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Dancing on air By Cindy Blankenship,For the Tidings Aug 04, 2005 12:00 AM A A Jazz dancer, aerialist, choreographer and teacher Lorenzo SantaBarbara was a big fan of Dick Clark& s & American Bandstand& : & At the age of 7, I was dancing in a living room with & American Bandstand& and that never has left me.& Ashlanders may remember him for his Children& s Dance Theatre, which drew 1,400 people to weekend performances of & Cats& in 1999. He has been out of state and recently returned. At 28 and having earned a master& s degree, SantaBarbara studied dance for the first time, dancing with the Memphis Ballet. Later, he applied to the University of Utah& s undergraduate dance program, where he hoped to study jazz. & I was literally on my knees, pleading with the department director. I told him I have so much passion to dance, please let me into your department,& recalls SantaBarbara, explaining this is a very tough dance program. & I wasn& t technically strong. They said my passion got me in.& Since earning his fine arts degree in jazz from Utah, he has danced, taught and choreographed for many years (he won& t give away his age by sharing how many). In Boulder, Colo., he created his first dance company and eventually went to New York. & It& s the Mecca for dance; there are more dancers in New York City than anywhere in the world. And my family is in Upstate New York,& SantaBarbara explains. In Manhattan, he lived in a 6-foot by 10-foot studio with no windows in a brownstone where the bathroom was down the hall. He danced in New York with jazz choreographers Lynn Simmonson and Lori Davido, taught dance to children in a private school Upper East Side school, and took his own dance company & Kids in Motion& (based on Jacque D& aboise& s teaching method) to conferences out of state and in Europe where they performed. & I made my debut there & as a truly starving artist in New York City!& he says with a chuckle and with pride. Later, he moved to Seattle where he studied and danced with Nancy Cranborn and created a Seattle dance company for youth, & Movin.& He also danced by invitation at Tokyo& s Nikano Dance Festival. — — ARTIST SKETCH — Name: Lorenzo SantaBarbara — Hails From: New York — Age: & Ageless& — Training: Bachelors of Fine Arts in Jazz from University of Utah. — Studied with jazz choreographers Alan Nicholai, Gus Giordano and the Ririe-Woodbury — team; and aerialists Robert Davidson and Nancy Smith. — Claim to Fame: Locally, directing and choreographing & Cats.& — Niche: Collaborating with children in musical productions. — Inspiration: & The beauty and grace in the body line and in the — movement through space.& — — & One of the greatest things I love about dance is supporting students to move on with their art and helping them sculpt their passion,& he adds. In 1998, he and his wife moved to Ashland, where she has family, to raise their daughter, Tiana. Here, he created the Children& s Dance Theatre from which he has many happy memories, including providing the scholarship that fulfilled the dream of one dancer to attend a performing arts high school. The training she received at Idyllwild Arts Academy helped Aniala Mahzary into Juilliard Performing Arts School in New York. Later, divorced, he took a position as director of an arts school near Chapel Hill, N.C., which he left this year after learning that his daughter& s mother was entering chemotherapy: & I told my daughter, & 145;There& s no way I am going to leave you,& so I had to figure out a way to make a living.& Currently he& s teaching at his La Cirque Center, which houses the Circus and Dance Academy and allows him to rig up his trapeze, 6 tight wire and other aerial equipment. His aerial work was influenced by former Cirque du Soleil & Saltimbanco& trapeze artists Elsie and Serenity Smith. SantaBarbara who teaches jazz and, to those interested in aerial, both, says, & The kids are having a blast. We are about strength, unity and self-esteem.& The Circus and Dance Academy will perform an unusual & Nutcracker& this December, choreographed by SantaBarbara and scored by new Ashlander and former musical director for Cirque du Soleil& s & O& in Las Vegas, John Taylor. Lorenzo SantaBarbara can be reached at 301-6864. His Circus and Dance Academy is located at 280 E. Hersey St., Studio 19.