Tacoma City Ballet has not just one, but two public events in store for the end of October. Both feature live dance and live classical music.

First up is the third in a series of studio gallery evenings — the first two happened in June and August — hosted by TCB at the company’s Merlino Arts Center headquarters Saturday, Oct. 25.  The gallery events offer a showcase of work by local painters, and artists in other media, in a non-commission setting, explains TCB Artistic Director Erin Ceragioli. The one-night gallery also provides TCB with an opportunity to show off its school setting at the Merlino, “because it’s such a beautiful space,” Ceragioli says. Visitors, in turn, get a chance to “learn a lot about the arts” in Tacoma. 

The studio gallery evenings carry a $5 admission fee, which qualifies the holder for a glass of champagne (refills are $1) and a selection of “culinary delights” provided by nearby eateries and bakeries, to which gallery attendees travel during the event. While at TCB, they can enjoy the champagne, walk through an array of portable easels on which for-sale art work is displayed, and enjoy live entertainment.

Instrumental music will be provided by a guitar duo from the Tacoma-based Northwest Sinfonietta, featuring the group’s director, Christophe Chagnard, and member Neil Anderson. And dance sequences will offer a sneak preview of TCB’s upcoming world premiere production of Dracula: The Romantic Ballet, coming to the Broadway Center’s Theatre on the Square Oct. 31 and Nov. 1.

While proceeds from art sales go directly to the contributing artists, admission and beverage revenues have traditionally benefitted TCB’s Jan Collum Memorial Scholarship Fund, which helps to pay dance school fees for deserving students. For the October gallery night, however, that money will be adapted for another purpose; the Collum Fund will donate it to a member of the TCB “family” of dancers, whose child suffers from a rare form of muscular dystrophy. His parents will use the money to enter Seattle’s upcoming Half Marathon, which is raising funds via $500 entry fees to support research seeking a cure for the disease.

Dracula

Still to come in October at Tacoma City Ballet is the premiere of the company’s long-awaited original production of Dracula: The Romantic Ballet, with three performances at the Theatre on the Square, beginning Friday, Oct. 31 at 7:30 p.m., and concluding with two performances on Nov. 1 at 2 and 7:30 p.m.

 

The ballet’s beginning was actually some four years ago, Ceragioli recalls. “I had thought that it might be nice to do a ballet that revolved around another holiday.” (TCB is among the many companies, near and far, that perform The Nutcracker each December to large audiences.) Ceragioli reasoned that a ballet built around another holiday theme might also be attractive to audiences. The result was a grant from the Cheney Foundation and an original ballet based on Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

 

But Dracula: The Romantic Ballet has still not been seen by Tacoma audiences. The original production was stalled — one week before its scheduled opening — by venue problems incurred by the Pantages, which was then the only theater that could accommodate the production. TCB had already used the Cheney grant to build scenery, props and costumes for the production. With the approval of the foundation, all of it went into storage until the orphaned show found a home. The vacant Theatre on the Square has now provided that home for Dracula to rise at last and see the light of … night.

 

Ceragioli created the choreography, and Northwest Sinfonietta Music Director Christophe Chagnard arranged the score. Chagnard also directs the Lake Union Civic Orchestra, and that group will perform the Dracula score live for the production.

Audiences can, and are encouraged to, wear costumes of their own. 

To learn more about Tacoma City Ballet, visit www.tacomacityballet.com. 

[Merlino Arts Center, Saturday, Oct. 25, 7-9 p.m., $5, 508 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253.272.4219]

 

[Theatre on the Square, Friday, Oct. 31 7:30 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 1 2 and 7 p.m., $25, 915 Broadway, Tacoma, 253.591.5894]