This week we began our 3-week Summer Intensive. Our first guest master instructor that has joined FMBallet Master instructors Mr. Matt Gasper (Artistic Director), Ms. Lindsey Setzekorn (Ballet Mistress), and Mrs. Kathy Gasper (Founding Director) is Ms. Cici Houston Sudholt from St. Louis Ballet. Find out more about Ms. Cici below.
CiCi Houston Sudholt is in her 20th year as a professional in ballet. Currently at Saint Louis Ballet, Ms. Houston serves as Ballet Mistress to the professional company, teacher to the affiliated school, and is Director of Education and Outreach. Originally from Detroit, Ms. Houston trained on scholarship with Theresa Crawford, Central Pennsylvania Youth Ballet, and Virginia School of the Arts under the direction of Petrus Bosman and David Keener, augmenting her studies with summer intensives in Boston, Cleveland, Houston, and Alba, Italy.
A former company dancer with Saint Louis Ballet, Ms. Houston performed featured roles in ballets by choreographers such as George Balanchine, Gen Horiuchi, and Francis Patrelle, as well as performing as a guest artist internationally. Ms. Houston was on staff for Alexandra Ballet for twelve years, where she taught, choreographed, served on the Board and as Administrator, eventually earning the title of Co-Artistic Director. Also a former Director for Regional Dance America, she participated in eleven festivals in the MidStates region and nationally. As Ballet Mistress for SLB, Ms. Houston rehearses repertoire including Balanchine, Arpino, Petipa, and new works, working closely with guest choreographers and repetiteurs including Charthel Arthur, Elyse Borne, Christopher D’Amboise, Tom Gold, Emery LeCrone, Miriam Madhaviani, Nilas Martins, Amy Seiwert, and Artistic Director Gen Horiuchi. Her guest teaching locales include Ballet LaCrosse (WI), Center of Contemporary Arts (St. Louis, MO), Christine Rich Dance Studio (Champaign-Urbana, IL), Forum Dance Theater (Chicago, IL), New American Youth Ballet (Fort Wayne, IN), and River Raisin Centre for the Arts (Monroe, MI).
Ms. Houston’s choreography and restaging of classical repertoire are increasingly sought out; her original works include The Firebird, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Nutcracker, Absence, Gypsy Song, Heliotrope Bouquet, Joie de Danse, St. Paul’s Suite, and Valses Poeticos, and Ms. Houston has restaged Coppélia (Excerpts), La Bayadere (Palace Garden), Le Jardin Anime, Les Sylphides, Napoli (Act III), and Paquita (Grand pas de Deux).
Ms. Houston is honored to return to the MidStates as a guest teacher for FMBallet.