About Us
Our Academy is ballet based; all students must take ballet first, then add on as many other classes as they wish. Our students may take class once a week (Levels 1-3) or dance up to 6 days a week (Level 6 & 7). They may choose to perform in our annual Nutcracker, community shows such as Ronald McDonald House, local retirement homes or charitable events such as the St. John Family Festival or the Butterfly Ball with SYCD, local competitions with ACE or our annual Spring Show. Many want to do it all and we make sure the opportunities are there for them! Our students have pursued summer dance intensives and workshops with ABT, DCDC, Ballet Theater Midwest, Cincinnati Ballet, Atlanta Ballet, Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp, Garth Fagan, Pointe Park, Giordano & Alvin Ailey. Academy graduates have pursued dance majors at Wright State University, the University of Akron, Ohio State and the University of Buffalo. We are incredibly proud of all our students, small or tall, and hope when they leave the Academy, at whatever age and for whatever reason, they will always remember how much FUN dance was with us!
About our Instructors
Our teaching staff has always been packed full of professional experience, college degree’s and classroom time. Academy instructors have danced with professional ballet companies including the Joffrey Ballet, American Ballet Theater, the Kirov Ballet and Cincinnati Ballet. Some have worked with high school show choirs and dance teams, as well as performing in off Broadway and dinner theater productions. Others have been certified to teach Jazzercise, Zumba, Pilates and Yoga. With all this knowledge and experience, we can provide exceptional classroom instruction from an incredibly diverse teaching staff. Please read on about our current instructors below…
Mary St.Romain
Mary St.Romain is the owner and director of the St.Romain Dance Academy, founded in August 2002. A former principle dancer with over 35 years of classroom experience, she has taught all levels from beginners to professionals. She began her teaching career at the age of 16 while still a student in Rochester New York, before moving to New York City to study on full scholarship at American Ballet Theater and with master teacher David Howard. She performed soloist and principle roles during her 5 years at Ballet Oklahoma, under the direction of Bojan Spassoff and Edward Villella, then retired to begin a family with her husband Richard. While raising her sons Mark (CCAD-Columbus) and Joseph (former CPL USMC, now Boise State ID), she continued to teach and perform in Denver and Minneapolis before settling with her husband in West Chester, Ohio. She became a certified Jazzercise instructor and returned to teaching dance full time at Oui Danse and the Academy of Cincinnati Ballet while beginning her study of Yoga. Since opening the SDA, she attended both a Finis Jung and Dance Medicine teaching seminar, participated in the Jazz Dance World Congress (bringing numerous students along) in Chicago in 05, 07 & 09, become a certified ZUMBA instructor attending 3 different Zumba training workshops and has participated in many different dance teacher educational seminars. By continuing her own dance education, she is able to offer her students the very best and newest dance styles, in addition to preserving classical ballet history through the teachings of the repertoire she herself learned and now passes along to her students.
Lindsay Dangerfield
Lindsay Dangerfield has been with the St. Romain Dance Academy since it opened in 2002. Lindsay grew up dancing in the West Chester and Middletown areas. Her ballet training is in Cecchetti, Vaganova and RAD. She earned her BFA in Dance from Wright State University, training in the disciplines of ballet, jazz, tap and modern in the Horton and Cunnigham techniques. Lindsay has been teaching dance and choreographing for various groups and shows for the past nine years. Her professional performing credits include: Damn Yankees, Sayonara, West Side Story and A Grand Holiday. Her professional choreography credits include: Hello Dolly, Anything Goes, Schoolhouse Rock Live, The Wiz, and Bye Bye Birdie. Lindsay is married to Thomas Dangerfield and they have a son, Carter.
Erica Collins
Erica Collins, from Middletown Ohio, has been teaching dance and yoga to children and adults for over 23 years. She previously taught at Richland Academy in Mansfield, Ohio and has worked with several Broadway directors and choreographers in off Broadway performances such as Tommy Walsh in “All Night Strut” and Phil McKinnley in “A Christmas Carol.” She has a background in theater dancing and Polynesian dancing as well as ballet, jazz, tap, hip hop and modern. She has studied numerous forms of yoga, weight training, Pilates, aerobics and modeling and has traveled the country training elephants and other exotic animals for educational performances and conservational awareness. This diverse background enables her to communicate with the public in many unique ways. Her healing arts practice is located in residence at the Academy consisting of Clinical Hypnotherapy, Reiki, Yoga, Healthy Chocolate and Aromatherapy. She has been teaching with SDA since 2007 and loves to share the joy dancing and performing has brought into her life with her students, as well as the local community!
Amy Wissel
Amy (Mura) Wissel was born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri. A dancer since the age of 2 ½ , Amy became a company member of the Westport Ballet Theater in Kansas City at the age of 12. She earned a BFA in Dance from Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri where she learned various styles and methods of dance: Ballet in the technique styles of Cecchetti , Vaganova and Balanchine, Modern in the techniques of Humphry-Weidman, Limon, Hawkins, Cunningham and Horton, as well as East Indian, Russian, Spanish Flamenco, Musical Theatre, jazz and tap. After college, Amy returned to Kansas City to continue performing with the Westport Ballet Theatre. She also taught dance at the School of the Westport Ballet, Miss Maria’s Dance Studio in Lenexa, Kansas and set musical theatre choreography for a children’s theater troupe in Kansas City. In 2004, Amy moved to the Cincinnati area and lives in Liberty Twp. with her husband, Jim and three children, Keely, Brett and Brock. Amy is excited to once again be able to share her love of dance with her students at St.Romain Dance Academy!
Olga Mikerina
A native of St. Petersburg, Russia, Olga Mikerina completed her formal dance training at the Vaganova Ballet Academy. Upon her graduation, Olga joined the Kirov Ballet, where she performed an extensive repertoire of classical works and appeared in company international tours. Between 2003 and 2008, Olga worked at the Cincinnati Ballet, as the director of Academy Operations. She was also a key faculty member for the Cincinnati Ballet Academy, where she taught a wide range of levels of ballet technique, pointe and character classes and also staged multiple works of classical repertoire for student performances. Due to her training background and performing experiences in Russia, Olga offers a significant level of expertise in the Vaganova technique and classical repertoire. She is excited to share this knowledge with her students.
In addition to her career in dance, Olga holds an MBA and MA in Arts Administration from the University of Cincinnati. Most recently, she joined Procter & Gamble, where she is pursuing a career in brand management. Even with a new career, she continues to be passionate about dance and is dedicated to helping aspiring students realize their highest potential as she joins the Academy this fall.
Steve Beirens
Steve Beirens started his studies at the age of 12 at The National Ballet School of Antwerp, Belgium. He also worked with The Royal Ballet of Flanders and was selected to participate in The Rencontres Internationales de Baule in France, where he received the award for “Best Classical Dancer”. Following graduation, Beirens danced with Le Juene Ballet de France, where his numerous solo and principal roles included Flames of Paris, Sleeping Beauty, The Nutcracker, La Fille Mal Gardee, Don Quixote and Le Corsaire, among others. From 1990 to 1991 Beirens danced with The Zuricher Ballet and in 1992 he was invited to join Wiesbaden Ballet to perform the role of Apollo in the Oedipus. In 1995, Beirens joined The Joffrey Ballet of Chicago, under the direction of Gerald Arpino, as a principal dancer. While with The Joffrey, Beirens performed in ballets including Robert Joffrey’s The Nutcracker, Ann Marie DeAngelo’s Stay With Me, George Balanchine’s Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux, and Gerald Arpino’s Viva Vivaldi, Confetti, Suite Saints Sants, and Kettentanz. Choreographer Alonzo King created a role for Beirens in his Joffrey-commissioned Cante.
Recently, Beirens has worked as a guest dancer and coach in numerous companies across the United States, including Tulsa Ballet, The Civic Ballet of Chicago, Maddison Ballet, Ballet Arkansas, Dance Galaxy, Westside Ballet, LA Dance Theater, LA Chamber Ballet and New Mexico Ballet. Since 2003 he has been invited to teach and coach in schools across the US, including New Mexico Ballet, New Mexico University, Reif Art Center Minnesota, Dance Arts Tennessee, Idyllwild Arts School, Los Angeles School of the Arts and Ballet Tech Ohio. In April 2007 he was appointed the position of Artistic Director of Ballet Quad Cities, were he served for one season. During the season he choreographed The Nutcracker, Sentimenti, and Coppelia. As of August 2008 he is a faculty member of Ballet Tech Ohio and Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, joining the St.Romain Dance Academy this fall.
