New American Youth Ballet is a great program for children of different ages and backgrounds. It's directed by Elizabeth Flores, who is not only a professional, caring, charismatic and highly motivated teacher, but a great dancer herself, thus being a wonderful role model for her students. The program has two large performances per year presenting full-length ballets, such as Nutcracker, Coppelia or Sleeping Beauty. It is hard to overestimate importance of these performances for kids. They get to be on stage with the professionals, participating in creating a show together. Having seen a few shows myself, I can appreciate the enthusiasm, joy, and great effort to do their best that even kids as young as 3-4 years old demonstrate. Finally, a really unique feature that makes the performances of the school to stand out, is that they are accompanied by live orchestra. The Richmond County Orchestra conducted by Maestro Alan Aurelia is performing the great music by Tchaikovsky, Delibes, and other composers and makes the magic of the classical ballet performance complete. I am sure that no matter what profession Elizabeth's students are to choose later in life, their ballet experience will always stay the most memorable, and they will be always the better persons for that.
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