I am not sure it would have been this way anywhere else. I have been allowed to dance to the divine strains of Tchaikovsky more than my fair share, I think, as well as those of Stravinsky, Mozart, Delibes, Prokofiev, Ravel, Faure, Chopin and countless others. The music that moves our souls- I was granted the chance to dance to that- to live- to exist.

All of the ballets I will dance this year hold special meaning for me, and to be able to visit them again before I leave the stage is a special gift. And so I am looking forward to a season of little private moments of goodbye. Dancing my last performances of Company B and Allegro Brillante during the Kravis weekend, words such as,”…and this is the last time…” would float through my head, and the lump in my throat would start to swell. Each moment became a private goodbye to that part of my on-stage world. Bittersweet though it is, I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Deanna Seay in “Diamonds”. Photo by Steven Caras

Daniel told us what he’s looking forward to performing. What are you looking forward to seeing?