Considering that we tend to think of “dance” as something that people do to express joy, excitement, freedom and creativity, it’s an odd thing that ballet has acquired somewhat of a stern and forbidding public image. While mastering the artform certainly calls for commitment and discipline, it doesn’t have to be, in Scarlett Fiero’s view, something “mean.” So when Fiero founded the Saugerties Ballet Center back in 1984, she says, “I didn’t want it to be that way. We can be kind to one another. We can support one another.”

She recalls a teacher she encountered at the age of 17 whose feedback to students was so consistently negative that “I was almost ready to quit. It was always ‘No, no, no, no.’ I realized later that she was just trying to pull the best out of me. But I decided that when

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