Darlene Thorne 2007
Artistic Director Darlene Thorne has been teaching, choreographing and producing dance for over 30 years. She trained under Dance Master Dimitri Romanoff of American Ballet Theatre and Francesca Romanoff of the San Francisco Ballet for 12 years then took over his original San Jose Ballet School in 1980. She also has a MA degree in Dance/Technical Theatre. This unique legacy is a direct line of teaching from the famous Diaghilev's Ballets Russes in France through Theodore Kosloff, Adoft Bolm, then Dimitri Romanoff, Ballet Master and founding member of American Ballet Theatre in New York. She owned the San Jose Ballet School for several years until giving it up for a position as Dance Coordinator at Evergreen Valley College. For almost 20 years she produced and choreographed their many shows and taught ballet and modern dance and conducted dance and theatre production workshops. She has been a judge for many dance competitions including the Dance Masters of America California finals and has won numerous choreography awards.
In 1989 she opened Sterling Dance Theatre and the studio has been popular ever since. Many of her students have gone on to professions in the dance world as producers, teachers, professional dancers and studio owners and many more are in other fields such as medicine, physical therapy, aviation, education, music and social work. They all still have one thing in common, they still agree that dance helped them become the successful adults they are today and they still keep in touch with their studio and director.