BY KAREN BOSSICK

Experience the world-class beauty and pizzazz of ballroom dancing, including the flirtatious cha cha and the exotic samba, when the Sun Valley Culinary Institute presents an evening of ballroom dance performances at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 26, at The Argyros Center for the Performing Arts in Ketchum.

The show, produced by dance instructor and former world champion Vasily Golovin, will star Russian dancers Karina Smirnoff and Dmitry Timokhin in their first-ever U.S. performance together.

Smirnoff is one of the original “Dancing with the Stars” professionals and Timokhin is an eight-time National Russian Champion. They will be joined by the world’s current No. 1 ballroom dancing duo Arina Grishanina and Alexander Chernositov, who won the 2025 Blackpool Latin Championship—the world’s largest and most prestigious ballroom dancing competition—this summer.

Alexander Chernositov and Arina Grishanina are the world’s top ballroom dancing duo.

Also performing such dances as the passionate rumba, the energetic jive, the dramatic pasodoble, the elegant waltz, tango, foxtrot and quickstep will be U.S. champions Tatiana and Yegor Novikov and three-time Ohio Ballroom Champions Lynn Shanahan and Darius Mosteika.

Tickets are available at https://www.theargyros.org/

“Unbelievable young dancers who are winning the highest-level competitions all over the world will be dancing at the debut of Sun Valley Ballroom,” said Vasily Golovin, who teaches ballroom dancing at Studio Move in Ketchum. “This is an incredible opportunity to see the world’s best rhythm dancers.”

The performance, which will be followed by an opportunity for the audience to dance, is the brainchild of Sun Valley resident Mindy Meads. She tried ballroom dancing several years while living in New York and fell in love with it.

Karina Smirnoff, a winner on “Dancing with the Stars,” and eight-time National Russian Champion Dmitry Timokhin will mark their first time dancing together on U.S. soil.

“I became mesmerized watching ‘Dancing and the Stars’—it called my name. And I signed up immediately for classes when I heard Vasily Golovin was coming here to teach. I’ve always liked to dance and I like music,” she said.

As a true believer, Mead decided she wanted to share it with others.

“I started thinking, ‘Wouldn’t it be fun to have a dancing demonstration here?’ As one of the founders of the Sun Valley Culinary Institute, the proceeds will go to student scholarships at the Culinary Institute.,” said Mead, who has had an elegant gown custom made for the evening.

Tickets for the dinner portion of the event sold out at the Sun Valley Culinary Institute’s annual fundraising dinner. But there are tickets for seats to watch the dancing.

U.S. Champions Tatiana and Yegor Novikov will take part in Sun Valley Ballroom on Sept. 26.

“We’ll have one and a half hours of the dancing show, then the opportunity for the audience to join in the dancing,” said Meads.

Ballroom dancing developed in Europe in the 16th century where the privileged danced to minuets.

Vasily Golovin teaches ballroom dancing in Boise but makes the trek to Ketchum weekly to teach dance at Studio Move. A former National Russian Champion and World Champion, his students have placed second twice in World Championships, taking home the World Championship title once.

“My Mom entered me in dance when I was 9,” said Golovin, who grew up in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Mindy Meads and Vasily Golovin kick it up with the cha -cha. PHOTO: Karen Bossick

Golovin came to Syracuse in 2011, before moving to Boston and Santa Barbara. He’s run the Idaho Ballroom Dance Center where his Golovin Dance Studio is located for a year.

“It’s an amazing sport, very elegant. And it’s good for cardio, for memory—you have to remember what step comes next,” he said.

“It’s a great sport for all ages, keeping you on your toes as every step is different,” chimed in Meads. “It helps with overall wellness and stress. And it’s so much fun.”

Karl Uri, the director of the Sun Valley Culinary Institute, said the Institute is graduating nine students from its latest year-long program on Saturday. Nine new students have enrolled for the program, which begins this Saturday.

Six are from the Wood River Valley and three from Boise. They range in age from 18 to 62. The latter has worked in the restaurant industry but wants to sharpen his skills.

“We want to thank Mindy and Vasily for their vision,” Uri said. “Mindy has been such a driving force behind the Sun Valley Culinary Institute even before we opened. And I know her well enough to know if she’s going to do something it will be spectacular.”