Melissa Sandvig has been with the Velocity family since the beginning. She is known for a ballet class where all are welcomed and the goal is to enjoy the process.  Melissa relates ballet and technique to all dancers and styles and ultimately strives to have fun in class with encouragement, entertaining music, and a focus on all the beautiful details and placement you find in ballet technique. 

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Melissa was born and raised in Orange County California.  She began her ballet training at Long Beach Ballet at the age of 5 and began dancing professionally at age 15. While still in high school, she won 2nd place in the prestigious Music Center Spotlight Awards and toured internationally with the Los Angeles Classical Ballet to Taiwan and China. After graduating she was recruited to join The Milwaukee Ballet where she danced soloist roles with them for 6 seasons. Melissa then returned home to Los Angeles to become a freelance artist and a certified Pilates and Progressive Ballet Technique instructor.  She enjoys teaching younger dancers how not only to be healthy but to work their bodies correctly to prevent injuries. 

 

Melissa has performed with companies such as Helios Dance Theater, Sacramento Ballet, Los Angeles Contemporary Ballet, Luminario Ballet, Motion Tribe, Body Traffic, Strange and Elegant Dancers, String Theory, The Los Angeles Opera, and many more. She is most well known for her performance on Season 5 of "So You Think You Can Dance" as the "Naughty Ballerina". Melissa was the first classically trained ballerina and the oldest contestant at age 29.  She broke stereotypes about age and ballet and made it all the way to the top 6.  Now she continues to perform, teach master classes, independently as well as traveling full time with VelocityDance Convention. Commercially her favorite job was dancing as one of the ballerinas in Taylor Swift’s music video “Shake it off” choreographed by Tyce Diorio.  She has been a guest dancer on  "Physical", "Glee",“Bunheads”, “Vegas”, “Dancing With The Stars”, “America’s Got Talent”, “Mobbed”, “Grey’s Anatomy”, “Hart of Dixie”, “The Young and the Restless”, “Lucifer”, a Microsoft Tablet commercial, and many more.  She has also performed in motion capture work for many of the Dreamwork animated films such as “Shrek”, “Puss in Boots” "Trolls", "Dog Gone Trouble", and  “Madagascar 3”.  She has also collaborated with Cirque Du Soleil and Disney to create a new show.  Melissa can also be found on CLI conservatory, the Youtube channel, Buzzfeed, DS2DIO and the webshows EHOW and HealthyPowerTV. She was chosen to perform as the principal ballerina in the Hit Off Broadway Musical “Silence” opening in Los Angeles. 

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Melissa married Erik Sandvig in '05, a childhood friend that she grew up with at her local church.  Now that she is a mother of 2 young boys, she continues to perform but is focusing on her teaching and choreography. Melissa’s contemporary ballet choreography for groups and solos continues to be competed in NYC for Finals of Youth America Grand Prix, and competitions around the US. She has recently opened her own pilates studio space, in her neighborhood, to teach private lessons on the equipment as well as a floor/barre space to focus on technique and pointe work. Melissa hopes to pass on the love of ballet and performing to the next generation.