Bart Shatto calls Peoria his hometown, but he gets back here very seldom.
“I live like a gypsy,” he said, laughing.
Shatto, 44, is a Broadway performer and vocalist and a regular vocalist with the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. 
He came home for a few days last month to spend time with his mother, who lives in North Peoria. It was a short stop-over before heading to rehearsals for the lead in a new production of “Scandalous,” a play based on the life of D.H. Lawrence, in New Orleans later this month.
“This is my purpose,” he said. “This is what I’m supposed to do.”
 
Gypsy
Shatto said, however, he is tiring of his gypsy life, dragging him all over the country. But, he said, it is the nature of following his dream.
“You cannot rest on your laurels in this business,” he said.
He now lives in Jersey City, N.J., with the New York City skyline as a backdrop.
“If I can help it, nowadays, I spend as little time outside of New York City as possible. The time out of New York City diminishes my ability to get the big parts.”
“Besides that, my girlfriend is beginning to have abandonment issues.”
The world Shatto now lives in is one requiring unbridled ambition, he said.
“You can’t just sit back and wait for opportunities, even if you are a known commodity,” he said.
“I still work as hard as the kid who just arrived with $10 in his pocket.”
Shatto said he harbors hopes of landing TV and film work. He has done some work on the TV soap opera “The Guiding Light.”
TV work, he said, has always been his dream.
“Growing up in Peoria, TV is all I was exposed to,” he said.
Shatto said until he has TV credits and some feature film credits under his belt, he will not consider himself a success.
“If I’ve done a couple of feature films, I’ll feel like I’ve really succeeded,” he said.
“That’s something saved for the ages.”

Dreams
Shatto has not fulfilled his dreams, but, he said, he has not given up on them.
“You make your own luck. I didn’t just sit here with my dreams,” Shatto said.
His career path was Peoria to Western Illinois University to Southern Illinois University to St. Louis and, finally,  the bright lights of Broadway.
“It was a lot of work, but it was never what I considered hard work. I loved what I was doing,” Shatto said.
“The most satisfactory thing to me has been the journey. When I got to Broadway, it was like, ‘Is this all there is?’ It was like community theater with lots of money.”
Shatto said that is why moving to TV and films is so important to him.
“It’s about the journey for me. I don’t want to ever be satisfied,” he said.
“I have to keep pushing. I don’t have room for complacency. Art is about pursuing dreams.”