SUMMER 2010
Director and choreographer, Wes Veldink, discovered his passion for teaching dance early on when he co-founded All That Jazz Dance Studio in Grants Pass, Oregon at age 16. He later moved to Los Angeles to complete his senior year of high school at the elite Orange County High School for the Performing Arts. Throughout the next decade, Wes became well known as a performer, teacher and choreographer. He appeared in the Disney film Newsies, co-choreographed Paula Abdul's video for "Blowing Kisses in the Wind," was Michael Jackson's dance double on two videos, and was invited to improvise live onstage with singer/songwriter Ani Difranco. As a teacher, Wes was a popular faculty member at Tremaine Dance Center and Edge Performing Arts Center, where he trained and inspired scholarship students making the transition to professional dance as well as professionals from throughout the world who came to study dance in Los Angeles. Dance companies and institutions across the globe began inviting Wes to both teach and choreograph including the Oslo State Ballet School and Oslo Dance Ensemble (Norway), the Osaka School of Music and K-Broadway (Japan), the Mediterraneo Dance Festival (Italy), Le Harmonique (France), The Dance Center (Holland), and the Nadine Bommer Academy (Israel), not to mention universities, conservatories, and conventions throughout the United States and Canada.