NELVIN C. CEPEDA / Union-Tribune Nations performers include (top) Adelaide and Leilainia, and (above, from left) Irene Roman, Jade Power Sotomayor (foreground), Edwin Moclova, Gabriel Troche, Miguel Melendez and Ruben Garcia.

Rather, she practices the Bharata Natyam style of Indian dance, in which the purpose is to become free of worldly burdens and transcend the self.

“You reach a point where you are no longer there onstage. You completely become one with the cosmos,” says Sharma, who performs at the Nations of San Diego International Dance Festival this weekend.

Sharma's Nations appearance (on the Friday evening and Sunday matinee programs) will be her local debut, and she promises to be a sparkling addition to the dance community. Trained in her native Madras, she moved to Philadelphia and had a two-decade East Coast career that included dancing at New York's Lincoln Center and establishing a school.

A master of abhinaya, expressive dance, in 2004 she received a Human Rights for Arts & Culture Award from the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations and a Rocky Award for outstanding performance from the Philadelphia dance community.

Her husband's career brought Sharma to San Diego last year, and now that she's had a chance to settle in, she's gotta dance.

“With this beautiful, balmy weather, my toes are tapping to dance more,” she says.

DETAILS Nations of San Diego International Dance Festival When: 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday Where: Performing Arts Center, Coronado School of the Arts, 650 D Ave., Coronado Tickets: $15 to $25 Phone: (619) 522-4050, ext. 5 Online: cosafoundation.org

Nations of San Diego will introduce Sharma to local audiences – continuing the festival's 15-year history of presenting accomplished world dance artists who are based here.

In its first year, 1994, the festival featured internationally known American Indian dancer Eric Runningpath, Irish step champion Liam Harney and flamenca Yaelisa. And alongside those professional dancers, Nations has also presented amateurs in the best sense of the word, whose Latin root is love – people who study a culture's dance forms out of personal passion (and often to connect with their heritage).

As the organizers of the first Nations Festival discovered when they scouted out performers at backyard parties and community centers all over the county, San Diego abounds in groups of dedicated amateur dancers and musicians, many of whom devote hours to rehearsing and even travel the globe to learn from masters.

One discovery that debut year was the PASACAT Philippine Dance Company, whose spirited dances, live music and sumptuous costumes made them an audience favorite. In fact, as Nations grew to become the largest multicultural dance festival in Southern California, PASACAT performed every year.

PASACAT is returning this time around, as is Runningpath, in a lineup featuring 15 companies or individual artists, most of them appearing in two of the four shows.

Among the highlights to look forward to ...

In story dances, Sharma will “relate” a tale of Krishna as a mischievous child-god, while Ni Wayan Ekarini, a consecrated Balinese temple dancer, will perform a segment from a classical dance-drama of a king and a captive maiden.

Folk tales about the peacock, a symbol of good fortune, are the basis for the “Peacock Dance” by the Moonlight Chinese Dance Company, of which all 18 members are first-generation immigrants.

Like PASACAT, Areito Borincano (Puerto Rico) will provide live music. So will Omo Ache Afro-Cuban Dance Company, Flamenco Arana, Capoeira Mandinga San Diego, the Pualani Hawaiian Dancers and the Shimmy Sisters performing with the Middle Eastern fusion group Danyavaad.

And look for dancers of all ages. Unlike Western theatrical dance, which favors young, athletic bodies, many traditional forms involve the kind of artistry that deepens with maturity.

For Runningpath: “I've been dancing since I was 9. I'm 49 now, and I'm still dancing. A dancer can be over 80. You watch their style, their step, how gracefully they dance to the rhythm of the music.”

As Sharma says, “My guru, my teacher, is 70, and he's slowed down the heavy footwork, but his expressive skills are phenomenal.”

Backstage drama

Putting on any show requires plenty of backstage effort, but this year's Nations reflects a truly intense drama behind the scenes. The festival has been brought back from the dead.

Two years ago, the event's producer, the San Diego Dance Alliance, canceled the festival scheduled for January 2007. And then the Dance Alliance went under, a victim of poor management and substantial debt.

The Nations Festival had been the organization's flagship program, as well as a major showcase for a number of participating companies.

For Amy Danchen Deng, director of the Moonlight company, “Nations is our biggest event in the whole year.”

With no sponsoring organization or funding, however, the festival appeared to be beyond help.

Enter Betzi Roe. A former Dance Alliance president, Roe had spearheaded an attempt to save the Dance Alliance, and she continued to carry the ball for the Nations Festival, inviting former Nations performers to two town hall-style meetings.

“They all expressed deep concern and love for the festival, and the willingness to dance for very little and help me promote it if I would take it on,” Roe says. “I hemmed and hawed because I knew how huge it is. But I felt their hearts. I felt the value of it.”

Roe, who heads the dance program at the Coronado School of the Arts, sold the school's foundation on sponsoring the festival as a fundraiser and presenting it in their 600-seat theater. (She'd eventually like to see it move to a more visible public venue, though she's making no promises about continuing as director after this year.)

Ever practical, she explains why she's knocking herself out to produce the festival by beginning with the event's history as a moneymaker for the Dance Alliance.

When she gets to her deeper motivation, however, Roe might be speaking for many of the artists performing in Nations of San Diego.

“By advocating for the arts every day, I step into constantly redefining and revisiting why I love dance so much and how much it enhances my life,” she says. “I get the luxury of waking up every morning and making my life about dance.”

Janice Steinberg is a San Diego dance writer.