Leadership
Adam Sage
Artistic Director
Adam Sage has enjoyed a four-decade directing, coaching, teaching, performing and choreographic career that has spanned four continents. He has served as Associate Artistic Director of Ballet Philippines, Founder/Artistic Director of Missouri Ballet Theatre, Artistic Director of Virginia School of the Arts, Ballet Master and School Director of Nashville Ballet and Adjunct Faculty at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.
He began his ballet studies in his hometown of San Diego with the United States International University Conservatory and California Ballet, before moving on to dance professionally with Ballet Philippines, Ballet West, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Hong Kong Ballet, Ballet Memphis, Nashville Ballet and N.A.P.A.C. Dance Company in Durban, South Africa.
Mr. Sage has performed principal roles in all of the major ballet classics as well as in works by such dance luminaries as Dame Ninette DeValois, Sir Kenneth McMillan, Sir Frederick Ashton, George Balanchine, Andre Prokovsky, John Cranko and Harald Lander.
He has had the honor of dancing at the Opera House at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., the grand opening of the Hong Kong Cultural Center and at the Cultural Center of the Philippines.
He has created over 40 choreographic works including full-length Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, Cinderella, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Dracula, Peter and the Wolf and Little Mermaid, which was most recently re-staged for Cape Town City Ballet in 2018.
Caitlin Helton Scherer
Ballet Mistress
Ms. Helton Scherer, a native of Springfield, Illinois, and a Springfield Ballet alumna, was most recently the Artistic Director for SYPG and has been teaching professionally for over 15 years.
In addition to dancing many lead roles for SBC, she also trained at Nashville Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, the Rock School for Dance Education, and Ballet Austin. After placing in the Regional Top 12 of Youth America Grand Prix in Chicago in 2003, she competed at the international finals in New York City.
She was a founding member of Missouri Ballet Theatre (MBT), where she danced for five years under the artistic direction of Adam Sage. While at MBT, she danced the roles of Snow Queen and Dew Drop in The Nutcracker, Hermia in the world premiere of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the Fire Opal Fairy in Cinderella, and lead roles in Rays of the Sun, Opus 18, Masquerade, Baroque Fantasie, Tres, and Porteno Fantastico. She has performed as a guest artist with SBC in The Nutcracker and has choreographed for the company.
Ms. Helton Scherer studied dance performance at Butler University and graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in educational psychology from University of Illinois in Springfield. While at BU, Ms. Helton Scherer performed abroad in Poland, touring Krakow, Warsaw, Gdańsk, Poznań, and Bytom. She is certified in Progressing Ballet Technique and in American Ballet Theatre’s National Training Curriculum Levels 1-3.
2022-2023 Board of Directors
President
Dr. Callie Carter
Vice President
Gail Rister
Secretary
Erica Filipiak
Treasurer
Julie Pittman McDonough
Rachel Burdick *
Dr. Sarah Henkle
Mary Jennings
*Past President