Joan Bartoletti - Founder

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 Dance FX founder Joan Bartoletti hailed from Detroit and spent most of her adult life in Sunrise, Florida, where she started Dance FX more than 25 years ago. Bartoletti received her training at Ricardeau's in Detroit. Before moving south, she performed in the pre-show at the State Fair, as well as at various tradeshows and conventions. With 55 years of dance experience, Bartoletti favored tap above all other dance styles—in fact, she couldn’t do without her tap shoes.

She was most often found teaching ages 3–8 in ballet, tap, jazz, and creative dance. Among her proudest accomplishments were founding the Central Park Dancers, opening Dance FX, and training many working professional dancers, teachers, doctors, nurses, choreographers, and more. Bartoletti’s dance role model was Gene Kelly.

When asked, “Why dance?” Bartoletti would always respond: “Why not? What a way to be free!”