Dance Biography

   My name is Jason Miller.  I have been dancing since I was 19 years old.  I am an experienced dancer and have learned just about every ballroom and latin dance there is to know from cha-cha to waltz to salsa to night club two- step.  I began dancing shortly after I recovered from a broken leg during my freshman year in college. I attended the University of California, Santa Cruz where I began dancing at a free ballroom dance club there called "Swinging Slugs" in 1994.  I learned most of the basic social ballroom dances and began branching out to learn as many patterns as I could wherever I could.  At the time there was a monthly dance put on by Becky Adams in Capitola (near Santa Cruz) and I would also hitch a ride over the hill whenever I could to dance at the Cubberley Pavilion in Sunnyvale.  During my senior year in college I went to a dance competition in San Jose and was hooked on competitive dancing.  I began to compete in low level college competitions and even competed in the International Grand Ball in 1997.  I was training with Steve Hughes, owner of the Palomar Ballroom in Santa Cruz for a little while and then began training with Steve Vasco in San Jose.  I also took various coachings from Elizabeth Knoll and Roberta Sun while I was there. 

     In 1999, I moved back to the Inland Empire where I began dancing at the Diamond Ballroom and various other studios in the area.  Eventually one of the other instructors convinced me to teach and a after about a year and a half, I was the manager of the Diamond.  I had the pleasure of taking a few coachings with Ron Montez while I was there and the Diamond gave me the opportunity to develop my own talent as a choreographer (which is really one of my strengths).  I began to put together many exhibitions in many types of dancing.  I decided to leave the Diamond to pursue my own dancing.  I helped some friends open a new studio in Redlands called Studio K and then decided to teach dance at home.