George Balanchine was an American ballet choreographer who was one of the most influential 20th-century choreographers. Styled as the father of American ballet, he co-founded the New York City Ballet and remained its Artistic Director for more than 35 years. His choreography is characterized by plotless ballets with minimal costume and décor, performed to classical and neoclassical music.
Savion Glover is an American tap dancer, actor, and choreographer.
Dianne Walker, also known as Lady Di, is an American tap dancer. Her thirty-year career spans Broadway, television, film, and international dance concerts. Walker is the Artistic Director of TapDancin, Inc. in Boston, Massachusetts.
Imagine Tap! is a musical revue developed by Derick K. Grant (director/choreographer), Zane Mark, Aaron Tolson, and Channing Cook Holmes. It opened at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance in Chicago, IL on July 11, 2006 and closed on August 6, 2006.
Mia Michaels Melchiona is an American choreographer and judge on the television show So You Think You Can Dance. She has worked with Tom Cruise, Celine Dion, Gloria Estefan, Madonna, Ricky Martin, Prince, and Catherine Zeta-Jones. In 2005 she choreographed Cirque du Soleil's world tour Delirium and Celine Dion's A New Day, for which she received an Emmy Award nomination. In 2007 she won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Choreography for her routine on "Calling You" during season two of So You Think You Can Dance. She won another Emmy Award during season five in 2010. She was a judge during season 7 with Adam Shankman and Nigel Lythgoe. She choreographed the dance sequence for "Get Happy" in the episode "Bombshells" of the television series House.
Bring in 'da Noise, Bring in 'da Funk is a musical that debuted Off-Broadway at the New York Shakespeare Festival/Public Theater in 1995 and moved to Broadway in 1996. The show was conceived and directed by George C. Wolfe, and featured music by Daryl Waters, Zane Mark and Ann Duquesnay; lyrics by Reg E. Gaines, George C. Wolfe and Ann Duquesnay; and a book by Reg E. Gaines. The choreography was by Savion Glover.
The Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT) is a modern dance company based in New York City. It was founded in 1958 by choreographer and dancer Alvin Ailey. It is made up of 32 dancers, led by artistic director Robert Battle and associate artistic director Matthew Rushing.
Desmond Richardson is an American dancer, co-founder, and co-artistic director of Complexions Contemporary Ballet. He has mastered a wide range of dance forms including hip hop, classical, modern, classical ballet, and contemporary ballet.
Aaron Tolson has been a tap dancer since 1986. He was the assistant choreographer, co-creator and assistant producer of Imagine Tap! - a tap show created with Derick Grant. He is currently an Associate Professor of Dance at The Boston Conservatory in Boston, Massachusetts and is the founder, choreographer, and director for the pre-professional tap company Speaking in Taps.
Lenny Seidman is a tabla player, a composer, a co-director of the Spoken Hand Percussion Orchestra, and a World Music/Jazz curator at the Painted Bride Art Center in Philadelphia.
Jason Samuels Smith is an American tap dance performer, choreographer, and director.
Staś Kmieć is a theater and dance choreographer, specializing in a variety of styles of dance: theatre dance, character/folk, period/historical, social/ballroom, ballet, and concert dance.
Hip-hop theater is a form of theater that presents contemporary stories through the use of one or more of the four elements of hip-hop culture—b-boying, graffiti writing, MCing (rapping), and DJing. Other cultural markers of hip-hop such as spoken word, beatboxing, and hip-hop dance can be included as well although they are not always present. What is most important is the language of the theatrical piece and the plot's relevance to the world. Danny Hoch, founder of the Hip-Hop Theater Festival, further defines it as such: "Hip-hop theatre must fit into the realm of theatrical performance, and it must be by, about and for the hip-hop generation, participants in hip-hop culture, or both."
Chloe Arnold is an American dancer, and an Emmy-nominated choreographer, actress, director, and producer. She is best known internationally as a tap dancer, and was recently seen on Season 11 of FOX's So You Think You Can Dance with her company Chloe Arnold's Syncopated Ladies.
Rennie Harris is a dancer, choreographer, artistic director and professor of hip-hop dance. Harris formed the first and longest running hip-hop dance touring company, Rennie Harris Puremovement in 1992. In 2007, he conceived another touring company, RHAW or Rennie Harris Awe-Inspiring Works.
The American Tap Dance Foundation is a nonprofit organization whose primary goal is the presentation and teaching of tap dance. Its original stated purpose was to provide an "international home for tap dance, perpetuate tap as a contemporary art form, preserve it through performance and an archival library, provide educational programming, and establish a formal school for tap dance."
Michelle Dorrance is an American tap dancer, performer, choreographer, teacher and director. Awarded a MacArthur "Genius Grant", she is the Founder and Artistic Director of Dorrance Dance. Dorrance is known for her creative ensemble choreography, rhythm tap style and ambitious collaborative projects with fellow tap dance choreographers and musicians. She is currently a 2017 Choreographic Fellow at New York City Center and an Artist in Residence at the American Tap Dance Foundation. Dorrance lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Ayodele Casel is an American actress, tap dancer and choreographer. Raised in Puerto Rico, she derived inspiration for her tap style from salsa music. While in college, she studied with Baakari Wilder and Charles Goddertz. She became the first, and remains the only, woman to be a member of Savion Glover's Not Your Ordinary Tappers.
Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards is an American tap dancer, choreographer, and instructor who has been called "the mastress of her generation." In 1998, she married fellow dancer Omar Edwards and opened a studio with him in Harlem; they have three children.
Ted Louis Levy is an American tap dancer, singer, choreographer, and director. He is widely celebrated as one of America’s premier tap dance artists.