DC Artist Collective and CityDance Ensemble Announce New Partnership
Leaders in dance education and performance form partnership
at the DC Dance Collective’s
studios in northwest Washington, DC
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 18, 2009
Washington, DC—The DC Artist Collective, under the leadership of legendary tap teacher Nancy Newell, and CityDance Ensemble, winner of the 2009 Mayor’s Arts Award for Artistic Excellence, announced on Friday, December 18, 2009 the formation of a partnership at the Collective’s northwest Washington, DC dance studios. Beginning in January 2010, students around the Washington area will have the resources and talent of two organizations to draw on for excellence in dance training across an extraordinary breadth of disciplines.
“As the Artist Collective moves into its next phase, it was clear to me that we needed a partner with both artistic and administrative excellence,” noted Nancy Newell, Founder and Director of the Collective. “That’s why I approached CityDance. I couldn’t be happier that they’ve accepted, and that with the beginning of the New Year we’ll be partners.”
“This is the culmination of a 20 year friendship and working relationship with the directors of CityDance,” she continued. “They are absolutely the right people, with the right vision and experience. Together we complement each other and add value to the student experience that will make the Collective an extraordinary place to learn.”
“There is no better tap teacher to be found anywhere than Nancy,” said CityDance’s Founder and Artistic Director, Paul Emerson. “She was my first tap teacher and the love of the art she instills in her students is extraordinary. That carries over into the school she has built and that we’re delighted to now partner with.”
“CityDance already runs an exceptionally successful school at the Music Center at Strathmore, and directs the Dance Program at The Madeira School in McLean, Virginia” noted CityDance Director of Studio Education & Conservatory, Lorraine Spiegler. “In my two and a half years at the Center we’ve gone from a student body of 300 to one approaching 1,000. This year we have launched our Conservatory of Dance, and we’re simply bursting at the seams. There is also a beautifully natural symbiosis that exists as we strive to build excellence in studio programming. We needed room to grow, and we also needed a partner with whom we could share our vision and our goals. Nancy is that person.”
“This partnership accomplishes a fundamental goal for CityDance,” commented CityDance’s Executive Director, Alexe Nowakowski. “Since leaving our studio at the DC Historical Society’s Mt. Vernon Square location, we’ve been searching for a facility in the District. This city is our home, and even though we have an exceptionally robust community education program throughout the city, and have our residency of the professional dance company at the Harman Center for the Arts, we needed a studio to call home inside Washington. This partnership restores that balance.”
Beginning in January, 2010 CityDance will begin space improvements at the Collective, and its class offerings will be open to the community beginning February 1, 2010. With funding support from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities the space, and the façade, will undergo an elegant and extensive transformation, bringing the Collective new life.
“We’re already a destination for tap students not just from Washington, but from around the region,” said Newell. “With CityDance we add the range and diversity of an organization committed to building the professional, as well as the recreational, dancers who will be the dancers of tomorrow. They get it, and they know how to get it done administratively. I cannot express my delight at adding not just their artistic but their managerial excellence to the Collective.”
“At the end of the day, this is about bringing a new level of excellence in dance education to a studio with a rich tradition in its own right,” said Emerson. “We’re deeply committed to Washington, DC, and to the neighborhood surrounding the Dance Collective, and looking forward to a long and exceptional partnership.”
A complete listing of classes will be available beginning December 19 on both the CityDance website (www.citydance.net) and on the DC Artist Collective website (www.dcdancecollective.com).
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Paul Emerson, Artistic Director, CityDance Ensemble: 202.246.2044, pemerson@mac.comBetsy Lundgren
, Director of Marketing,
CityDance Ensemble
: 202.347.3909,
betsy@citydance.net
Nancy Newell,
Director, DC Dance Collective
: 202.362.7244,
newelln@dcdancecollective.com
ABOUT THE DIRECTORS AND ORGANIZATIONS:
Nancy Newell
Nancy Newell has been teaching dance for more than 47 years and has a background in theater from Northwestern University. She has taught internationally as well as throughout the United States. During her career, she has choreographed more than 50 musicals. Newell is a driving force in the DC metropolitan dance community. Most recently she spearheaded LEGACY-A Tribute to Legends Jimmy Slyde and LaVaughn Robinson as well as the Metro-DC Tribute to Gregory Hines. In 1998, Newell was curator of the Smithsonian series, The Women of Tap with special guest Ann Miller. In 1999 she coordinated the Smithsonian series, The Legends of Tap with Rusty Frank, Fred Kelly, and special guest Baakari Wilder. She co-sponsored the 1999 DC MetroTap Festival and has sponsored the Washington, D.C. area National TAP FEST program for nine years. In 2009, DC Artist Collective provided a home for Chloe and Maud Arnold’s 1st Annual Tap Festival which will also be held at the Collective in 2010. In 2002 and 2003, funded in part by the DC Commission of the Arts and Humanities, Newell performed and taught Master Classes in the Czech Republic where she represented DC in the The Prague, DC, Philadelphia Tap Festival. In 2006 she returned to Prague to help celebrate National Tap Dance Day with tap dancers from around the world. In 2004, Newell traveled to Bergerac, France to teach workshops at Ecole de Danse Desha/Simone Moulin and then to Kiev, Ukraine, to teach master classes at Volodomyr Shpudeiko's Jazz Tap Dance Studio. Newell opened DC Dance Collective in June of 1999 as a center for creativity and collaboration. She was honored to be nominated for the 2007 Metro DC Dance Award (MDCDA) in the category "Outstanding Achievement in Dance Education.”
CityDance Ensemble
CityDance Ensemble, Inc. is the parent organization to CityDance Ensemble, a professional contemporary dance company that performs locally and around the world; CityDance Early Arts, an outreach program that provides free dance classes and performances to children in underserved neighborhoods; CityDance Center at Strathmore, a dance school for youth and adults with a pre-professional training program for teens; and CityDance FilmWORKS, a creator of original dance-on-camera productions. The mission of CityDance Ensemble, Inc. is to advance the appreciation for and participation in the art of dance through excellence in performance, education, film, and artistic innovation.
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