The group brings as many body types, skin colors, hair styles and cultural backgrounds as one could find in the Bay Area.

The group is busy rehearsing for the opening season program, The Choreography of Dennis Nahat . They've spent the summer off-season dancing guest spots around the world for other companies. Several dancers got married (to other dancers in the company), one gave birth to a baby girl and still others went back to their homes in Cleveland, Ohio, where the company used to share a stage when it was known as San Jose Cleveland Ballet.

The dancers may not share similar family backgrounds but they do share common concerns. Injury prevention and care come up often. The company employs physical therapists, chiropractors and massage therapists to monitor injuries and hopefully prevent the ones caused by overuse and years of wear and tear so common to a professional dancer. Each show warrants at least one physician back stage in the event a dancer is injured during a performance. The likelihood of being injured on stage requires several understudies to also be waiting in the wings in costume if they are needed to substitute for a sprained ankle or twisted knee. Those are physical stresses for any of the 32 dancers, then there are the societal worries. It doesn't take a Bay Area native to know the arts are in trouble. Nearly two years of a global economic downturn and general anxiety over an uncertain foreign policy have taken its toll on arts organizations and their would-be supporters in and around San Jose. The company's announcement this week of its creation of Symphony San Jose Silicon Valley was the direct result of the closing of the San Jose Symphony last year

"Ballet is very important now," says Alexandria Koltun, a Russian dancer in her second year with the company. "People can come to see the theater and feel joy and we feel it, too—we can give that to them."

Koltun is happy to be living San Jose, where she recently purchased a condominium. She finds it easier to warm up in the mornings compared to the cold weather in Boston where she previously danced. Joints, muscles and bones loosen up faster in the mild California climate.

Karen Gabay, 22-year veteran of Nahat's company is returning this season from a year's sabbatical. She gave birth to her first child this year and shows no physical sign of it—she is ready for a new season and says it feels good to be back to the eight-hour days of rehearsing and training.

A five story Depression-era building on N. First Street is home to Ballet San Jose Silicon Valley. Under the roof of their building, they house rehearsals, dance class, physical therapy, a full-time box office, community outreach, full team of costume designers, a world-renowned artistic director and, of course, 32 professional dancers.

There are the dozens of elementary school children who can be found padding up and down the stairs in socks, fresh from their initial introduction to ballet class, a gift that the company gives to San Jose schools as part of its outreach program. Kids come for a tour and a class taught by a professional dancer and then are offered 18 additional classes, complete with shoes, rehearsal clothing and transportation assistance to and from class at no cost—the only requirement­parental consent.

Then there's the music, only heard if one cracks a door to the four sound proof studios spread throughout the building. It's loud; select dancers familiarize themselves with the lyrics they will dance to once Lainie Kazan takes the stage for "In Studio D," one of the offerings in the season's opener The Choreography of Dennis Nahat.

One is left imagining Kazan as she belts out original torch songs set to a story that is described as part ballet and part New York piano bar. Nahat, artistic director of Ballet San Jose, based the story on his own experience as a young dancer in a New York City rehearsal hall, chronicling the long and intense hours that dancers and choreographers spend training for a career on stage.

They listen, respond and follow direction from longtime company dancer Dalia Rawson who is conducting their rehearsal. Then they break to watch a recording of the opening scene from a previous performance of the piece. More dancers are stretching in the corners, quietly huddled, and engaged in private conversation, some do pushups and sit-ups preparing for their turn to learn new choreography. It's hard to read their expressions as they rehearse. Are they saving the emotion for dress rehearsal? So deep in concentration, working out kinks or confusion over timing and positioning. The director notices late turns and landings that appear invisible to the lay eye. That's why she's there. To catch every detail as the team of professionals prepare for the opening of the 2002­03 season.

A season that will offer such classics as The Tempest based on William Shakespeare's original play and, of course, the annual holiday performance of The Nutcracker, in addition to original pieces and several company and West Coast premieres of ballet favorites.

The season promises a rich combination of dance, music, theater and award-winning costumes. All the while interpreting timeless themes of romance, desire, humor and greed through familiar and original choreography.