EXPERIENCE THE POWER OF DANCE

Diablo Ballet is an internationally recognized professional performing dance company committed to enriching, inspiring, enlightening, and educating children and adults through the art of dance. Diablo Ballet was founded in 1993 in order to address the absence of a professional ballet company in the region. The company consists of international dancers who have performed soloist and principal roles in such distinguished companies as the Bavarian National Ballet, the Ballet De Cali in Colombia, Ballet de Caracas in Venezuela, the Miami City, San Francisco, and the Houston and Colorado Ballets.

Diablo Ballet offers exciting dance performances, educational and outreach projects, and productions on tour. The Company has achieved remarkable artistic success capturing enthusiastic public response, substantial critical acclaim, and international recognition. The freshness and vitality of the superb dancers and choreographers coupled with the highest degree of technical excellence and a dynamic, original repertoire continue to captivate audiences of all ages.


Diablo Ballet's purpose is:

1) To make professional-quality dance available to all residents of Contra Costa County and surrounding counties (including Alameda County);

2) To support dancers and new works by emerging choreographers in order to further the field of dance;

3) To promote and serve community alliances through working with businesses, schools, and other non-profit organizations to enhance the arts and arts education;

4) To support our youth by using the arts to teach in-school lessons of self-esteem, group process, and, most profoundly, the joy of artistic expression.

To accomplish these goals, efforts are focused on performances at home and on tour and free education and outreach programs that have reached over 65,000 school children in the past decade.

PEEK Outreach Program for Low-Income Youth:

Diablo Ballet’s PEEK Program consists of three elements: Dance in the Schools, Theatre Encounter and Adopt-a-Class.

Dance in the Schools presents interactive ballet programs to five schools in Contra Costa County each season by visiting public school classes between September and May. The presentation enables the students to participate in a collaborative process by creating their own short ballet. The program consists of a one-hour lecture/demonstration presented with a piano accompaniment during which the history of ballet is presented and basics in movement and choreography are demonstrated.

The Theatre Encounter is a FREE program that brings 750 low income school children from Contra Costa County school systems into the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek, annually for a one-hour lecture/demonstration. The program, performed with stage lighting and piano accompaniment, offers young people a true theatre experience, which in turn prepares them to become the audience of the future.

Adopt-a-Class is a comprehensive arts education program that brings dance and music education into second grade elementary schools (120 children) once a month for 45 minute sessions over the course of the entire school year. The Artistic Director develops curriculum in collaboration with the second grade teachers, integrating existing areas of study, such as dance traditions from a specific country that the students will study for the year.

As part of the program, the children also visit Diablo Ballet’s rehearsal studio to watch a live rehearsal. In April, they visit the Lesher Center for the Arts to watch a professional performance in the theater with approximately 650 other school children. For many children in the program, this is their first and only opportunity to see a professional performance in a real theater.

The Adopt-a-Class program culminates with an end-of-year performance where the students perform a piece that they have practiced over the course of the year. This performance gives the children the opportunity to showcase what they have learned and demonstrate the confidence and poise they have developed.