MOSES LAKE — Toby Black has taught and trained generations of dancers and performers at Dance FX and Scholastic FX dance studio and preschool in Moses Lake.

For more than 20 years, Black has shared his passion and knowledge of dance through a variety of classes and styles with his instructors. Dance FX at one time had studios in four different cities, but dwindled to the sole location, at 530 W. Valley Road in Moses Lake, in the early 2000s as Black’s children got older.

Black said life is difficult and he hopes to provide a safe place for kids to come and be happy.

“If they have trouble, they know they can talk to me about things,” Black said. “That’s what makes it worth it; I keep the doors open for them. Eventually the doors will shut, but for now, we’ll just keep pushing.”

Born and raised in Othello, Black said his first touch of the arts came from his musical family. His grandmother has played piano by ear since she was 3 and had a big dance band of her own despite “not reading a lick of music.” His grandfather and uncle on the other side of his family played in that dance band.

At 6, Black said he started taking piano lessons and admitted he picked up the instrument pretty quickly. After moving up to a classical concert piano instructor, he said the heavy focus on music theory took some of the passion out of it for him.

Black said he did gymnastics as a kid, but didn’t get started in dance until he went off to college at Brigham Young University-Idaho, known as Ricks College at the time. He said he fell in love with dance early on and he’s always liked performing.

At college, Black said he didn’t put too much thought into his career plans early on, knowing he’d be taking two years off for a mission for his church. Originally, he said he’d thought about becoming a mortician.

“You go to college for a little bit and then you go on a mission. I knew I was going on a mission for two years; I didn’t really have to worry about it,” Black said. “I was having such a fun time with the cheer team and dance team that I didn’t worry about it.”

After graduating from college in the late 1990s, Black said he came home and helped out at a dance studio, where his niece and nephew were enrolled. He said he wasn’t happy with some of the negativity he saw in the studio that was taking some of the fun out of things for his niece and nephew. Black decided to leave and “do his own thing.”

Dance FX originally focused on just clogging-style dance, Black said.

“My goal was just to get them to competitions every year,” Black said. “Clogging is very much a Southern-style of dance; it’s not very popular out west. There were teams in California, Utah, a great one in Arizona, but it wasn’t something that was local for us to perform or compete, so we had to go nationwide.”

Black said his dance teams would participate in competitions around the country and were performing about 14 times a summer at the peak of clogging instruction. He took a season off to dance with a company at Silver Dollar City theme park in Branson, Missouri. He got married that summer, to another trained dancer.

With his then-wife involved, Black said Dance FX expanded from just clogging into all varieties of theater dance style. He said he was familiar with all of those other styles, too, and had great instructors in college, but just wasn’t drawn to them as much in school.

Black had to relearn the other styles after expanding the classes at Dance FX, but said expanding helped take the studio to a different level. Today, instructors Makynlee Miller and Sara Myers assist Black with his dance classes and preschool program.

Trophies line the walls coming into the dance studio in Moses Lake. Black said he’s made multiple trips to national competitions through the years and has seen his dancers rake in numerous accolades. Performing and competing are some of his favorite parts of having the dance studio and he said it’s always a unique situation.

Black recalled his young dancers performing on top of plywood, which was on sawhorses on a main street at a festival in Washington.

“That’s the fun with performances, you don’t know what you’re getting into,” Black said. “It’s not a theater all the time; it’s not always fancy performances. Sometimes it’s sawhorses and rocks.”

Seeing the kids get on stage and feel good about themselves is a highlight of everything, he said. Watching the kids grow from year to year is fun to see, he said. A little kid who can’t touch their toes becomes a dancer who can stretch their foot over their head or do aerial routines — that’s the sort of thing Black said he enjoys seeing.

Through the years, Black said his approach has changed as the dance styles themselves have continued to evolve. In clogging, he said it’s a mix of Irish step and tap dance. Tap, he said, is a pretty set standard, while Irish step changes so often, if you don’t aggressively keep up, “you’re a has-been.”

Black said the clogging competitions don’t come around as often nowadays and fears the studio would be so far behind if it hadn’t evolved, it would take a couple of years “getting their butts kicked” to catch up.

In addition to his work with Dance FX, Black has been an assistant coach for the four-time state champion Moses Lake High School cheer team. Black said cheer competition is very different from dance. Cheerleaders work all season for two minutes at the end to prove themselves.

Black is also involved with Basin Community Theater, taking part in, directing and helping with choreography for numerous musical performances. He said he’s excited to hit the stage again soon, after the pandemic kept performances under wraps this past year.

Black said all three of his kids, Tyler, Dallin and Kali, have come up through the Dance FX programs. His oldest son, Tyler, first performed on stage on the Fourth of July, shortly after Black’s father returned to town after suffering a stroke.

“For a long time, I still had his little shoe on my shelf in my office,” Black said.

As the years have gone by, Black admitted his competitive drive has dwindled a little bit, as he’s more happy now to just see his dancers get up and have fun. He said he doesn’t know how long the dance studio will be around, but it’s been “a fun way to live” so far.

Casey McCarthy can be reached via email at cmccarthy@columbiabasinherald.com.