Judging by geography alone, the Peninsula International Dance Festival is an impressive undertaking.

Running July 19-20 at the San Mateo Performing Arts Center, the fourth annual cultural showcase features more than 200 artists from 21 companies devoted to a global spectrum of dance traditions. But the metrics hardly tell the tale behind an event designed to introduce the region to the international array of artists who call the Bay Area home.

Related Articles

Celebrate the golden age of radio at a quirky East Bay festival

Caviar hot dogs, Nobu star in the Outside Lands 2025 food line-up

Summertime, and the living is easy with these Bay Area events

Photos: San Jose’s Obon Festival draws hundreds to Japantown

A London music festival cancels its final night after ELO’s Jeff Lynne pulls out

Produced by the Peninsula School of the Arts, the festival was created in a burst of cautious optimism in 2022 as the performing arts community was seeking to recover from its unprecedented contraction.

“With the pandemic, there was no theater, dance or music performances, and coming back there were all the limitations,” said choreographer Gregory Amato, artistic director and school co-director of Peninsula School of the Arts. “We just didn’t know if the audience was going to come back.”

Looking to put on a sure-fire attraction, Amato decided to produce a festival that could only happen in the Bay Area. After consulting with legendary dancer and choreographer Carlos Carvajal, co-artistic director of the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival from 2005-2018, he programmed some of the same companies that performed at the acclaimed SFIDF. But Amato wanted to cast a wider net.

“The cultural diversity we have is so much more than the Ethnic Dance Festival,” he said. “In 20 square miles we have some of the best cultural companies on the planet.”

Saturday’s program spans four continents — from the dramatic classical Indian tales of Chitresh Das Dance, a leading exponent of the Kathak tradition, to the Parangal Dance Company, which explores an array of styles from across the Philippines — “and tell stories like no one else,” Amato said.

The performances start with a benediction from Association of Ramaytush Ohlone, the indigenous people of Peninsula, and opens up the throttle with San Jose’s Taiko SOBA. The program also features the Yang Yang Leon’s International Performing Arts of America, which focuses on the classical, folk,  and ethnic dance of China, Melissa Cruz Flamenco, and Jubilee American Dance Theatre, a company that celebrates social dances of the United States, from Appalachia to Cajun country and swing era dance halls to East Texas juke joints.

“We took a world map and said, let’s try to get as many countries as we can,” Amato said. “Tahiti, Greece, Peru, Mexico, Armenia. Most of these companies present one festival a year for their communities, usually outdoors. They rarely get into a theater with a fully produced show. Some of the artistic directors are professors and world-renowned choreographers.”

In the case of North Bay-based Charya Burt Cambodian Dance, which also performs Saturday, the company has played a central role in rescuing traditions that the Khmer Rouge sought to eradicate during the genocide of the 1970s. Under Pol Pot, the communist regime targeted teachers, professionals, intellectuals and artists of all stripes.

“Charya Burt got a grant from the government to go back and rediscover this dance that was lost,” Amato said. “She found teachers and dancers who had escaped in the hills, and she was able to recreate the royal Cambodian court dances that were lost and destroyed. She’s one person I’ve always been moved by.”

Sunday’s program is similarly expansive, with Oakland’s percussion powered Ballet Nlolo Kongo, San Francisco’s Tradición Peruana, San Leandro’s Kantuta Ballet Folklórico de Bolivia, Theatre Flamenco of San Francisco, San Mateo-based ARAX Dance, which celebrates the folk dance of Armenia.

Mexico’s many regions are represented by San José’s Aztec dancers of Calpulli Tonalehqueh and Oakland’s Ballet Folklórico Mexicano de Carlos Moreno, a protege of the great Amalia Hernández “who documented much of Mexico’s regional dance and music styles,” Amato said.

Always on the lookout for talent, Amato first saw the Bollywood-inspired Gurus of Dance at a Warriors half-time show. Impressed by their energy and athleticism, he hesitated for a moment before offering the troupe a spot due to the flashy production values of their performances, “but their passion isn’t any less than ours,” he said.

Talking to Gurus founder Aditya Patel he realized that “they work so much like a ballet company, but with dance based on Bollywood. India is such a diverse country with so many different traditions and styles. We decided to add them on Saturday’s program.”

Contact Andrew Gilbert at [email protected].

PENINSULA INTERNATIONAL DANCE FESTIVAL

When: 2 p.m. July 19-20

Where: San Mateo Performing Arts Center, 66 N. Delaware  St., San Mateo

Tickets: $40-$70; www.peninsulalivelyarts.org