November 17, 2024
Crowne Plaza Boston/Woburn
TEACHERS Schedule for the day:
9:00 to 9:50am - Hip Hop with John Comix Barrella
10:00 to 10:50am - Tap with Luke Spring
11:00 to 11:50am - Ballet Fusion with Tyler Malone
12:00 to 12:50pm - MEMBER BUSINESS MEETING
1:00 to 1:50pm - Jazz with Christina Belinsky
Student Workshop:
Registration Form Download HERE!
Student & Teacher Workshop Faculty
Ballet with Tyler Malone -- Originally from Long Island, Tyler grew up in North Carolina. Here is where we began dancing at age 7. After graduating high school, Tyler attended Point Park University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where he earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance Performance. Throughout his college career, Tyler had the honor of working with choreographers such as Keisha Lalama, Ron Tassone, Alan Hineline, Nicolas Petrov, Peter Merz and Darrell Grand Moultrie just to name a few. Immediately following college, Tyler was hired by Lehrer Dance, now known as Jon Lehrer Dance Company, a contemporary/modern dance company based out of Buffalo, NY. Through his career with Lehrer Dance, Tyler performed all over the globe. With residencies across the United States at numerous universities and high schools, and multiple tours to Europe and Russia, Tyler has been able to share his passion for dance with so many diverse people and cultures. Most recently he is working with RWS Entertainment Group out of NYC on numerous projects including, a contract dancing aboard Holland America Cruise Line and being a member of their Step One Dance Company. Happy to be settling down in Iowa, Tyler can’t wait to begin his new path in the dance community locally and nationally and share his wealth of knowledge and experience.
Tap with Luke Spring -- Luke was in both the original Broadway cast of A Christmas Story, The Musical and the show’s 1st National Tour. Credits include Disney’s Newsies, Maurice Hines Is Tappin’ Thru Life, Kennedy Center Honors (Tom Hanks Tribute), Tony Awards, Fred and Adele Astaire Awards, and Ford’s Theatre Annual Gala. Luke has performed at Radio City Music Hall, Madison Square Garden, New World Stages, Feinstein’s/54 Below, Arena Stage, and the Apollo, Joyce, Town Hall, Lincoln, and Wallis theaters, among many others.
Luke has also performed with the American Festival Pops Orchestra, internationally as a member of Rhythmatic Tap Company, and at corporate entertainment events around the country. His television credits include The Ellen DeGeneres Show, SYTYCD, Good Morning America, Fox & Friends, CBS Sunday Morning Show, and Good Day New York. Trained in tap, hip hop, musical theater, ballet, jazz, contemporary, lyrical, and improvisation, Luke enjoys sharing his love for dance with others through performing, teaching, and choreographing.
Jazz with Christina Belinsky -- Christina is a graduate of Dean College with an A.A. and the 'Trustee's Prize' Award in Dance and The University of the Arts where she earned her B.F.A. in Modern Dance Performance and the award for Most Outstanding Performance in Modern Dance. Concert dance credits include Doris Humphrey's "Water Studies" at The Yard on Martha's Vineyard, Philadelphia's Contempra Dance Theatre, Boston Dance Company's "The Nutcracker Suite", NYC's Perceptions Contemporary Dance Company and Thistle Dance, and the 80th Anniversary Tour of the Martha Graham Dance Company performing as an ensemble member in the classic, “Panorama” at the Annenberg Center in Philadelphia. Professional regional theater credits include Irving Berlin's White Christmas, Mary Poppins, A Christmas Carol, Footloose, The Producers, Sweet Charity, Seussical: The Musical, Charlotte’s Web, and the NYC industry reading of "Woody: A New Fairytale". TV and film credits include HBO's The Gilded Age, Westworld, Dance Mom's Season 8 Finale, MTV's Say It In Song, HGTV's Spontaneous Construction, and Lucky for Life Lottery commercial. Other credits include Massachusetts Symphony Orchestra and Cirque du Soleil's One Drop Foundation,
Christina has toured internationally as the dance captain and swing of "The Aluminum Show"; a show that combines puppetry, acrobatics, and dance with aluminum-toned objects. With "The Aluminum Show" she has performed throughout the US, Brazil, Canada, Spain, Israel, and Russia and has made numerous television appearances. She has toured as the dance captain and swing of the North American and Tokyo tour of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat", directed and choreographed by Tony Award-winning choreographer, Andy Blankenbuehler. Christina was a member of the ensemble and Peter Pan understudy in the Broadway 1st National Tour of "Finding Neverland", directed by Tony Award winner Diane Paulus and choreographed by Emmy Award winner, Mia Michaels. She has worked with industry leaders like Karla Puno-Garcia, Joey Pizzi, Nancy Braun, and John Caraffa.
Christina has been a guest teacher at various universities, dance conventions, and conferences around the country as well as Broadway Dance Center, NYC's Think Tank, and New York City's Stage Door Connections. Her choreography has been presented at San Antonio’s Empire Theatre, Philadelphia’s Drake Theater, Think Tank NYC, New Hampshire’s Majestic Theater and Palace Theatre, Boston’s Dance Complex and Third Life Choreographers’ Series as well as at the Built On Stilts Performing Arts Festival on Martha’s Vineyard.
Christina is the producer of the Artists in Motion Film Festival at The Gem Theater in Bethel, Maine. Her dance films have been featured at the 50th Dance On Camera Festival at Lincoln Center, American Dance Festival, SXSW Music and Film Festival, Martha’s Vineyard Film Festival, LA Dance Film Festival, Maine International Film Festival, and Acadia Dance Festival (Audience Choice Award). She is the cinematographer of the Boston-Based dance company “RootsUprising” with artistic direction by Nailah Randall-Bellinger. Their dance film collaborations have been commissioned by Harvard University, New England Foundation for the Arts, and CambridgeArts. "Initiation- In Love Solidarity", their second dance film collaboration is now a permanent work-in-residence of the "Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery" tour at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute.
Christina is a 2023 New England Dance Fund Choreographer's Grant recipient and 2024 Maine Arts Comission Spring. She is the proud creator of Artists In Motion Apparel @artistsinmotionapparel, an upcycled hand silk screen printed dance studio to streetwear clothing brand promoting sustainability, creativity, and community. Christina is proud to be a member of Actors' Equity and a founding member of Impact Dance Adjudicators.
Hip Hop with John Comix Barrella -- John’s work is based around street dance culture. His work utilizes a range of arts influences with techniques based in locking, popping, b-boy, and hip hop. As a performer, John works as a solo artist and in collaboration with members of the hip hop community. He has been a featured dancer in music videos “HSKT” by Tenin and “Get Away” By Alissia. Other works include a presentation fot Tedx: Chaos, Halftime shows for the NY Knicks, NYC Breakers’ Battle of the Boroughs reunion and much more. As a choreographer, John’s work has been presented internationally. His unique approach to movement has been placed on dancers in countless schools in and out of the United States.
At the age of 14, John was accepted into the “School of the Arts” in East Brunswick where he spent four years learning modern dance and ballet from a variety of instructors and master teachers. Aside from traditional dance classes, he attended annual courses in human anatomy, improvisational techniques, childhood education, choreography techniques, musical theatre, and theatre. In college, John studied small business management to round out the important aspects of his dance career training. From his early teens, John has studied under various hip hop artists and was recruited into WildStyle dance company where he learned his core hip hop techniques. He gained appreciation for street styles with glimpses into technique for house dance, waacking and dancehall. Furthering his training, John still regularly attends classes and events with master and pioneering hip hop artists. Notable influences on his work include Tom Mckie, Spex, Brian Green, Bev Brown, Jazzy J, Sekou, Pavan Thimmiah and more.
John is director of “The Redef Movement: Artists of Street Dance,” a dance company he founded in 2007. He and his company present work both in a range of hip hop and professional dance atmospheres, most frequently presented throughout NJ, NY, and Philadelphia. Their comedy-based work “Stupid Humans” is a satire on the performing arts, often utilizing live shows or dance films to create humorous takes on common elements of the dance and performance world. In addition to his duties as a company director, John is an adjunct professor for hip hop at Rider University.
In recent years, John has developed a curriculum and program that trains teachers in hip hop terminology and technique, applying it to class structure. This program, “Essentials for Dance Education” has been implemented in classrooms around the world and has offered countless teachers a look into his own method of instruction. John’s classes and events are designed to teach aspiring dancers the fundamentals of street & hip hop dance as a freestyle art and techniques to master choreography. His goals are to inspire people to be artists and push themselves creatively and positively both in and outside of dance.
