Essential Dance Companies

Part of the Dayton Performing Arts Alliance, Dayton Ballet is the second-oldest regional professional ballet company in the US, recently celebrating its 85th anniversary. This season, the 20-member company will perform Dracula: Bloodlines, Swan Lake, and the beloved holiday tradition, The Nutcracker. The season's final show, New Beginnings, is a repertory ballet showcasing the Ballet's new Artistic Director Brandon Ragland's vision for the next chapter of Dayton Ballet.

Rooted in the African American experience, the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company is a culturally diverse contemporary dance company committed to reaching the broadest audience through exceptional performance and arts-integrated education.

The Dayton Dance Conservatory Company is a pre-professional youth dance company committed to creating young ambassadors of dance who will continue to proliferate and sustain the art of dance in the Dayton area. DDCC offers pre-professional dance instruction as well as two annual concerts which include guest artists from the Dayton area and surrounding states.

Dayton Dance Initiative is an independent collective of professional dancers from the Dayton area. They strive to create a platform for artists to explore their choreographic sides, collaborate with dancers of different styles, and bring the community together through their art form. The DDI mission is to provide professional dancers a platform to collaborate and create with artists outside their own company or genre while deepening the Dayton community’s interaction with the art of dance.

Dayton Historic Dance is a non-profit organization teaching dance and dance history and performing as Madame Gigi's Outrageous French Can-Can Dancers.