Category Archives: Events

CINCINNATI, OH – Who will be voted Cincinnati’s best celebrity dancer?  Which stars have the right moves to rule the dance floor?  Find out on Saturday, June 18, 2022 when the Cincinnati Arts Association (CAA) celebrates season fourteen of its annual fundraiser Dancing for the Stars at the Music Hall Ballroom to benefit CAA’s Overture Awards – the nation’s largest locally-run high school arts scholarship competition – and Arts Education Programs.

Inspired by the hit ABC-TV show Dancing with the Stars, Dancing for the Stars will feature six Cincinnati celebrities paired with some of the area’s finest professional dancers in a competition program, at which the audience will vote for their favorite celebrity dancer. The competitive dance for the evening will be the Foxtrot and each dance pair will have ninety seconds to woo the crowd and the judges.

In addition, Dancing for the Stars will feature:

• Dance music by guest on-air DJ JD Hughes from 103.5 WGRR-FM
• Pre-event bourbon & wine tasting, plus meet-and-greet reception with the stars and pros
• Open dancing before and after the competition
• Lite bites provided by some of Cincinnati’s finest restaurants and caterers
• Cash bar

Saturday, June 18, 2022

• 6:00 PM – Bourbon & Wine Tasting / Meet-and-Greet Reception with the Stars and the Pros
• 7:00 PM – Dancing, Dinner by the Bite, Cash Bar
• 8:00 PM – Celebrity Dance Competition
• 9:30 PM – Dance the Night Away

In addition to the winner of the dance competition, Dancing for the Stars will crown a Fundraising Champion – the celebrity dancer who raises the most revenue toward the event’s fundraising goal through table/ticket sales and donations. Fans may add a donation under their favorite celebrity’s name at the time of their ticket purchase, or simply make a donation if they cannot attend the event. These direct donations (outside of the event ticket price) will help one of the fans’ favorite celebrities win the Dancing for the Stars Fundraising Champion award – which will be announced the evening of the event – and are 100% tax deductible.

Tickets are currently on sale at the following levels (a portion of the ticket price is tax-deductible):

• $150 – Patron (pre-event reception and two drink tickets)
• $1,500 – Corporate Table (ten Patron level tickets and a half-page program ad)
• $2,000 – Celebrity Circle Table (premium “first-row” viewing of competition area, ten Patron level tickets, full-page program ad, recognition on event signage)

RESERVATIONS AND INFORMATION:

• https://www.cincinnatiarts.org/membership-support/dfts22  
• (513) 977-4188 

THE STARS:

• Sebastian Castillo (Manager, Prime Cincinnati)
• Jill Jansen (Director of Government & External Relations, Mercy Health)
• Elizabeth Knuppel (President, Skystone Partners)
• Jon Lawhead (Senior Vice President, Sinclair Broadcast Group – LOCAL 12 WKRC-TV)
• Sara Mirus (Real Estate Agent, eXp Realty)
• Bret Schneider (CEO & President, WOW Windowboxes) 

THE PROS (WITH STAR PAIRING):  

• Doreen Beatrice (Independent Dance Instructor) – Sebastian Castillo
• Bonita Brockert (Independent Dance Instructor) – Bret Schneider
• Maura Garuccio (Independent Dance Instructor) – Jon Lawhead
• Jeremy Mainous (Arthur Murray Dance Studio – Cincinnati) – Sara Mirus
• Jozsef Parragh (Independent Dance Instructor) – Jill Jansen
• Josh Tilford (Independent Dance Instructor) – Elizabeth Knuppel 

THE HOSTS: Amanda Orlando, The Warm Morning Show, WARM 98.5 

THE JUDGES:   

• Douglas Beal (Independent Dance Instructor)
• Michael Betz (2019 Dancing for the Stars Alum and Fundraising Champion)
• Guest Judge – TBA

EVENT COMMITTEE:  Amal Daoud, Terry Foster, Ginger Loftin, Rosemary Schlachter, Phil Schworer, and Tracey Skale

EVENT SPONSORS:  TriHealth – Presenting Sponsor, Arthur Murray – Cincinnati, Doreen Beatrice,  Bonita Brockert, Maura Garuccio, Graphic Village, Jozsef Parragh, Punky’s Pixels, Josh Tilford 

THIRTEEN YEARS OF DANCING FOR THE STARS WINNERS:

• 2007:    Dr. O’dell Owens (former Hamilton County Coroner)
• 2008:    Jenell Walton (former WCPO-TV9 Anchor and Reporter)
• 2009:    Phil Schworer (past President, Cincinnati Bar Association; Environmental Lawyer, Frost, Brown and Todd)
• 2010:    Donna Speigel (Owner, The Snooty Fox)
• 2011:    Dr. Tracey Skale (Chief Medical Officer, Greater Cincinnati Behavioral Health Services)
• 2012:    Regina Russo (former Director of Marketing and Communications, Cincinnati Art Museum)
• 2013:    Chris Seelbach (former Cincinnati City Councilman)
• 2014:    Neal Schulte (Founder & President, Schulte Financial Group, LLC)
• 2015:    Johnny Chu (Owner, AmerAsia Kungfood Restaurant)
• 2016:    Jay Lame (Financial Analyst, Lenox Wealth Management)
• 2017:    Rohan Hemani (former Procter & Gamble Fabric Care Intrapenuer)
• 2018:    Dr. Marcia Bowling (Gynecologic Oncology, Oncology Hematology Care, Inc.)
• 2019:    Halle Quinn (Community Volunteer)
• 2020:    Event cancelled due to the pandemic
• 2021:    Event cancelled due to the pandemic

CINCINNATI ARTS ASSOCIATION’S EDUCATION & COMMUNITY ENGAGMENT PROGRAMS 

CAA’s Education & Community Engagement [ECE] Department cultivates diverse, inclusive, and accessible arts engagements, seeking to remove barriers preventing arts participation. Committed to a practice of antiracism, the ECE Department encourages the use of CAA venues, develops diverse arts supporters, and fosters an appreciation and understanding of diverse arts disciplines, while encouraging and supporting practicing arts educators and administrators, audiences, and aspiring artists.

SchoolTime presents a series of programs that feature nationally recognized artists at the Aronoff Center and Music Hall. The Artists on Tour program brings a variety of arts experiences directly to schools, community centers, and other organizations. The finest local teaching artists in the region enhance learning with unique programs that vary in culture and art form.

The Arts in Healing Initiative integrates the performing and visual arts in medical and community healthcare settings and other non-traditional locations to promote community wellness and encourage the community to explore the arts as an active part of their healing and ongoing wellness.

The Overture Awards is a program that recognizes and rewards excellence in the arts among Greater Cincinnati students in grades 9-12. Its mission is to encourage arts education as an integral part of a student’s academic experience and to create an environment that encourages training in, and appreciation of, the arts. The Overture Awards is the area’s largest solo arts competition and offers awards in six artistic disciplines: creative writing, dance, instrumental music, theatre, visual art, and vocal music.

Now in its 26th year, the Overture Awards has granted more than $950,000 to youth and schools in the Tri-state region. The Overture Awards was launched in 1996 by the Cinergy Foundation and Leadership Cincinnati (a Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber of Commerce program).

CINCINNATI ARTS ASSOCIATION
Founded in 1992, the Cincinnati Arts Association (CAA) is a not-for-profit organization that oversees the programming and management of two of the Tri-state’s finest performing arts venues – the Aronoff Center for the Arts and Music Hall – and is dedicated to supporting performing and visual arts. Each year, CAA presents a diverse schedule of events; serves more than 600,000 people in its venues; features the work of talented local, regional, and national artists in the Weston Art Gallery (located in the Aronoff Center); and supports the work of nearly one dozen resident companies, including Cincinnati Ballet, Cincinnati Opera, Cincinnati Symphony/Pops Orchestras, May Festival, and Fifth Third Bank Broadway in Cincinnati, presented by TriHealth. Since the inception of its acclaimed arts education programs in 1995, CAA has reached nearly two million students and adults.

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