About — Cai Circus

ABOUT THE CIRCUS

Cai Circus is a premier circus company and training facility located in the heart of Houston, Texas, offering a unique blend of performance artistry and cutting-edge training. Known for its exceptional aerial acts, acrobatics, and daring performances.

Cai Circus is also a proud partner with Future Stars of Houston, an organization dedicated to nurturing, developing and empowering young talent in the Houston area. Together, we are working to create a pipeline for aspiring young artists, providing them with the skills, resources, and mentorship they need to thrive both in the circus world and beyond.

A State-of-the-Art Training Facility

At the core of Cai Circus is our training facility, located inside of Future Stars of Houston, a spacious and dynamic space designed to foster growth, skill development, and artistic expression. The facility boasts an impressive 28-foot ceiling, allowing for the full range of aerial disciplines—from silks and trapeze to hoops and aerial lyra—to be performed and perfected. With such a high ceiling, the training area accommodates acrobats and aerialists of all levels, from beginners to seasoned professionals, giving them the room they need to push boundaries and explore new heights.

The facility is designed to be a safe yet challenging space where students can practice aerial and acrobatic techniques, tumbling, juggling, clowning, and much more.

Whether you’re an aspiring aerialist, a child with a passion for circus arts, or a professional performer seeking to hone your skills, Cai Circus provides a supportive, encouraging environment. Our experienced trainers—many of whom are former or current circus performers—offer personalized instruction to help students achieve their full potential.
Want to know how to take a class or get involved? Contact us at caicircus@gmail.com

the FOUNDER

Caiya Velasco-Teters is a 26 y/o, seasoned choreographer, performer and business owner. She holds over 100+ performances under her belt as a dancer & circus artist and has created and produced 6 full length productions featuring contemporary and aerial arts disciplines. Caiya’s training dates back to age 3 when she began training Classical Ballet. She then went on to train in many other dance disciplines along with circus arts. With an emphasis on dance her whole life, she decided she wanted to pursue circus at the age of 16 hoping to create original productions that incorporated both dance and circus arts. After gaining knowledge and training in circus, it was time for her to set her dream of creating productions in motion; so she started Cai Circus. She did this not only help build the circus community in Houston, but to also bring both the Dance Industry and Circus Industry together, being an example of mixing performing arts disciplines to create something new and creative here in Houston.

During her early teen years she was involved in musical theatre and has performed for companies such as, TUTS (Theater Under The Stars), Applause Theater, CCT, The Players Theater company and many more. Coming from a dance background she has also performed with ReFine Arts and Haven Arts Theatre. Caiya’s circus training began with Contortion which led into Aerial. She took her Circus training very seriously which then brought her to Boston MA, New York City NY, and Brattleboro Vermont. She has trained under coaches such as Bayarma Parry, Danielle Artis, Emily McFarlane and many more. Caiya has performed Circus Arts for various different festivals and events, just a few being: The Texas Renaissance Festival After Dark, Dickens on The Strand Galveston, Lights All Night (Dallas), Tall Ships Galveston, A-Kon Dallas, George R. Brown Convention Center, Discovery Green and Houston Fringe Festival Mind the Gap Houston.

Cai Circus is a circus school based out of Future Stars of Houston. Offering contemporary and traditional circus techniques for Aerial Arts and Ground Acrobatics. Along with professional performers providing spectacular performances for festivals, events & venues of all kinds!

She has been coaching dance since age 15 and circus arts since age 18. She continues to hone her teaching techniques to this day.

the Cai Circus team

Emma Foster is a dancer turned aerial performer and teacher. In 2013, they found their passion for teaching after an aerial silks teacher training course in Houston, Tx. Since then they have dedicated their weeks to teaching and providing unabashed encouragement to all of her students.

As an instructor, Emma excels at creative problem solving. She applies this to all things from sequence creation to human body specifics in relation to obtaining skills. Providing accessible learning methods to participants of all levels and movement backgrounds in order to achieve their desired skills, sequences, and performance goals is their passion.

Angela’s love of all things Circus began with a random college job working as a birthday clown, juggler and singing telegramist for children’s and adult parties. Adulting and life put the kibosh on her dreams of joining the circus until eight years ago with her first aerial fabric lesson. From that point on Angela has had the opportunity to learn from many amazing aerial artists all over the United States and internationally.

She has focused on skills-based techniques for breaking down and teaching aerial fabric and rope sequences, and is beyond thrilled to share that knowledge with her students at Future Stars of Houston!“

Edward began training in gymnastics in his home country of Venezuela at the age of 16. He attended El Parque Miranda Gymnastics School and also began dance training with the prestigious Musa School of Dance. In 2015, his love for movement eventually brought him to the circus, where he began studying circus arts at the Zirkus Zone Circus School. Upon moving to Houston in 2016, he began attending classes and performing with Cirque La Vie. Edward has performed at Memorial City Mall, Champion Forest Baptist Church, Texas Renaissance Festival and many more.

Nicole is a Houston based aerialist and circus performer with 8 years of training and experience in aerial arts such as silks, aerial chains, aerial cube, aerial net, and her favorite aerial hoop aka Lyra. She began her journey in Houston studios such as Vault working her way up to becoming an aerial instructor there as well. She then taught at Revolve Pole studio and The Artz as well as workshops for Long Island Flow Fest and Austin's Flowstorm.

Nicole regularly performs for her company Knockout Entertainment as well as her Circus production, Cirque Olympus, at The Texas Renaissance Festival. A multi faceted performer Nicole is also a skilled juggler, stilt walker, and fire performer.

Kayla Mason is a Houston native who received her bachelor degree in Performance and Production from the University of Texas (San Marcos). During her high school and early college years, she found a deep love for movement art and participated in dance recitals at Westfield High School. Her love for circus arts was sparked by her first Aerial jungle themed production of Jungle book at Lone Star Community College.

Since then, Kayla has spent the past 4 years of her life training Aerial Silks, Lyra and Contortion at Axis Aerial Pole. She has taught at Cirque La Vie, and has been perfecting her skills with Cai Circus. Kayla is looking forward to creating a fun collaborative space with Cai Circus and Future Stars of Houston.

Diana is a native Russian who moved to the USA in 2009 and has been living in Houston since 2015. She holds MS degree in Applied Math and is currently teaching Upper Elementary aged kids in one of the Houston’s public school.

Diana started her journey in Circus Arts more than 5 years ago by first taking Introductory level Contortion classes, than moving to Advanced level classes in various Aerial disciplines such as Trapeze, Silks, Lyra, and finally performing on stage. In order to enhance her experience in Aerials, she took private classes from Cirque Du Soleil artist/instructor.

Diana is a mother of two daughters age 6 and 9. She enjoys travelling and learning new languages.