When I started my journey to learn how to dance, I never set out to be successful. I simply set out to learn, and perhaps to be good. I was a product of the open class system in NYC in the 1980’s and those open classes were very different than the open classes of today. There were much fewer teachers, teaching many more classes. Teachers taught multiple classes each day and at various levels, allowing students to study with a particular teacher and grow and progress under their tutelage. Classes were also, for the most part, much more about training dancers and much less about teaching choreography and creating an “experience”.

So it was in this environment that I set out on my journey to learn to dance. Classes were large, corrections were few, and I was a 25 year old absolute beginner. I was blessed with good natural turn out, but none of the other physical attributes one would look for in a dancer, and I certainly wasn’t an extraordinary talent. And although it seemed like my teachers were happy to teach me, and occasionally correct me, I never got the sense that anyone was invested in guiding me into a career. And quite frankly why should they have been?

I was, to a large extent, dancing in a void. I had teachers who taught me, I had friends (some very close friends) who danced with me, but from where I stood, it seemed like no one actually believed in me. And with everything the dance industry passively taught me (you need to be tall, you need to be flexible, you need to have beautiful proportions, you need to be an extraordinary talent) I didn’t think that there was much to believe in.

But I was tenacious. And I loved every moment in the classroom; not because of some impossible dream of a career (a goal that everyone in my life, including Luigi, discouraged) but because I simply wanted to learn. I took two to three classes a day, six to seven days a week. I made some pretty extreme sacrifices to keep up that regimen. And over the next five years, in that void, with no real support or anyone actually believing in me, I built a professional level technique to support the artistry and musicality that my teachers gradually cultivated. No one guided me (I figured out most things by myself), no one supported me (I worked insane hours and sacrificed much), no one believed in me (yet day after day and year after year I relentlessly trained).

Slowly, the performing opportunities presented themselves. Auditions became less daunting. And in the same way, and in the same void that I built my technique and artistry, I built a performing career. Not a career at the highest level (no First-Rate company, no Broadway shows) but a reasonably busy NYC freelance career; which was, quite frankly, more than I ever thought possible. But a dancer’s career has a limited life, and perhaps I quit too soon, but there was no one encouraging me to keep at it. I had achieved my goal: I learned (and maybe I was good-I’m actually not really sure). Eventually the brutal reality of a NYC freelance dance career took its toll on me. I was done. Not angry, not disappointed, just done.

Years later, just shy of my 49th birthday, I got bit by the teaching bug. I’m not really sure how, or why, but I decided that I was going to become a ballet teacher. But now, for some reason, I found support coming from the people around me. The industry that so discouraged my performing career was now supporting my goal to teach, and doors started opening. It started with two neighborhood studios in Brooklyn (Hamilton Dace and Cora Dance). Then came (in chronological order) CAP21, The Joffrey Ballet School, New York Film Academy, Broadway Dance Center, The New York Conservatory for Dramatic Arts, Ballet Academy East and The Kanyok Arts Initiative. I have also had the opportunity to travel the country and the world as a guest teacher.

Something that I hear from many students graduating from the pre-professional programs in which I teach is: “Thank you for believing in me!” The first time it happened it really took me by surprise. I didn’t realize that I was “believing in them”. I was simply teaching. I have always aimed to treat all my students the same. But this comment always seems to come from that driven student; that student who simply HAS TO LEARN. Occasionally it comes from a student who was gifted with a beautiful facility, a perfect physique or a remarkable talent. But often it comes from a student who wasn’t. But every one of these students has that quiet tenacity; that relentless discipline that never needs a push. And so without realizing it, I have been quietly believing in the students who were just like me; when I never had the strength or courage to believe in myself.

Thank you to the dance artists who always believed and continue to believe in my journey to the classroom:

Lisa Gajda Maiolo, Shannon Hummel, Stephanie Godino, Era Jouravlev, Stacey Cadell, Beth Goheen, Greg Zane, Lisa Hildebrand, Julia Dubno, Diane Miller-Chapman, Laurie Kanyok, Therese Rooney and the late Rita Hamilton who gave me my first teaching job, showed me the way and has been a career-long inspiration.