Magic comes alive at the circus. Charming awe out of the audience, performers crisscross as they fly through the air, flip across the stage, and fold out into splits. Music jitters across the stage, poles held by tightrope walkers bow toward the ground, and clowns whip out laughter at a jumping pace.

Senior Nick Zelle and alumnus Jonah Finkelstein have followed their passions for the circus in the aerial arts and acrobatics.

Senior Nick Zelle auditioned for professional circus

Doing the splits on the ground sounds like a pretty difficult task for some people, but senior Nick Zelle can do them in the air while hanging upside down.

Zelle was inspired by Cirque du Soleil to perform in the circus. He has practiced with Xelias for eleven years, performing aerial arts and handstands. In the summer, he tours New England with Circus Smirkus, staying at each location for two to four days and traveling in vans. Aerial arts is “anything hanging,” Zelle said. “That’s why I love circus: it can be anything.” He has performed with and without music, and as improvisation and as routine.

“[Aerial arts] is a unique art form because it’s also a sport, and besides dance it’s kind of the only art that is also athletic. It satisfies both of those areas for me… it’s kind of like gymnastics but there’s more creativity and freedom to it,” Zelle said.

He mostly does rope and solo trapeze. “I can hang from my neck or my toes or my heels, and then I can release and do a flip and catch it again,” Zelle said. He does not perform with a net, and has gone as high as 45 to 50 feet in the air. Handstands are his second major act, and he uses three feet high stilts-like “canes” that allow him to twist on his hands.

In early February, Zelle auditioned for professional circus schools in Canada, and will know the final results in March. “I just really like inspiring people,” Zelle said. “Probably my favorite thing about performances [is] like seeing the emotional reactions and having people talk to me afterwards.”

Finkelstein (‘08) enjoys thrill of performing daring acts

Current students are not the only way St. Paul Academy and Summit School brushes up against the circus. Jonah Finkelstein, an alumnus of the class of ‘08, currently performs over the summer with Xelias Aerial Arts Studio while completing a degree in engineering at the University of Minnesota. World record holder and famous wirewalker Nik Wallenda encouraged Finkelstein to keep circus in his life at the beginning of his freshman year of college, and the two of them continue to work together.

Along with wirewalking, Finkelstein also does “jump rope, hand balancing, table slide, and juggling acts.” He can train up to six hours a day for six days a week in preparation for risky acts. “[In] my first show I was performing a seven-person pyramid on a 35 foot high wire, a trick that claimed two lives in 1962,” he said.

Part of his ability to do such tricks comes from intense concentration. “That focus, and ability to turn off all fear is more difficult to achieve than the physical skill,” he said. “If I asked you to walk a 2×4 a foot of the ground you would do it no problem, [but] if it was 1000 feet off the ground you most likely wouldn’t, even though it is just as easy.”

“It is an exhilarating feeling, knowing that a five eighth inch cable (about the size of a nickel) is all that stands between the ground and me,” he said. Finkelstein also finds wirewalking a good way to relieve stress from school.

Finkelstein’s favorite aspect of touring is getting to know fellow performers very well. “An extremely tight bond is formed and whether it has been 5 days or 10 years since you have seen them last that bond is always there,” he said.

For aspiring circus performers, Finkelstein advised them to “Have fun! Circus can be the best job in the world, but can also become just another job if you are not careful. I know so many younger kids and professionals who are so hard and so critical on themselves. They are no longer having fun, and I think it shows when they perform. Put the joy back in the art, have fun, [be]cause that truly is what it should be about.”