Arion Tanabe's Biography

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     Arion's path in the performing arts began at nine-years-old, when he started he training in both piano and ballet. In dance, he trained at the Judith Svalander School of Ballet in Crystal Lake, Illinois. For music, he received private instruction from various piano teachers in the northern Illinois area. Then in 2000, he became a student of Dr. Kenneth Drake, Professor Emeritus of Piano, at the University of Illinois. 

     Arion started his performing arts career as a professional ballet dancer in 2003. He joined the Milwaukee Ballet II,in Wisconsin, was then hired as a company dancer with the Dayton Ballet, in Ohio, and later joining the Grand Rapids Ballet, in Michigan. At the same time that he was a full-time dancer at those companies, he also accompanied ballet classes and taught ballet at the respective ballet schools. It was also in this time that he started composing piano songs and electronica.

     In 2009, Arion moved to Chicago, focusing on teaching ballet and performing in various local rock bands, throughout the midwest, while continuing to compose on the side. There, he helped produced music and choreography that was featured throughout the Chicago area, as well as, with the Montgomery Ballet, in Alabama. 

     Moving to Phoenix in 2013, Arion continued to teach and accompany dance, while composing music, and performing with rock and blues bands. In 2019, he began his path towards a higher education degree. Further refining his skills in composition, with Dr. Kendra Dercole, the primary music theory teacher for Phoenix college and Dr. Karl Schindler, the director of Phoenix College's Music Department.

     Arion won the 2020 Maricopa Community College Artist of Promise Competition, in the category of Music Composition, for his piece Gesù, L'uccisore di Serpenti, as well as winning in 2021 for piano performance. His choreography was featured as a part of the reopening of the Woodstock Opera house, in Illinois, with several of his choreographed works being performed by students of the Judith Svalander School of Ballet. He is featured in the music recording for Phoenix College Founders Day 100th Anniversary Celebration. 

     He studied composition at Arizona State University, studying under Dr. Jodi Rockmaker, Dr. Fernanda Navarro, Dr. Garth Paine, and Dr. Gabriel Bolaños at the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts. He graduated with a degree in theory and composition in the spring of 2023. He is currently a music instructor at Arizona School of Music.

     As a Sound Designer, he most recently designed the sounds and edited the music for the independent film The New World Order: Dark Prince. As a composer, he writes in various genres, with a deft ability in combining them. This is demonstrated in his Graduating work, The Effect of Music on Visual Media: Six Pieces in Different Genres Accompanying Two Videos, where he combines European Classical, Jazz, and Industrial Dance into one piece. The genres he is most comfortable and experienced composing in are Electronica/EDM, Classical, Soundscapes/Ambient, Experimental, Pop, Alternative Rock, and World Music.