International Evenings of Dance III

Tiler Peck

Tiler Peck has been a Principal Dancer with New York City Ballet since 2009. She made her Broadway debut at age 11 as Gracie Shinn in The Music Man and was seen on Broadway as Ivy Smith in the Tony Nominated On The Town. She originated the title role in Susan Stroman’s newest musical Little Dancer at the Kennedy Center and is attached to star in the Broadway production. Tiler made her choreographic debut at the Vail Dance Festival in 2018 and has gone on to choreograph and appear in episodes of Tiny Pretty Things and Ray Donovan, for the Boston Ballet and the box office smash hit film John Wick 3. She has also appeared on Dancing with the Stars, the Kennedy Center Honors and Live From Lincoln Center’s The Nutcracker and Carousel, Disney+’s The Hip Hop Nutcracker, and Josh Groban’s Great Big Radio City Show PBS special. As a guest star, she was the first ballerina ever to appear on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. In film she has starred in “Ballet Now”, a Hulu documentary that followed her as she became the first woman to curate and star in The Los Angeles Music Center’s presentation ofBalletNOW, “Ballet 422”, “A Time for Dancing”, and “Donnie Darko”. She is a recipient of the Princess Grace Statue Award, The Dance Magazine Award and was named one of Forbes 30 under 30.  Most recently, she curated and directed the highly anticipated inaugural Artists at the Center for New York City Center that will make its European debut this summer as Turn It Out With Tiler Peck & Friends. This program marked her NYC choreographic debut and featured premieres from William Forsythe, Alonzo King, Jillian Meyers and Michelle Dorrance.

To keep the dance world connected during the pandemic, Tiler developed a free ballet class #TurnItOutWithTiler that airs on her Instagram. She is the designer of the Love,Tiler collection for Só Dança and the capsule collection Tiler Peck X STATESIDE in collaboration with the popular Los Angeles-based clothing company. She has released two children’s books with Simon & Schuster: Katarina Ballerina and Katarina Ballerina & The Victory Dance.

More on Tiler at www.tilerpeck.com. Tiler can be found on Instagram & TikTok via @TilerPeck.

Lil Buck

Robbie Fairchild

Robert Fairchild began dancing at the age of four in Salt Lake City. He began his training at the School of American Ballet at the age of 15 and shortly after rose through the ranks of the prestigious New York City Ballet. He became an apprentice with NYCB in June 2005. The following June, he joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet. He was promoted to soloist in May 2007 and was promoted to Principal Dancer in October 2009. 

Robert Fairchild made his Broadway debut last year with his breakout role as “Jerry Mulligan” in the Tony Award-winning musical AN AMERICAN IN PARIS. He was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Performance By An Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical, and won the 2015 Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Outstanding Actor in a Musical, the 2015 Astaire Award for Best Male Dancer, and the 2015 Theatre World Award. He was also nominated for the 2015 Drama League Award for Distinguished Performance. 

He appears regularly in NYCB’s seasons at Lincoln Center. His roles range from Prince Desirè in The Sleeping Beauty to works by world renowned choreographer William Forsythe. Last Fall he participated in “Broadway at the White House” where he danced for the First Lady Michelle Obama. 

TV: “Julie’s Greenroom” on Netflix, Romeo in NYCB’s “Romeo and Juliet” and Carousel Boy in NY Philharmonic’s “Carousel,” both for PBS; “Live From Lincoln Center”, “Dancing With The Stars”, “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”, “Live with Kelly and Michael”, “CBS Sunday Morning”, “60 Minutes.” Film: NY Export: Opus Jazz. 

Adji Cissoko

Adji Cissoko was born and grew up in Munich, Germany where she trained at the Ballet Academy Munich and graduated with a diploma in dance. Cissoko attended the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School at American Ballet Theatre in New York City on full scholarship, before joining the National Ballet of Canada in 2010. In 2012 she was awarded the Patron Award of Merit by the Patrons’ Council Committee of The National Ballet of Canada. Cissoko joined LINES Ballet in 2014. Since then she’s originated many central roles and guested for galas worldwide. Cissoko has given multiple masterclasses and taught classes around the world as part of the company’s outreach program. In 2020, she became certified in health/life coaching and ABT’s National Training Curriculum. Cissoko choreographed her first piece “AZIZ “ for Ballet X in 2021. She also is a 2022 recipient of the Toulmin fellowship.

Aran Bell

Aran Bell was born in Bethesda, Maryland. He began studying ballet at age four, receiving the majority of his early training at Central Pennsylvania Youth Ballet and with Denys Ganio in Rome, Italy. He has performed in galas throughout Europe and the United States. Bell was featured in the 2011 film First Position: A Ballet Documentary. Bell joined the ABT Studio Company in September 2014, joined the main Company as an apprentice in May 2016 and became a member of the corps de ballet in March 2017.

Ben Rudisin

Ben Rudisin was born in Woodbridge, Virginia and trained at the North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem and Houston Ballet II in Texas. Ben joined The National Ballet of Canada as a RBC Apprentice in 2013 and was promoted to Principal Dancer in 2021.

Most recently, Ben made his debut in the title role of Romeo and Juliet, as Adam in the world premiere of MADDADDAM by Wayne McGregor and performed in the Canadian premieres of David Dawson’s Anima Animus and Alonzo King’s The Collective Agreement. An elegant dancer with pristine technique, he excels in roles such as Diaghilev in Nijinsky, Siegfried and Rothbart in Swan Lake, Prince Gremin in Onegin and the male lead in Being and Nothingness as well as Icicle in The Nutcracker, The Mad Hatter in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and L’Allumeur in Le Petit Prince. His repertoire includes roles in The Sleeping Beauty, Giselle, Cinderella, The Winter’s Tale, Nijinsky,  Anna Karenina, The Merry Widow, Manon, Frame by Frame, A Streetcar Named Desire, La Sylphide, The Four Seasons, The Concert, Chaconne, Allegro Brillante, Symphony #9, Carousel (A Dance), The Second Detail, Approximate Sonata 2016, Chroma, Genus, Angels’ Atlas, Emergence, Cacti, Petite Mort, Paz de la Jolla, Night, Orpheus Alive, The Dreamers Ever Leave You and Soul. 

Brooklyn Rider

Johnny Gandelsman, violin
Colin Jacobsen, violin
Nicholas Cords, viola
Michael Nicolas, cello

With their gripping performance style and unquenchable appetite for musical adventure, Brooklyn Rider has carved a singular space in the world of string quartets over their fifteen-plus year history. Defining the string quartet as a medium with deep historic roots and endless possibility for invention, they find equal inspiration in musical languages ranging from late Beethoven to Persian classical music to American roots music to the endlessly varied voices of living composers. Claiming no allegiance to either end of the historical spectrum, Brooklyn Rider most comfortably operates within the long arc of the tradition, seeking to illuminate works of the past with fresh insight while coaxing the malleable genre into the future through an inclusive programming vision, deep-rooted collaborations with a wide range of global tradition bearers, and the creation of thoughtful and relevant frames for commissioning projects.   

The upcoming concert season is strongly illustrative of the intrepid musical appetite of Brooklyn Rider. This fall, they began unveiling a major new commissioning and programmatic venture called The Four Elements; an exploration of the four classical elements (earth, air, water, and fire) as metaphor for both the complex inner world of the string quartet and the current health of planet Earth. Featuring new commissions – each based on an element – by Andreia Pinto Correia, Conrad Tao, Dan Trueman, and Akshaya Tucker, this project also features existing works from the repertoire including Shostakovich’s 8th String Quartet, Dutilleux’s Ainsi la nuit, Golijov’s Tenebrae, and American folk music collected by Ruth Crawford, newly arranged by Brooklyn Rider’s own Colin Jacobsen. This winter, the quartet will also release The Wanderer, their first ever live concert recording, made at Paliesius Manor in eastern Lithuania while on tour last spring. The album consists of two works written recently for Brooklyn Rider: Gonzalo Grau’s Aroma a distancia and Osvaldo Golijov’s Um Dia bom. Also featured is Brooklyn Rider’s signature interpretation of Schubert’s iconic “Death and the Maiden” string quartet. This season also sees the quartet reuniting with Magos Herrera across the U.S. for their Dreamers project. Looking further into the future, they will expand work already underway with Syrian clarinetist Kinan Azmah, including the future release of a collaborative album. 

The 2021-22 season boasted two unique collaborative ventures: one with Israeli mandolin virtuoso Avi Avital, and the other a brand new phase of work with Swedish mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter, where they explored themes of love and death through the music of Franz Schubert and Rufus Wainwright. Also, 2022’s release of The Stranger (Avie Records) with tenor Nicholas Phan was recently nominated for a 2023 Grammy® award and made numerous best-of lists for 2022, including The New Yorker. 

Prior to the global pandemic, the 2019-20 season saw a veritable explosion of new projects and releases. Shared at the height of the US lockdown, the Grammy®-nominated recording Healing Modes (In A Circle Records) presented Beethoven’s towering Opus 132 — the composer’s late testament on healing and the restorative power of new creation — interwoven with five new commissions powerfully exploring topics as wide-ranging as the US-Mexico border conflict, the Syrian refugee crisis, the mental health epidemic, and physical well-being. Described by The New Yorker as a project which “…could not possibly be more relevant or necessary than it is currently,” the composers include Reena Esmail, Gabriela Lena Frank, Matana Roberts, Caroline Shaw, and Du Yun.   

Earlier in the same season saw the release of two projects from vastly different musical spheres. The Butterfly, with the master Irish fiddler Martin Hayes (In A Circle Records), an album which the Irish Times described as “a masterclass in risk-taking,” and the other, Sun On Sand (Nonesuch Records), featuring the music of Patrick Zimmerli with saxophone giant Joshua Redman and fellow collaborators Scott Colley on bass and Satoshi Takeishi, percussion.   

In fall 2018, Brooklyn Rider released Dreamers on Sony Music Masterworks with Mexican jazz vocalist Magos Herrera. Celebrating the power of beauty as a political act, Dreamers amplifies the visionary artistry of Violeta Parra, Federico Garcia Lorca, Gilberto Gil, Joao Gilberto, Octavio Paz, and others, all who dared to dream under repressive regimes. Featuring gems from the Ibero-American songbook in evocative arrangements by Jaques Morelenbaum, Diego Schissi, Gonzalo Grau, Guillermo Klein, and Brooklyn Rider’s own Colin Jacobsen, Dreamers topped numerous charts and garnered a Grammy® nomination for best arrangement (Gonzalo Grau’s “Niña”). Touring widely to support the album, they appeared at venues ranging from New York City’s Jazz at Lincoln Center to Mexico City’s Deco masterpiece, the Palacio de Bellas Artes.  

Brooklyn Rider has remained steadfast in their commitment to generate new music for string quartet at nearly every phase of their history. To kick off the 2017-18 season, Brooklyn Rider released Spontaneous Symbols (In a Circle Records), featuring new commissions by Tyondai Braxton, Evan Ziporyn, Paula Matthusen, Kyle Sanna, and Colin Jacobsen. In the 2015-16 season, the group celebrated its tenth anniversary with the groundbreaking multi-disciplinary project The Brooklyn Rider Almanac, for which it recorded and toured 15 specially commissioned works by musicians from the worlds of folk, jazz, and indie rock, each inspired by a different artistic muse. The Fiction Issue, with singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane, featured his composition which was premiered in 2012 at Carnegie Hall by Kahane, Brooklyn Rider, and Shara Nova. Additionally, Brooklyn Rider has enjoyed a long-standing relationship with the music of the iconic American composer Philip Glass, which began with 2011’s much-praised recording Brooklyn Rider Plays Philip Glass and continued with two subsequent installments of Glass’s works for string quartet, all released on the composer’s label Orange Mountain Music.  

Numerous other collaborations have helped give rise to NPR Music’s observation that Brooklyn Rider is “recreating the 300-year-old form of string quartet as a vital and creative 21st-century ensemble.” During the 2016-17 season, Brooklyn Rider released an album entitled So Many Things on Naïve Records with Swedish mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter, comprising music by Colin Jacobsen, Caroline Shaw, John Adams, Nico Muhly, Björk, Sting, Kate Bush and Elvis Costello, among others. Some Of A Thousand Words, an evening-length program with choreographer Brian Brooks and former New York City Ballet prima ballerina Wendy Whelan, was an intimate series of duets and solos in which the quartet’s live onstage music is a dynamic and central creative component. Some Of A Thousand Words was featured at the 2016 Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, before two U.S. tours, including a week-long run at New York City’s Joyce Theater. A collaboration with Dance Heginbotham with music written by Colin Jacobsen resulted in Chalk And Soot, an evening-length work presented by Lincoln Center’s White Lights Festival in 2014. Brooklyn Rider has also frequently teamed up with banjoist Béla Fleck, with whom they appeared on two different albums, 2017’s Juno Concerto and 2013’s The Impostor. And in one of their longest-standing musical friendships to date, Brooklyn Rider and Iranian kamancheh player Kayhan Kalhor released the highly praised recording Silent City (World Village) in 2008, still touring the project to this day. 

Catherine Hurlin

Born in New York City, Catherine Hurlin joined the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis school of American Ballet Theater at the age of 12 under the direction of Franco DeVita. She joined ABT’s Studio Company in 2012. She joined ABT as an apprentice in December 2013 and the corps de ballet in June 2014.  She was promoted to Soloist in September 2018 and to Principal In 2022. Her repertoire with the Company includes principal roles such as Kitri in Don Quixote, Odette/Odile in Swan Lake, Myrta in Giselle, Lescaut’s Mistress in Manon, Lead Maiden in Firebird, Princess Florine in Ratmansky’s The Sleeping Beauty, and created the principal role Calirhoe in Alexi Ratmanski’s Of Love and Rage. As well as leading roles in works by Twyla Tharp, Wayne McGregor, Jessica Lang, Mark Morris, Michelle Dorrance, Benjamin Millepied, Christopher Wheeldon and Alexei Ratmansky. Ms. Hurlin was nominated for a 2015 Clive Barnes Award and is a 2018 Princess Grace Award recipient and Erik Bruhn Prize winner in 2019.

Daisy Kate Jacobson

Davóne Tines

Davóne Tines, heralded as an artist “changing what it means to be a classical singer (The New Yorker) and “[one] of the most powerful voices of our time” (Los Angeles Times), is a pathbreaking artist whose work encompasses a diverse repertoire, ranging from early music to new commissions by leading composers, while exploring the social issues of today. A creator, curator, and performer at the intersection of many histories, cultures, and aesthetics, he is engaged in work that blends opera, art song, spirituals, contemporary classical, gospel, and protest songs as a means to tell a deeply personal story of perseverance connecting to all of humanity. 

Tines is a musician who takes full agency of his work, devising new programs and pieces from conception to performance. He reflects this ethos in his Recital No. 1: MASS, an examination of the liturgy, comparing Western European, African American, and 21st Century traditions; as well as in his orchestral creations: Concerto No. 1: SERMON, a work he premiered with the Philadelphia and BBC Symphony Orchestras; and Concerto No. 2: ANTHEM, premiered with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Tines has also premiered operas by today’s leading composers, including John Adams, Terence Blanchard, and Matthew Aucoin; and his concert appearances include performances of works ranging from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to Kaija Saariaho’s True Fire. This season, he makes his Metropolitan Opera debut performing in John Adams’ El Niño.  

He is Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Artist-in-Residence and Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale’s first-ever Creative Partner. He recently served as Artist-in-Residence at Detroit Opera—an appointment that culminated in his performance in the title role of Anthony Davis’ X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X in the spring of 2022. Tines is featured on the Grammy-nominated world premiere recording of the opera released on BMOP/sound in 2022. Tines is a member of AMOC and co-creator of The Black Clown, a music theater experience commissioned and premiered by American Repertory Theater. He is Musical America’s 2022 Vocalist of the Year, a winner of the 2020 Sphinx Medal of Excellence, and the recipient of the 2018 Emerging Artists Award from Lincoln Center. He is a graduate of The Juilliard School and Harvard University.  

Jamar Roberts // Artist-In-Residence

Jamar Roberts returns to Vail this season as an Artist-In-Residence, after choreographing his first work for the Vail Dance Festival in 2021, and creating two additional new works for the 2023 Festival. Roberts is a prolific and highly in-demand choreographer who has made works for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, New York City Ballet, Miami City Ballet, the Martha Graham Company, BalletX, The Juilliard School, Ailey 2, New York City Center’s Fall for Dance, and he also serves as a Creative Associate for The Juilliard School from 2023-2024. Roberts, a graduate of the New World School of the Arts and the Ailey School has danced for AAADT, Ailey II, and Complexions Contemporary Ballet, won the 2016 “Bessie” award for outstanding performer, and has performed as a guest artist with the Royal Ballet in London and made multiple television performance appearances. In 2020, the March on Washington Film Festival invited Roberts to create a dance on film tribute to the Honorable John Lewis. Other highlights include Works and Process at the Guggenheim, where he created the acclaimed short work on the film Cooped and A Chronicle of a Pivot at a Point in Time, which premiered on film in 2021 and was restaged for a live performance world premiere in 2022. Roberts was a director’s fellow at NYU’s Center for Ballet and the Arts in the 2020-21 season and he has also made a short film for the LA Opera entitled The First Bluebird in the Morning. His first narrative ballet, Resurrection, premiered at San Francisco Ballet in January 2023.

Jerard Palazo

Jerard Palazo was born in Manila, Philippines and moved to Canada at 8 years old, where he began his formal dance training at the Royal Winnipeg Ballet School Professional Division in Winnipeg, Manitoba in 2006. After graduating in 2012 he moved to Toronto to further his dance studies with the Toronto Dance Theatre for a year. Upon receiving a full tuition scholarship from the Alvin Ailey School Jerard moved to New York and trained at Ailey from 2013-2015. Jerard was selected for summer programs on full tuition scholarships at Jacob’s Pillow Contemporary Program and Nederlands Dans Theatre. He has worked with Nai Ni Chen Dance Company, Peridance Company and Lavagnino Dance in New York.Jerard made his debut as a choreographer at iHeartDanceNYC on June 2021 with ‘New Beginnings’. A duet he specially conceived for New York City Ballet soloist Megan LeCrone, performed by Ms. LeCrone and Jerard on the rooftop of the Empire Hotel near Lincoln Center. It turned out to be the onset of ‘So Close’ his first full-length ballet that had its world premiere in the spring of 2022 at Peridance Contemporary Dance Company and was received enthusiastically. Jerard Palazo is excited to dance in his first season with BalletX.  

Kayla Mak // Scholar-In-Residence

Kayla Mak grew up in Rye Brook, NY and is of Japanese, Chinese, and Cuban descent. She studied at Westchester Dance Academy and Ballet Academy East and is now in her third year at The Juilliard School in NY where she will receive her BFA, under the direction of Alicia Graf Mack and associate director Mario Alberto Zambrano. Kayla currently trains in ballet, modern, classical pointe, and contemporary pointe. Her inspiration for dance sparked at the young age of 4, while watching ABT’s production of The Nutcracker. She soon became involved in competitive dance where she was able to gain exposure to stage performance. In the past years, Kayla has performed at the Kaatsbaan Cultural Park Summer Festival 2022, in the “Rising Stars” Show where she had the honor to perform Alvin Ailey’s “Memoria” coached by Masazumi Chaya and Elizabeth Roxas- Dobrish, as well as Justin Peck’s “In Creases” in Juilliard’s Spring Dances 2023, coached by Patricia Delgado and Justin Peck. This past summer Mak performed with Juliano Nunes in his work “O’clock”, which premiered in Switzerland at the Origen Festival Cultural. In the future, Kayla dreams to become a professional dancer in a company where she can meld her love for both ballet and contemporary as well as spread her love for the beautiful art form of dance.

Spencer Lenain

Born in San Diego, California, Spencer Lenain began his dance training at age 7 at Ballet Arte where he was instructed by Erlends Zieminch and Sara Viale. He also attended nine summer intensives at American Ballet Theater, earning the National Training Scholar scholarship three times. He attended the California Institute of the Arts and graduated with a BFA in dance in May 2024. Spencer is also very active on social media where his ballet videos are featured on TikTok @spencerdancerrr and Instagram @spencerdancer. 

Lauren Lovette

Lauren Lovette personifies the intertwining of dance and choreography, moving seamlessly from one to the other. Her work has been commissioned and performed by leading dance companies and festivals, including the New York City Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, the Vail International Dance Festival, American Ballet Theatre Studio Company, the Paul Taylor Dance Company, Nevada Ballet Theatre, Juilliard, Oregon Ballet Theater, Colorado Ballet, as well as a self-produced evening entirely of her own work in which she also danced, Why It Matters.

Born in Thousand Oaks, California, Lovette began studying ballet at the age of 11 at the Cary Ballet Conservatory in Cary, North Carolina. She enrolled at SAB as a full time student in 2006. In October 2009, Ms. Lovette became an apprentice with NYCB and joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet in September 2010. Promoted to soloist in February 2013 and to principal dancer in June 2015, she stepped down from her position at the company in 2021 in order to embark on a career devoted to dance and choreography in more equal measure. She is now the choreographer in residence at the Paul Taylor Dance Company and performs as a guest principal dancer around the world.

Ms. Lovette received the Clive Barnes Award for dance in December 2012 and was the 2012-2013 recipient of the Janice Levin Award.

Frances Samson

Frances Lorraine Samson is a New York based artist originally from Toronto, Canada. She has been featured by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), TEDx and Harper’s Bazaar, and has had the honor of working for institutions such as The Juilliard School, SUNY Purchase College and the Danish National Academy of Music. Frances was a principal dancer with the Limón Dance Company from 2017-2023 and is currently on faculty for the Limón Institute. She has had the pleasure of collaborating with artists such as Kate Weare, Francesca Harper, Raúl Tamez, Kayla Farrish, Madeline Hollander and Aszure Barton. Frances most recently performed for Award-winning choreographers Twyla Tharp and Baye & Asa. She is the 2023 recipient of the Clive Barnes Award for Dance and is an unarmed actor combatant certified by The Society of American Fight Directors.

Savannah Green

Savannah Green grew up in New York City, where she attended LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts as a Dance Major. She attended Manhattan Youth Ballet on a full merit scholarship, performing featured roles in works by George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, and Larry Keigwin. In 2017, Savannah earned her BFA in Dance at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she was a member of the Senior Dance Company. She spent her senior year touring internationally, performing works by José Limón, Andrea Miller, and others. Upon graduation, she began working with Buglisi Dance Theater, performing new works in New York City and the Kaatsbaan International Dance Center. In 2019, Savannah became the inaugural Dance Fellow at BalletX, before being invited to join the company in 2020. Since joining BalletX, she has performed in ballets by Matthew Neenan, Jamar Roberts, Tiler Peck, Nicolo Fonte, Amy Hall Garner, Trey McIntyre, Annabelle Lopez-Ochoa, among others.

Sara Mearns // Artist-In-Residence

SARA MEARNS, Columbia, SC, principal dancer New York City Ballet since 2008. Originated roles with choreographers Justin Peck, Kyle Abraham, Alexei Ratmansky, Pam Tanowitz, Bobbi Jene Smith, Christopher Wheeldon, Guillaume Cote, Beth Gill, among others. Guest Performer: Paul Taylor Dance Company, The Cunningham Centennial Celebration, Jodi Melnick Dance, Bill T Jones/Lee Ming Wei, and Wang Ramirez. At NYCC, she starred in Matthew Bourne’s The Red Shoes, Encores! I Married An Angel, and Twyla Now as well as multiple Fall for Dances, and performed Dances of Isadora Duncan at Lincoln Center. At The Joyce in 2022, Sara performed a full evening with five world premier pieces, titled “A piece of Work”, awarded the Bessie Award for outstanding performer in 2018, awarded the Dance Magazine Award in 2019, and an Honorary Doctorate University of South Carolina in 2019. 

Isabella Boylston

James Whiteside

Youba Cissokho

Denys Drozdyuk

Denys Drozdyuk was born in Chernivtsi, Ukraine where he started dancing at the age of 4. From then on he has been continuously trained in ballroom dance. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Dance from the Juilliard School and a Master of Arts Degree in Dance Education from New York University.

Together with Antonina Skobina, Denys co-founded a collaborative ballroom dance duet “DNA” with the mission to develop Ballroom dance as a performing art. Denys also participated on NBC’s TV show World of Dance for 2 Seasons and was the finalist on TV Show Revolution in Canada. Being a versatile dancer, Denys is also a winner of So You Think You Can Dance Canada Television Show. Some of his ballroom dance achievements include: 3-Time World Ballroom Champion, 3-Time USA National Ballroom Dance Champion, 7-Time German National Ballroom Dance Champion, 3-Time Canadian National Ballroom Dance Champion and a Blackpool Dance Festival Winner. Denys performs frequently as a Guest Artist with the Stars of American Ballet and in various International Ballet Galas, Festivals, and Productions worldwide. Denys is also the recipient of NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship in Choreography, CUNY Dance Initiative Residency, and Green Box Arts Residency. He also teaches workshops and master classes throughout the world.

Antonina Skobina

Antonina Skobina was born in Mariupol, Ukraine. She is a 3-Time US National Ballroom Dance Champion and a World Championship Bronze Medalist. She is also a Blackpool Dance Festival Winner, which is the most prestigious Ballroom dance competition in the world. Together with Denys Drozdyuk, Antonina co-founded a collaborative ballroom dance duet “DNA” – whose goal it is to develop Ballroom dance as a performing art. Antonina also participated on NBC’s Hit Television Show World of Dance for 2 Seasons and was the finalist on TV Show Revolution in Canada. Antonina performs frequently as a Guest Artist with the Stars of American Ballet and in various International Ballet Galas, Festivals, and Productions worldwide. Antonina is also the recipient of NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship in Choreography, CUNY Dance Initiative Residency, and Green Box Arts Residency. Apart from dancing, Antonina has a great passion for acting and she is a graduate of the New York Film Academy. She also teaches workshops and master classes throughout the world.

Olivia Bell

Olivia Bell is a member of New York City Ballet’s Corps de Ballet. Born in Fort Worth, Texas, she trained locally before being accepted to the School of American Ballet in 2018. While a student, Olivia performed in the New York Choreographic Institute, the Virginia B. Toulmin Female Choreography Program, and the 2022 SAB Annual Workshop, originating a featured role in Gianna Reisen’s Signs. Olivia was selected for Rising Stars Weekend at Kaatsbaan Summer Festival in 2022, where she performed works by George Balanchine, and originated a role in Haley Winegarden’s Reminisce for Tomorrow. As an apprentice with New York City Ballet, Olivia has performed works by George Balanchine, including a featured role in George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker.

Philip Duclos

Philip Duclos is a member of the Corps de Ballet with The Royal Danish Ballet. He has danced featured roles in Wayne McGregor’s Dante Project, George Balanchine’s Scotch Symphony and The Nutcracker, John Neumeier’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Gregory Dean’s Gotta Dance. He has performed roles in Jerome Robbins’ Glass Pieces and The Four Seasons, August Bournonville’s La Sylphide and Napoli, as well as Nikolaj Hubbe’s Swan Lake and Giselle.  He has also attended the Vail Dance Festival in 2021, 2022, and 2023. 

Gilbert Bolden III

Gilbert Bolden III is a Soloist with New York City Ballet. He was born in San Diego, California and began dancing at the age of nine in Las Vegas, Nevada. His ballet training began in 2011 at Idyllwild Arts Academy in Idyllwild, CA, and he continued his studies at The Rock School for Dance Education in Philadelphia, PA in 2013. In 2014, Mr. Bolden enrolled at the School of American Ballet, NYCB’s official school. He became an apprentice with the Company in August 2017, joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet in August 2018, and was promoted to Soloist in October 2023. Since joining the company Mr. Bolden has originated featured roles in ballets by Justin Peck, Silas Farley, and Gianna Reisen. He has also been featured in many works by George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins. 

Harrison Coll

Harrison Coll is a New York City Ballet Soloist. Born in Manhattan, New York, he began his dance training locally at the age of 4 and in 2003, he entered the School of American Ballet. In November 2012, Mr. Coll became an apprentice with NYCB and joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet in August 2013. He was promoted to soloist in October 2018. Since joining the Company, Coll has performed featured roles in ballets by George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, Peter Martins, Mauro Bigonzetti, Andrea Miller, Justin Peck, Troy Schumacher, and Myles Thatcher.  

Melissa Toogood

Melissa Toogood is a Sydney and New York based Dancer, Master Teacher, Stager, Coach, Contributor, Mother, and sometimes Choreographer. She is a New York and Performance Award (Bessie) winning Performer. Melissa is both Dancer and Rehearsal Director for Pam Tanowitz Dance. She has assisted Tanowitz on new creations for the Australian Ballet, L.A. Dance Project, Martha Graham Dance Company, Paul Taylor Dance Company, The Royal Ballet, and others. She was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, is a 2013 & 2015 Merce Cunningham fellow, has taught Cunningham Technique since 2007, and is a licensed Stager of Merce Cunningham’s work. She has performed with Kyle Abraham/A.I.M., Kimberly Bartosik/Daela, Rosie Herrera Dance Theater, Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Reiner, Stephen Petronio Company, Sally Silvers & Dancers, Christopher Williams, The Bang Group: Tap Lab, Bill Young and many others. Her own work has been commissioned by the Boston Ballet, New York Theater Ballet and the Vail International Dance Festival. This year marks Melissa’s 10th season with the Festival.   

Herman Cornejo

Herman Cornejo was born in Villa Mercedes, San Luis province, Argentina, and began his ballet studies at the age of eight at Teatro Colón’s Instituto Superior de Arte, Buenos Aires. At fourteen he received a scholarship from the School of American Ballet, the dance school of New York City Ballet and on his return to Buenos Aires he joined Julio Bocca’s Ballet Argentino. In 1999 Herman joined American Ballet Theatre, New York, was promoted to Soloist in 2000 and was appointed Principal Dancer in 2003. Herman has participated in numerous galas and has performed as Principal Guest Dancer with Ballet del Teatro Argentino de La Plata, Boston Ballet, Compañía de Danza Contemporánea de Cuba, Corella Ballet Castilla y León, New York City Ballet and Sapporo Ballet.