A local dance center event sold out a week before it was scheduled to happen.
Spinning into its 40th anniversary, the Starlight Ballroom and Dance Center hosted its Showcase Celebration on Aug. 17 with live music, hors d’oeuvres, drinks and dancing by the center’s students.
“We are excited to do something different for this showcase,” said Beatrix Isaac, owner of the center with her husband, Jose. “For the 40th anniversary, we wanted to showcase our clients. People love seeing professional dance, but we are also giving people a chance to see their friends and family perform.”
As the place where people go to learn to dance like a pro, the dance center offers classes on the cha cha, waltz, tango, swing, paso doble and rumba. It was previously located at the historic Palace Theatre, at 414 W. Main St. in Leesburg, which was a former silent cinema built in 1922, but the center is now housed at 1710 Citrus Blvd. in Leesburg.
The husband-and-wife duo has been dancing since around the ’80s, though Beatrix said she knew she wanted to dance long before then. She said when she was 8 years old, she looked through a large window after stepping off the school bus and saw a room full of adults who around her parents’ age. She saw them dancing and thought they seemed happy with their lives.
“It was like an epiphany,” Beatrix said. “I knew that was what I was supposed to do with my life.”
But before becoming the dance instructor she is today, Beatrix was with law enforcement.
The opportunity to dance fell into her lap after watching some friends attend a dance class she introduced them to, she said.
“I was like, ‘That’s supposed to be me,’” Beatrix said, adding that her dance career started shortly after that.
Later, she became a teacher and manager of a franchise studio in Vero Beach and Melbourne. Her husband joined her.
Jose started dancing at the Fred Astaire Dance Studio in Texas in 1975.
The following year, he started his service in the U.S. Army, serving for three years while stationed in Germany and assigned to a Nuclear Battalion in a Medivac Unit.
In 1979, after returning to the U.S., Jose began dancing again and met Beatrix.
Nearly four years later, the couple opened a Fred Astaire Dance franchise in Leesburg. In 1992, it became the Starlight Ballroom and Dance Center.
Beatrix said the work the pair has been doing in Leesburg has been successful for so long because they were trained by professionals.
“We had some of the best teachers and were trained by greats in the industry,” she said.
She said it helped them develop into who they are.
“By the time we went independent, it was basically just a sign change,” Beatrix said. “We were able to still run.”Over the years, the dance center has received many awards, reached national merit status and had teachers rank in the top five in the country as determined by the national Dancesport competitions, according to the dance center.
“Time has flown by so fast,” Beatrix said. “It has been a God send. The students, community and county have all been so supportive of us.”
The celebration showcase gave the community a chance to come together and honor the work the dance center has done over the years, from helping host community fundraising events to working with local charities and teaching the community how to have fun with dance.
“People come in with a fear of the unknown,” Beatrix said. “My husband and I always tell our students that dancing takes time. Newcomers want to compare themselves to other dancers, but you can only compare yourself to how you last performed.”
She has enjoyed working with students to be comfortable and confident with dancing, a process she called “grabbing the gold reigns.”
“It’s gotta be fun, easy and exciting,” Beatrix said.
The showcase included performances by seasoned students, as well as newer students — some of which have been with the center for less than six months.
“The center is like a family,” she said. “It is a lot of laughter and camaraderie. Seasoned students work to make newcomers feel comfortable.”
For more information about the center in Leesburg, visit starlightballroomdancecenter.com.
Staff writer Brea Jones can be reached at 352-753-1119, ext. 5414, or brea.jones@thevillagesmedia.com.
