PROJECTS

I advance the scope of American tap dance and jazz music traditions through my live improvisations, my fresh approaches to composition and arrangement in my concert work, and community tap projects that bring people of all ages together.

Current

  • Jazz stories weave together tap dance, original music and written text to tell a narrative tale. The subject matter can range from musicians to periods of jazz history to abstract themes, told through jazz music. The stories can be factual, fictional, wildly imaginary, boldly futuristic or a mix of all these things.What I aim to do with my jazz stories is not make them straight biographies and instead enrich relevant themes with my own voice. This work of telling other people’s stories inevitably reveals facets of my own journey in dance and music. I start researching, and the stuff I find is just a portal into my own experiences; perhaps that is why I am drawn to them, or why they are drawn to me.

    Jazz Story 1 (2021): Tyner and Timmons (TNT)

    Jazz Story 2 (2022): Trouble the Water

    Jazz Story 3 (2023): Terry Pollard: A Jazz Epistolary

    Jazz Story 4 (2024): Beryl Booker

    Jazz Story 5 (2026): Dottie Smith

  • Item desTaking as inspiration Terri Lyne Carrington's movement "JAZZ WITHOUT PATRIARCHY," which centers the work of woman and nonbinary musicians to generate discourse around the ways jazz culture can be transformed to reflect true gender justice, "Jazz on a Women's Day" is an initiative that centers Philly women-identifying musicians and presents them on visible stages and accessible spaces throughout the city. Creative Philadelphia supported an April 2025 concert at Athletic Recreation Center which featured seven women in jazz at Athletic Recreation Center in North Philadelphia.

    Click here for concert videos.

  • Click here to enjoy this Youtube playlist of my favorite live moments.

  • Click here to watch some of my favorite concert work that showcases performances from Fairmount Waterworks, ArtYard, Symphony Space, PhillyCAM and more.

Past

  • I’ve greatly enjoyed the opportunity to meet countless Philly tap dancers at my studio spaces and the events that I produced over the last two decades. Click to see some of my group choreographies demonstrate pure Philly tap joy; it’s a privilege to have been a part of it all.


    2013 - Dorothy Wasserman & Jane Goldberg

    2015 - Heather Cornell

    2016 - Max Pollak

    2017 - Ray Hesselink

    2016-2020 National Tap Dance Day Celebrations

  • Click here to enjoy performances of my students at Smith Playground’s Kidchella, Girard Avenue Street Festival, Olney Youth Arts Festival and the Brewerytown Tap Dance Festival.

  • 2023 Best Music Performance Winner, Philadelphia Fringe Festival. We advanced the scope of American tap dance and jazz music traditions through current choreography, modern compositions, progressive performances and accessible environments and contexts for the work.

    The PJTE was commissioned by Jazz Bridge (Neighborhood Concert), The Philadelphia Jazz Project (7X7 Series, Whitman at 200, POOL), Creative Philadelphia (Music at the Market, Culture in the Courtyard, Creative Avenues, Neighborhood Arts), Dixon Place (30-30-30, Eight in Show), The Barnes Foundation (Free First Sunday), The Outlet Dance Project, the Allentown Art Museum (Third Thursday), Symphony Space (Stam-Pede/APAP), ArtYard and the Fairmount Waterworks. The PJTE has been featured on the nationally-syndicated arts program, Articulate. They received organizational and project grant funding from New Music USA (2022-2023), the Philadelphia Cultural Fund (2016-2024), the Connelly Foundation (2023-2024), Dolfinger-McMahon (2023), and the PA Council on the Arts (2016-2019), Youth Enrichment Grant/PCF (2020).

    Philly Youth Tap, a project of the PJTE and based at Athletic Recreation Center in 19121, has appeared at Olney Youth Arts Festival, Smith Playground, Temple University, City Hall, Cherry Street Pier, the Mann, Fairmount Arts Crawl, and at the Girard Avenue Street Festival. The children were awarded a 2025 grant from Philadelphia Youth Sports Collaborative.

  • I founded and scaled a performing arts organization from startup to three locations, leading a team of up to 20 instructors and staff while designing educational programming, managing operations, driving community engagement, and overseeing strategic growth. Sound Space Performing Arts was the only urban dance conservatory of its kind in Philadelphia, with a principal focus on preserving and advancing percussive dance. I conceptualized, created and executed ongoing dance programming for youths and adults; created and executed ongoing residency programs through space rentals and performance opportunities. I hired and managed a team of 10-20 faculty, independent contractors and staff; I developed new teaching talent through mentoring and internships; I directed all of the educational programs and taught all available classes for youths and adults. I expanded the business to three locations in ten years; and grew the facility three times, from 600 square feet to a total of 3000 square feet. I was the winner of the Storefront Improvement Grant in 2020 to paint a 30-foot mural on 2511 W Girard building. I contracted Kaitlin Chow to paint the mural and it still stands there today.

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