California Dance Institute (CDI), an in-school and after-school arts education program, will present SPACE: One Small Step, a Thousand Giant Leaps! on Wednesday, May 21^st at 7 PM and Thursday, May 22^nd at 4 and 7 PM. Each show will feature 170 children from the 3rd through 8th grades, in a professionally staged production accompanied by a live, professional band and vocalists. The performance is the culminating event of this school year's CDI program, which teaches life and learning skills through dance and music.  The show explores outer space through dance numbers set to an array of musical styles, from Richard Strauss, John Williams, George Gershwin and Charles Ives, to the Beatles, the Police, Robert Fripp and Philip Glass.

The 7pm Thursday evening performance will be followed by a Gala Reception at 8:00pm. Tickets to the Gala are $75, which includes the 7pm show.  All proceeds go to CDI’s programming.  

The event will be held at CDI’s new home in the Capshaw-Spielberg Center for Educational Justice at the Herb Alpert Village in Santa Monica.  Performances are in the state-of-the-art Ann and Jerry Moss Theater, with the Gala Reception taking place in the building’s beautiful Leadership Center.

Founder and Artistic Director Carole Valleskey, formerly a Joffrey Ballet principal dancer, started CDI in 2001. Today CDI serves over 1400 children in public schools throughout Los Angeles. CDI is an affiliate of the world-renowned National Dance Institute, founded in 1976 by New York City Ballet’s Jacques d’Amboise. NDI’s phenomenal success has led to national and international recognition, including the 1995 Kennedy Center Honors, the MacArthur Genius Award, and the Academy Award-winning film “He Makes Me Feel Like Dancin’.”  The program has touched the lives of over one million children throughout the country and abroad, across all ethnic and economic backgrounds.