Joey Mounce makes guest appearance in the 'Nutcracker'

WHAT: "The Nutcracker"

WHEN: Friday, Dec. 11

TIME: 8 p.m.

WHERE: Jacob Brown Auditorium

ADMISSION: $10 AND $15

TICKETS: Available at the door of Jacob Brown Auditorium or at Bellas Artes Academy

1440 Palm Blvd., Brownsville, Texas

FOR MORE INFORMATION: 541-6702

Joey Mounce stepped gallantly onto the stage, held out his arms majestically, then twirled his young partner in perfect harmony to the music.

Schoolchildren at Jacob Brown auditorium applauded as Mounce, 22, and his partner, Fjola Oddgeirsdottir, of Iceland, performed the pas de deux in "The Nutcracker," the famed ballet by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The performance, presented Thursday by Bellas Artes Academy, of Brownsville, will also be 8 p.m. tonight at the same venue.

Mounce, an Edinburg native, has performed twice before with Bellas Artes and looked forward to returning.

"It’s a pretty cool experience," said Mounce last week. He currently works as a solo performer with Ballet Pensacola.

Mounce said he believed he first performed as a guest dancer for Juan Jose Burgos, artistic director at Bellas Artes, at about age 14.

"It’s pretty fun to come back down," he said. "He was my first, actually, real guesting, like my first kind of gig deal. I believe the other roles I did for him, when I was younger, was the rat king or the mouse king, and I did one of the dolls, and I think I was Arabian and Russian. And of course all those are hard, as well."

However, performing as Cavalier in the pas de deux near the end of the ballet is a grand challenge. As the music cascaded across the stage, he held his partner in his arms and they bowed effortlessly toward the floor. Their arms fluttered like willow branches, her orange skirt blossoming as she spun beneath the bright lights. They moved in poetic synchronicity to one another’s movements, drawing exuberant applause from the schoolchildren.

"I think it’s just fantastic," said Gloria Ayala, a teacher at Longoria Elementary who’d brought her students to see the performance.

"I loved it," she said of the pas de deux. "It makes me feel so excited, incredible."

She also felt her students benefited from the experience.

"I think it’s very good exposure for them so they can know about the fine arts and maybe someday they might be there on the stage," she said.

Bellas Artes Academy was also appreciative of Mounce’s guest appearance.

"We’re really excited about it because we’ve known Joey since he was a little boy," said Bob Dean, administrator. "We’ve been good friends with his family, his mother and dad, and he came and danced for us when he was still in high school. He did supporting roles and he always was enthusiastic and excited about being on stage. He was a natural born entertainer. It was a real sense of fulfillment to have him come back now as a professional and be able to dance the virtuoso roles of the Snow King and the Cavalier."

Mounce, the son of Gary Mounce and Maria Elena Elias de Mounce, said he first became involved in ballet at the insistence of his parents as a way to become more active and lose weight.

"I was pretty fat back then so basically it was a way to get me to exercise," he said. "I just kind of stuck with it and then, yeah, here I am. Of course, when I was doing it you know I was like, ‘Yeah, this sucks. This is for gays,’ that whole stereotypical thing. Of course, the plus side is you’re surrounded by women all day long for nine hours, so it’s pretty cool. It’s pretty challenging and I enjoy being challenged and yeah, so I was like, ‘Yeah, this is a cool deal.’ "

His activities in ballet took on a whole new perspective when he realized he could build it into a profession.

"It kind of opened up a whole new thought process, and like just my way of thinking about it," he said. "I was like, ‘Oh, wow! This could actually be a career. I could actually make money doing this.’ "

Burgos said he was very proud of Mounce’s progress, but he declined to compare dancers.

"He first started when he was 14 years old, and he came in doing one of the small parts, and now he’s coming to do the big parts," he said. "I feel very good. It’s so difficult to compare. Each one, especially in this art, each one has to be so individual. You have to be your own. You have to have the technique, and you have the discipline. You cannot compare — appreciate each one’s personality in art."