|
|
|
Jon BergerJon Berger (teaching Morris Band) has played music for morris, English country, and contra dances since 1976. A former musician for Berkeley Morris, he now plays for Apple Tree Morris in Sebastopol, and in Flashpoint, a Santa Rosa-based contra dance band. He is well-known for his powerful music, and, while playing for morris, his ability to maintain a connection between the music, the dancers and the dance (not to mention his sense of humor, and grand singing voice). He is a regular musician at Bay Area and North Bay English country dances. Jon is also a former member of Tempest, a Celtic rock band that plays for an entirely different style of dancing. In his spare time between gigs, Jon is a lawyer for a small software company. He lives in Sebastopol, California with his wife, famed morris dancer Kalia Kliban, and a sufficient number of cats.
|
|
Kyla
BrookeA Certified Hellerwork Practitioner, Kyla (teaching Morning Warmups) has spent the past ten years in private practice as a corrective bodyworker and movement educator for individuals and organizations. She began dancing in the early '70s, and was one of the founding members of the U.S.'s first women's morris team, Ring O' Bells. She has been dancing, performing, teaching, and choreographing with ethnic and ritual dance ensembles and schools ever since. Kyla has an interest in teaching musicians and dancers how to prevent injuries, and how to recover from current injuries.
|
|
Alisa
DodsonAlisa Dodson (teaching ECD Beginners' Clinic and Deliciously Difficult Dances) has been dancing since she was 5 years old and was active in her teens in Southern and Central California musical theater. She has been involved with English dancing since 1980 and teaching dance (both English and Morris) since 1990. She started her ECD calling in the San Francisco Bay Area, while working with Jody McGeen and Bruce Hamilton, infusing BACDS dances with her cheerful energy. She was foreman of Mayfield Morris & Sword for three years, and still dances with Bufflehead and the Dead Ringers. Alisa founded an annual December mummer’s play in the south part of the Bay Area, which continues in her absence; it is well over 10 years old. She has also put in time on both the BACDS and CDSS boards. Now living in Ohio, Alisa has programmed excellent week-long camps and has been on staff at Buffalo Gap, Mendocino, and various dance weekends. She’s really excited about returning to Mendocino!
|
|
Jim MorrisonJim Morrison (teaching Papa Stour Longsword, Historic American Dance, and Cotswold Morris) is a California boy who, at an early age, began to play the guitar and got caught up in the world of traditional music. While at Dartmouth College, he worked for the Campbell Folk School, home of a long-standing traditional dance program. After attending the Berea Christmas Country Dance School that year, he decided he wanted life to imitate dance, so back at Dartmouth, Jim became a mover and shaker in his dance community. Upon graduating, he went to work for the Country Dance and Song Society (CDSS), and from the legendary teachers May Gadd and Genny Shimer, learned to call dances. Also while there, he received three NEH grants to study the early history of American social dance, served as director of CDSS, helped found historic dance performance groups, and was in the forefront of the morris and sword revival. Since 1978, Jim and his wife Marney have lived in Virginia. For many years he made a living from dance leadership, history, and collecting, while also playing in traditional and country bands. Jim now owns his own computer support business and is in a band with his twenty-something sons. He plays for the local rapper sword group, dances and plays with the high-jumping Albemarle Morris Men, and teaches intriguing workshops in several types of English and American dance.
|
|
Gene
MurrowGene Murrow (teaching Contemporary Composers ECD, Dancing the Best Well, and ECD Leadership) is a man of many faces - English country dancer and dance leader, teacher of early music workshops throughout the U.S., musician, and computer consultant. He approaches English country dances as works of art, striving "to make their richness of structure, musical form, texture, and affect enjoyable and appreciated by dancers of all abilities." Gene discovered English Country dancing in the summer of 1965 at Pinewoods as an 18-year-old oboist subbing for his teacher at Chamber Music Week, got hooked, and went on to work as a musician with such renowned teachers as May Gadd, Genny Shimer, and Arthur Cornelius, and musicians Phil Merrill, Pat Shaw, and Marshall Barron. After dancing and being "in the band" for over 20 years, Gene started calling dances in the mid ‘80s. Gene holds a degree in music from Columbia University with studies at Juilliard. When asked what makes English country dancing special or unique for him, Gene said "The beauty of the music; the intimate relationship of the music to the dance; the experiencing of artistic vision as a participant; the accessibility of fine art to almost everyone; the social interaction among individuals and the creation of community; the connection with the past; the continuing evolution of the genre."
|
|
Kari
SmithKari Smith (teaching Northwest Morris, Beginning Clog, and Experienced Clog) has been teaching a wide array of traditional dance (Cotswold and Northwest morris, clog, longsword, garland, etc.) and drama since 1985, at programs across the country, and in Canada and England. Among the teams with which Kari has been associated are Lemon & Capers Morris, Ha'Penny Morris, and several longsword and Northwest morris teams; most recently she founded and is the fore of Guiding Star Clog Morris in Massachusetts. With Tony Barrand, she collected the Marley clog dance tradition (an example of what happened to English clog after it hit the Vaudeville stage), and together they created the "New Dancing Marleys." She is currently completing her doctorate in dance history and folklore with research focused on the 19th and early 20th century American history of English-style clog dancing. Kari's teaching has been variously described as "precise," "in-depth," "inspiring," "the best," and her dancing as "beautiful" and "strong." This will be Kari's first trip to Mendocino since 1991.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
