But fate has a strange way of opening doors and prodding you into unexpected places. Happily retired, I received a phone call from a former colleague: Ballet Philippines was in need of my marketing and sales expertise just for three months to get things organized and going – would I want to help? Before I could even blink, I was whisked into the heady world of dance.

A firm believer in “doxa vs doxa” (opinion versus opinion results in greater truth), I conducted a series of focus group discussions by talking to different audience groups (in my marketing world and training: Consumer, in this case the audience, is king!).

Britt's raw, robust choreography has unleashed a side of the dancers that audiences rarely get to see in the course of the season. But then, that is the point of "New Works." It is, as the name suggests, a program made up entirely of new ballets, many of them out of the traditional ballet mold.

This year's program is even more out of the ordinary. Nearly all of the choreography and music has been created by artists from Greater Cincinnati. Besides Britt, choreographers include Missy Lay Zimmer and Andrew Hubbard (artistic directors of Exhale Dance Tribe/Planet Dance), Joy Jovet (former Cincinnati Ballet dancer) and Devon Carney (Cincinnati Ballet associate artistic director), as well as Luca Veggetti, an Italian choreographer who has created several recent pieces for the company.

As a trumpeter, the Canada native performed across the globe -- from Sweden's Brass Nova to Orquesta Sinfonica de Aguascalientes in Mexico.

In 1961, he was a founding member of the American Symphony Orchestra in New York. He also was principal trumpet for the New York City Opera, and played with the National Art Centre Orchestra in Canada and the New York City Ballet Orchestra.

A woman of incredible strength and determination, Crampton survived a near-fatal health scare in 2003, astounding doctors in the process, to recover and return to teaching and reviewing dance.

As further testament to her fighting spirit and passion for dance, Crampton went to the Australian Ballet's recent triple bill, Concord, just two Saturdays ago - eight days before she died.

The Colorado-themed show features “Great Galloping Gottschalk,” choreographed by Denver native Lynne Taylor-Corbett, and Agnes de Mille’s “Rodeo,” a Western-themed opera set to an original score by Aaron Copland.

“I find the Newman Center just a beautiful theater, and for works like these, smaller repertory pieces, they work very well on that size of a stage,” says Colorado Ballet Artistic Director Gil Boggs. “It also gives us a second venue to perform in here in Denver. Instead of being downtown, we’re able to go a little bit south, and maybe we’re able to attract some people that come to Newman Center that wouldn’t necessarily come downtown.”