Posted on 7/19/2022 8:11 PM
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“When I discovered classical dance, I was seven years old. I was a little boy, living in the Bronx. It was the opposite of everything I imagined for my future.” Currently artistic director of the New York Theater Ballet, Steven Melendez looks back on his story.
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“We hear a lot of stories of dancers who say they always knew they were made to dance. Or that they were dancing all the time in the middle of the living room. It’s not my story at all. I became a dancer by accident. A happy accident.” This classical dancer was discovered in a homeless shelter in New York. After a career with the New York Theater Ballet, he decided to retire following an injury. To offer other children the opportunity he had had, he took over the LIFT program, which develops dance in all mediums.
The LIFT program is a program implemented by the New York Theater Ballet in the city’s homeless shelters. “I was homeless for three years when I was a child. Diana [Byer] came and invited all the children who wanted to dance to follow her. My mother made me go there and take dance lessons. And at the end of the program, I was offered a scholarship”, says the dancer. He now tells his story in the documentary LIFT, presented at the Tribeca Festival.
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