BalletNEXT and the Park City Library share an important partnership within the Park City community. Through this collaboration, BalletNEXT curates a diverse array of community-oriented ballet shows and events accessible to all members of the public. These captivating performances typically last around an hour. Some shows are accompanied by talented musicians or feature narrative guidance for the audience to understand the plot of the performance. These immersive shows offer community members an interactive journey into the world of ballet, exciting and inspiring them. Past events brought to life through this dynamic partnership include cherished favorites such as the annual summer series, enchanting renditions of “Swan Lake”, “The Best of the Nutcracker”, “The Best of Sleeping Beauty”, and engaging showcases like “Works in Process”.
In 2024, BalletNEXT won the “I Partner with My Public Library” award, an award that celebrates community collaborators and sponsored by the non-profit Let’s Move in Libraries. Adriane Herrick Juarez, Park City Library’s Director, shares that “in our community, bringing live ballet to the Library stage meant many people would experience live dance for the first time. It’s a delight to see the eyes of the audience light up at the sight of high-caliber performances they never would have experienced otherwise.”
About BalletNEXT
BalletNEXT is a boundary-crossing platform, creating dynamic international performance collaborations between artists, students, and institutions. BalletNEXT provides a bridge for emerging talent to take their work to the next level alongside top professionals, masters, and musicians. By engaging with the next generation in this way and providing opportunities for them to develop and excel alongside experienced professionals, BalletNEXT seeks to make a valuable contribution to the dance development ecosystem. BalletNEXT started in New York, and moved to Park City, Utah in 2019. Now it is an official Utah company and 501c3 non-profit. One of BalletNEXT’s first partnerships in this new location was with the Park City Library in 2022.
Familiar Faces
Artistic director and founder of BalletNEXT, Michele Wiles, started her dancing journey when she was just three years old. It was at age ten that she discovered ballet, igniting a passion that would shape her life’s trajectory. She trained at the Kirov Academy for six years, learning the Vaganova style of ballet. Michele competed in competitions all around the world, won the junior gold medal at Varna, Bulgaria (the Olympics of ballet), a bronze at Nagoya Japan, and was a finalist at Paris International Ballet Competition. When she was seventeen, she joined the American Valley Theatre in New York to dance ballet professionally. She stayed here living out her ballerina dream for fifteen years, holding many different titles and positions, becoming a soloist in two years and a principal ballerina five years later. Here she danced many of her favorite ballets on some of the greatest stages in the world. At age thirty, Michele decided to start her own company, BalletNEXT.
With over 20 years of experience in multiple dance forms, alongside a lifelong dedication to martial arts since the age of 3, and early beginnings as a child actor at 5, Matt’s passion for performance knows no bounds.
He looks forward to performing for audiences so they can experience the magic of the music and dance coming together. The diversity in the styles of dance and the difference in every dancer adds to this magic.
Matt is now a full time dancer with BalletNEXT. He loves performing for Utah and Park City audiences.