Biography & Class Description

Alison's passion for the performing arts began as a five- year old scholarship student with The School of Cleveland San Jose Ballet in Cleveland, Ohio. Alison also has the opportunity to study with Alonso King's LINES Ballet, The Perry-Mansfield School of Performing Arts, The School of American Ballet and The Chautauqua Institution. In 1999, Alison moved to New York City to study at The Juilliard School under the artistic direction of the late Benjamin Harkarvy. After graduating with a BFA in Dance, she made her professional debut with The Errol Grimes Dance Group. Since then, she has danced everywhere from Belgium to Los Angeles taking part in shows such as Franco Dragone's Le Reve, Aida, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and Can Can. She has performed with a wide range of companies from John Malashock Dance Company to Body Traffic. Alison is also the grateful recipient of William Randolph Hearst Foundation Scholarship, The Rebekah Harkness Scholarship and honorary recognition from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts.

In addition to performing, Alison enjoys teaching and sharing her love for dance with students of all ages. She believes that everyone has the potential to become an accomplished dancer and pride's herself on the personal attention that she gives to each student. Alison always says: "I love teaching and insist on a learning environment that is engaging, stimulating, instructive, inspiring and, most of all, fun!"

Contemporary

Alison's class begins with an energizing warm-up in the center focusing on core strength, flexibility, extensions, breathing, the use of weight and the interplay with gravity. Working through parallel and turned out positions, a series of stretching, deep plie, tendu, degage, developpe and swinging combinations will prepare students for dancing across the floor while emphasizing the fundamental placement and awareness of classical line. The class continues moving across the floor in a series of progressive combinations referencing the work of the following masters: Martha Graham, Jose Limon, Lester Horton and Paul Taylor. The elements of modern dance--the seamless exchange of weight while exploring physical extremity, the modern surrendering versus the classical resistance to gravity, the expression of the torso in a Graham contraction versus a Limon head-tail curl, the sensation of being grounded, and the use of breath--are then incorporated into a contemporary combination specifically choreographed to challenge and inspire the dancers. The class ends with a brief cool-down to center and calm the mind and body through simple stretching, yoga poses and breathing.