Master Classes (*free for festival dancers, $10.00 for General Public)
Saturday July 11th
10:00 – 11:30 Amy McIntosh Master Class (Upstairs) IMPROVISATION
11:30 – 12:50 Rachel Bruce-Johnson Master Class (Downstairs) MODERN
11:30 – 12:50 Heather Chappell Master Class (Upstairs) AFRO-CUBAN
Saturday July 18th
10:00 – 11:20 Jill Priest Master Class (Downstairs) MODERN
10:00 – 11:20 Genevieve Durham Master Class (Upstairs) HIP-HOP
11:30 – 12:50 Rebekah Hampton Master Class (Upstairs) JAZZ
*All classes held at the UCO Physical Education Building
University of Central Oklahoma
Amy Roark-McIntosh
Amy Roark-Mcintosh, a native of Tulsa is the founding Director of Dance at Oral Roberts University, teaches modern dance at Tulsa Ballet Center for Dance Education, and has been a Guest Artist at Pointe to the Future summer intensive for the last two years. She has served as Adjunct Professor of Dance at the University of Tulsa in 2006-2007. McIntosh was the Associate Chair of Dance and tenured Assistant Professor of Dance at Belhaven College from 2001-2006. She was crucial in the formation of Belhaven's BFA Dance degree and in their receiving accreditation through the National Association of Schools of Dance. McIntosh holds an MFA in Dance Performance/Choreography from the State University of NY College at Brockport and a BFA in Dance from Stephens College of Columbia, MO. She has studied extensively with Risa Steinberg in the Jose Limón technique and repertory. In 1999 she performed in Tatiana Baganova’s “Crows” at the American Dance Festival. She has worked with artists Bill Evans, Irene Hultman, Douglas Nielson, Tere O’Connor, Alan Sener, Shapiro and Smith, Linda Tarnay, and Ellis Wood. She danced with the Kista Tucker Dance Co. and the Hendrick Dance Project of upstate NY, with Randy James Dance Works of New Jersey, and Polarity Dance Theatre of Jackson, MS. She is the Artistic Director of the Living Water Dance Company through which she continues to create and perform. Her work has also been presented in LocalMotion's "Dance on Tulsa", "Uptown Performance Series" NYC, Polarity Dance Theatre MS, Belhaven College Dance Ensemble MS, Thalia Mara Foundation MS, Monica Huggins Dance Theatre OK, Perpetual Motion OK, ORU Dance Ensemble OK, and recently in Living Arts, New Genre Dance Festival of Tulsa.
Genevieve Durham DeCesaro
Genevieve Durham DeCesaro is the Head of Dance and Associate Chair of the Department of Theatre and Dance at Texas Tech University in Lubbock. Her choreography has been commissioned by Old Dominion University in Virginia, Spleman College in Atlanta, Dallas’ Repertory Dance Theatre of Texas, Texas Woman’s University, South Carolina’s Litchfield Dance Academy, Atlanta’s Poetics, Stephen F. Austin State University, and Oklahoma City’s Perpetual Motion. She has held teaching positions at Tarrant County College and at Texas Woman’s University, and has given residencies and master classes at educational institutions across the country. Genevieve has been an invited presenter of original research and workshop design at numerous conferences, including the Southwest Theatre and Film Association, the American College Theatre Festival, and the Hawaii International Conference on the Arts and Humanities. She is a former Chair of the Texas Commission on the Arts Grant Review Panel, currently sits on the Ballet Lubbock Advisory Board, and was elected to represent the South Central Region on the National Board of the American College Dance Festival. Genevieve holds a BFA in Theatre from Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, and an MA and MFA in Dance from Texas Woman’s University, where she was honored with an Excellence in Teaching Award in the Department of Dance. Among her recognitions are receipt of the Texas Tech University Alumni Association’s New Faculty Award, receipt of the Texas Tech University Student Government Association’s Professor of the Year Award, recognition by the national honor society Mortar Board as one of four Outstanding Professors at Texas Tech, and presentation of her choreography at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
Jill Priest
Jill Priest earned a Bachelor of Arts in Dance Education from the University of Central Oklahoma and the Master of Fine Arts in Choreography and Performance from Texas Woman’s University. Prior to joining the faculty at UCO, she founded and directed Tulsa Contemporary Dance Theatre, presenting work at the Living Arts New Genre Festival, the Tulsa Performing Arts Center and the Nightingale Theatre. For four years, Jill served as Dance Program Coordinator at Northeastern State University and Artistic Director of the GoVertigo Dance Company. As a passionate dance educator, she was co-creator of the original children’s ballet, “Dance of the Night Fears”, with composer and Enid Symphony Conductor, Douglas Newell. She has been invited to set works for Stephen F. Austin State University, Enid Symphony Orchestra, Perpetual Motion Modern Dance Oklahoma and the Cherokee Nation. Last year, Jill served on the Dance Content Advisory Committee for the Oklahoma Commission for Teacher Preparation and toured as a facilitator for Artcore Residencies at Tulsa area public schools. Jill and her husband, Michael, are the proud parents of Quinlan, Grady and Margo.
Heather Burns Chappell
Heather Burns Chappell is a dancer and choreographer specializing in Cuban dance. She has studied and performed with many Cuban specialists, including her work as a Master’s student in cultural anthropology with Cutumba Ballet Folklorico in Santiago de Cuba where she performed in Cuba’s International Festival of the Arts Fiesta del Fuego.
Heather first trained in African dance at Duke University with master teacher Chuck Davis. After conducting fieldwork in Cuba and completing her M.A., she began dancing professionally in Los Angeles with Juan Calvo Flores’s Unity Arts and Stage of the Arts Productions.
Over the past ten years, Heather has been performing, choreographing and teaching, and she continues to conduct research in Cuba. She has taught university students, K-12, first-generation US teens, and dance professionals in four countries. She has worked as a dance instructor with at-risk youth in Los Angeles public schools, and her dances have been performed at Dodger’s Stadium and numerous other venues and festivals in Seattle, Los Angeles, Arkansas, Tennesee, and Oklahoma. Through the American Dance Festival and International dance conferences, she has continued her training by studying with many professional companies including the African American Dance Ensemble, Afrique Aya, Alvin Ailey, Ailey II, Ballet Hispanico, David Dorfman, Grupo Corpo, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Lizt Alfonso’s Dance Cuba, Paul Taylor, Taylor II, Pilobolus, and Pilobolus II.
Rachel Bruce Johnson
Rachel Bruce Johnson is the founder and artistic director of The Bell House, a collaborative dance and art cooperative dedicated to creating opportunity for artistic exchange. Ms. Johnson’s film work is centralized around dance specifically made for the film medium. This entails considering dance and film equally in all its depth and complexity to fuse the two mediums into the genre of dance for camera. Ms. Bruce’s dance film work includes we all fall down, PASSAGES, Ideas in the Mirror, Prepare the Veil, PaperCUTS, and She Drew a Picture of a Whale. Ms. Johnson has worked as a soloist, contributing choreographer and filmmaker for various companies across the U.S. and abroad. Her work has garnished such critical comments as "excellence in kinetic artistry" [Loretta Livingston] and was included in the American College Dance Festival’s gala invitational in 2007. Ms. Johnson holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in Performance and Choreography from Texas Woman's University in Denton, TX. She has studied with such artists as Melody Ruffin-Ward (Rhode Island College), Sarah Gamblin (Bebe Miller), Mary Williford-Shade (Mark Taylor), Todd Rosenlieb (Erik Hawkins), and Bill Wade, Jr. (Inlet Dance Theatre). She is particularly interested in performance process and in creating work for the dance for camera genre. She has recently worked with the Dance Program at Unitec College in Auckland, New Zealand to facilitate the develop online exchanges between dance institutions. Rachel currently performs and choreographs with the Living Water Dance Company.
Rebekah Hampton
Rebekah Hampton is in her third season with Perpetual Motion/Modern Dance & is currently a staff instructor for the School of Ballet Oklahoma in Oklahoma City. She was recently a guest performer and currently trains with Oklahoma City Ballet. She also performed for 2 seasons with the Nashville-based, modern dance company, Epiphany.
While her principle forms are classical ballet (18 years) and modern dance (9 years), Rebekah’s multi-disciplinary training includes jazz, tap, hip-hop, gymnastics, rhythmic gymnastics, martial arts, weaponry, stage combat, physical conditioning, drama & mime.
Growing up in Edmond, OK, she trained with A.R.T.S., Metro School of Fine Arts, the Oklahoma Arts Institute and Ballet Oklahoma before moving to Jacksonville, FL to tour nationally & internationally for 3 years with Renascent Productions where, in addition to being a principle performer & choreographer, she was also the creator & director of Renascent School of the Arts