Dance advisors
Dawn Hartley
David Williams
Graham Jeffery
Lee Fisher
Lucy Mason
Patricia Eckersley
Steven Slater
Ian Spink
Sheridan Nicol
Ruby Worth
Ashley Smith
Ellie Carr
Janice Parker
Jean Cameron
June Adamson
Lesley Smith
Steven Brett
'I left Scotland aged 14 to continue dance training and academic studies at Bush-Davies School, East Grinstead and then at London Contemporary Dance School. On graduation, I joined Michael Clark and Company, touring worldwide and also working with colleagues Matthew Hawkins and Carol Straker on their projects.
In 1990, I became the Trainee Dance Artist in rural areas to the Scottish Arts Council, based in the Borders and Dumfries and Galloway. I performed with Liz Ranken in ‘Ooh!’ with an integrated company, Elaine MacDonald and Frank McConnell in Peter Royston’s ‘Emotional Precipices’ and Alan Greig and Brigid McCarthy in The X Factor dance company.
Brigid and I founded Incognita to make site specific and touring works from 1993 - 1998. I also worked with Transfigured, TAG, Scottish Youth Dance, NVA and made solo, trio and large-scale community works. I drove a bus to ‘Ut Delphi’ festival in Hungary, worked with Vicente Saez (through New Moves) and received a Lisa Ullmann Travelling Scholarship to work with Bosnian children in exile in Slovenia.
I was part time dance Lecturer for the Drama Department of Edinburgh’s Telford College from 1995-1999.
From 1996 – 2003 I was also part time Lecturer for the Vocal Studies Department at RSAMD teaching physical awareness for singers and choreographing for student operas (Carmen, Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Rake’s Progress). I also choreographed Dream for The Aldeburgh Festival in 2000 and played Puck.
From 1999 to 2006, I was Dance Artist to East Lothian Council based at Brunton Theatre. Among other things, I delivered dance sessions in schools, created the after school programme and delivered In Service training.
I performed with Company Chordelia in 2003, 2004 and 2005. Most recent freelance choreography for Licketyspit children’s theatre Molly Whauppie and Brunton Theatre’s pantomime Dick McWhittington.
I am delighted to have joined Scottish Dance Theatre as Education Manager in January 2007.'
'I am an executive manager, consultant and board member with over twenty years experience in the performing arts (of presenting, producing and touring in the commercial and subsidised sectors). I have substantial senior-level responsibilities including organisational development and change management, programming and producing, finance and budgeting, buildings and operations, marketing and customer service.
I have been twelve years in Scotland in various roles including Joint Chief Executive of Scottish Ballet, Chief Executive at the Glasgow King’s Theatre and Theatre Royal and two spells of freelance consultant/interim management service. Before that I had worked in touring and personnel at English National Ballet, producing at the Theatre Royal Stratford East and general management and marketing at the Cambridge Arts Theatre. I studied Drama and English at Hull University.
Right now I am on the board of Suspect Culture, I am the manager of what The Herald described as Scotland’s 'national folk orchestra', The Unusual Suspects (in March we played an outdoor concert at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate in front of some 25,000 people) and I am also developing six separate producing projects involving Scotland, England, USA and mainland Europe.'
Graham Jeffery is a researcher, consultant and composer based in the west of Scotland. He retains a part-time post as Senior Research Fellow at the University of East London and is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Open Creativity Centre, Open University. He also acts as a curriculum advisor for the Teacher-Artist Partnership professional development programme for London-based teachers and artists.
Graham was formerly Programme Leader for Performing Arts at the University of East London, where he led the development of an integrated and inclusive dance, theatre and music curriculum which developed an international reputation for its pioneering approach to community engagement, creative partnerships and inclusive pedagogy. This resulted in the publication of his book The Creative College: building a successful learning culture in the arts (Trentham Books, 2005).
Graham has also published work on youth arts, local cultural policy, and culture and regeneration. He was a contributor to the Roberts Review 'Nurturing Creativity in Young People' which was jointly commissioned in 2006 by the DCMS and DFES. Current research includes a three year AHRC-funded study exploring the discourses of learning and inclusion in informal performing arts projects with young people, and work on a study of the role of the arts in community radio commissioned by the Community Media Association.
Graham's work as a composer includes local and international film and dance projects with young people supported by the British Council, LIFT, NESTA and East London Dance. He is currently working with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra facilitating a professional development residency for visual artists and orchestral musicians based in Durness, Sutherland. His work in dance and theatre has included commissioned music and audio for site-specific projects which have been performed as part of London International Festival of Theatre, the Greenwich and Docklands international festival and internationally in Lisbon and Bologna.
Lee Fisher is part-time Head of Creative Learning at Birmingham Royal Ballet, a freelance project director, choreographer and dance artist in education.
Born in Essex, Lee was educated at the Royal Ballet School before joining Sadler’s Wells Royal Ballet (now Birmingham Royal Ballet) in 1988.
In 17 year career with Birmingham Royal Ballet, Lee became a soloist, performed many leading roles in ballets such as Romeo and Juliet, Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker as well as host of 20th Century and new works. With the company he toured nationally and internationally and created roles for choreographers including Sir Kenneth Macmillan, Sir Peter Wright and David Bintley CBE. Despite retiring from a fulltime dancing career in 2005, he continues to perform and has since made guest appearances in Shanghai, London, Oxford and Birmingham.
In 2000, he obtained an MA in Applied Dance and has authored and presented papers, for academic journals and at conferences nationally and internationally. In 2002, he co-founded and is Artistic Director to Birmingham Royal Ballet’s and Fox Hollies Performing Arts College’s highly successful education and community initiative, Freefall Dance Company; a company of young dancers with learning disabilities.
In his capacity as Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Head of Creative Learning and as a freelance director and dance artist, he has devised and directed a wide range of interventions with partners across many art forms and in education and community contexts.
He was Dance Fellow 2005/06 on The Clore Leadership Programme, an initiative that supports and develops leadership in the cultural sector, is alumni of the Windsor Leadership Trust and fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts.
Lucy Mason is currently on secondment from her position as Chief Executive of Dance Base, Scotland’s National Centre for Dance, to the Scottish Executive’s department of Culture and Gaelic where she is working as an advisor to the new National Performing Companies unit.
Lucy has an MA (Hons) from Oxford University and an MA in European Cultural Policy and Administration from Warwick University. Since 1985 Lucy has gained extensive experience of producing, touring and managing the performing arts. She has been in Scotland since 1995 when she took up the post of Administrative Producer at Edinburgh’s Traverse Theatre – a position she held until she moved to Dance Base in 2001. Prior to this her positions included General Manager of Second Stride dance company in London, Administrator with Welsh National Opera and Concerts Assistant with the London Sinfonietta/Opera Factory.
Lucy is a Board member of Licketyspit theatre company and Magnetic North Theatre Productions. She was a member of the Scottish Executive’s Cultural Commission and has previously been a member of Scottish Arts Council’s Drama Committee and a Specialist Advisor for the Scottish Arts Council's Drama department. She is also a drama and dance advisor to the British Council.
Patricia trained at the Laban Centre for Movement and Dance, London with Dr Peter Brinson who pioneered the first dance in education training programme in the UK. She was a founding member of the Dance Council for Scotland and the Belford Centre for Dance. She initiated a successful partnership with Edinburgh City Council in establishing the first dance programme at the Assembly Rooms. This resulted in the formation of Dance Base, the National Centre for Dance.
Patricia has worked and taught for a number of years in community dance and education and recently undertook a major review of dance in education for East Renfrewshire Council. She has worked closely with East Lothian Council on devising a creative movement programme for children as part of the Council’s Perceptual Motor Programme. She has been an Advisor and External Assessor for dance at the Dance School of Scotland, Dundee and Edinburgh’s Telford College and worked for a number of years as the Dance Officer at the Scottish Arts Council.
In 1992 she was awarded the Association Francaise d’ Artistique by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Her specialist interest is in dance and education. In 2003 she completed training with the Institute of Neuro-Physiological Psychology and works closely with schools and children with movement and co-ordination problems. Patricia is a Trustee of the Peter Darrell Trust (the founder of Scottish Ballet).
'At the start I was a Punk who went to art school as a way out - winding up studying film, installation and performance. On graduating, I moved to Brighton and, as a way to earn some extra cash, took a position as coordinator of Zap Artreach, a community project linked to the Zap Club.
Moving to Glasgow, I began my re-education in arts programming. Timing is everything, and I suppose my arrival in Glasgow in 1988, in the build up to Glasgow’s ‘1990 City of Culture’, was very fortuitous. At the Third Eye Centre, I was able to define my programming skills and artistic parameters – inspired by much of the work I saw - particularly dance, theatre and performance. The flood of artists, ideas and new work that passed through the city during this time set the standard for my programming vision.
After Third Eye I became Administrator at Paisley Arts Centre. I learnt about the difficulties of balancing a programme with the needs of the local community. Commissioning dance from Scotland and the UK, coupled with my desire to occasionally turn the building upside down and inside out brought me to the attention of Bob Palmer and the Performing Arts Department, which ran Tramway….Now, eleven years on, Tramway is almost a part of me. I love its ability to change, adapt and nurture.
There is always challenge here, always questions to be answered. Tramway is a gateway to new ideas. It’s an adrenalin rush of new visions and experiences, which I guess I’m hooked on. If history is the fire that forges the future, I hope I can continue to help feed the flames.'
Ian Spink trained at the Australian Ballet School and danced and choreographed with The Australian Ballet, Australian Dance Theatre and the Dance Company of New South Wales prior to moving to London in 1977.
In London Ian performed with Richard Alston and dancers and started his own ACE funded Ian Spink Group (1978-82). In 1982 he co-founded Second Stride Dance (1982-96) Company with Siobhan Davies and Richard Alston. In 1988 he took over sole artistic directorship of the company with Antony McDonald as associate director, and initiated a move in the company's output towards experimental multi-disciplinary dance and music theatre. He directed nine full-length works for Second Stride, commissioning writers, directors, designers and composers including Caryl Churchill, Sian Evans, Tim Albery, Martin Duncan, Peter Mumford, Lucy Bevan, Antony McDonald, Evelyn Ficarra, Judith Weir, and Orlando Gough amongst others.
Ian's freelance work has included directing (Citizens Theatre, Scottish Opera) choreography and movement directing (Rambert, ENO, RSC, RNT and Opera North) as well as leading creative workshops.
Over the past 3 years Ian has been the Artistic Director of Citymoves which provides community and professional dance services to the Aberdeen and the North East. Citymoves also works in partnership with The Lemon Tree Studio and Peacock Visual Arts with dance and workshop programming. Recent new initiatives include the danceLive! season of new dance with live music and fast+Dirty dance and multi-artform workshops in October each year.
Ian has recently presented '3 of 26 Solos' at the POOL performance in Dundee and is currently planning a new production of Stravinsky's 'Petrushka' for Scottish Ballet's 2009 Edinburgh Festival program. Ian is a trustee on the board of YDance.
Sheridan Nicol is one of the UK's most respected and well travelled Director/Choreographers working in Theatre, TV, Video, Film, Cabaret and Corporate Entertainment. As a performer she worked worldwide in all aspects of the industry and was one of the very few Scottish performers to have the privelege of working with Broadway luminaries such as Bob Fosse, Roger Minami and Ron Field when she was in the USA and Director/Choreographers from the golden age of TV such as Dougie Squires, Victor Upshaw, Paddy Stone, Bruce McClure, Irvine Davies, David Toguri and Gillian Lynne.
As a Director/Choreographer she has staged hundreds of projects worldwide in all aspects of the industry. Credits include Director/Choreographer at Edinburgh King's Theatre from 1986-1995 including Stanley Baxter's last pantomime, 'Cinderella' and Director of Aladdin, Dick Whittington and Sleeping Beauty which are still being staged throughout the UK.
Sheridan also spent ten years at Glasgow's Pavilion Theatre as Director with record breaking runs with The Krankies, Andy Cameron, Tony Roper and the casts of River City and High Road.
TV credits include Summertime Specials (TVE Spain), Taggart, The Saturday Show, Choreography Pebble Mill at One, Choreography Anglia TV Norwich, Choreography Grampian TV Hogmanay shows and BBC Children in Need 2005 and 2006.
Sheridan is the founder and Artistic Director of Jazz Art UK.
Ruby Worth studied Community Arts in Edinburgh and later received a BA (hons) Degree in Theatre Studies from Dartington College of Arts.
Over the past 14 years, she has created a strong repertory of pioneering dance theatre performances and large-scale community arts events including 'Tracing Houdini' (Scottish Arts Council Venue and Artist Scheme at CCA), 'The Family Project' (Year of the Artist Award) and 'Hoops Hats & Acrobats' (a National Lottery commission through Imaginate for the International Childrens Festival). Her extensive performance experience has seen her regularly touring throughout Scotland with companies including Karl Jay-Lewin, Dogdaze Theatre and Cartoon Theatre in the Herald Angel award winning show 'The Comic'.
Ruby is also a dedicated teacher of dance and facilitator of creative projects for young people, working both locally and internationally. She was recently elected onto her local council as the Youth Listener Convener, serving the voice of the young people in her local community. This is Ruby's third year as an advisor to the Scottish Arts Council Dance and Drama Departments.
Ashley Smith is a researcher with a special interest in dance and Scottish cultural policy. Currently working for the Macaulay Institute in Aberdeen, Ashley has recently completed PhD research in association with the University of the West of Scotland. This work, titled 'Embodying Scotland: Identity, Cultural Policy, Dance' explores questions about national identity in scotland by investigating dance practice and specific pieces of dance in the context of post-devolution Scottish national cultural policy.
Ashley will carry this research interest forward through a proposed piece of new research which focussing on cultural policy's implementation at a local level and its links to well-being in rural communities. She is an ongoing member of several research associations including the Congress on Research in Dance (CORD) and the Society for Dance Research (SDR).
In addition to an interest in dance, Ashley has a background in studying and working in the creative industries in the United States. After completing a master's degree in film and television studies, Ashley spent several years working for WGBH (an American public broadcaster) in Boston, Massachusetts.
Ellie began dancing with Tracey Hawkes in Spring Lothian Youth Dance Company aged 15. She trained at De Montfort University, Leicester and London Contemporary Dance School (LCDS) and has a BA (Hons) degree in Contemporary Dance. She was the founding editor of the LCDS magazine: which was good while it lasted. After college she taught contemporary and creative dance to adults and children in Edinburgh and Lothians and further developed an early interest in dance film, working on projects with Katrina McPherson, Steve Hooper and Scottish Youth Dance Festival. She was lucky to work briefly with Morag Deyes and Cindy Sughrue at Edinburgh’s Dance Base in its original Assembly Rooms' home.
Following injury she turned to writing and quite unintentionally began an alternative career. She began at the List (Glasgow & Edinburgh Entertainments Guide) writing dance reviews and was somehow turned into a journalist by then Editor, Kathleen Morgan. From 1994 to 1998 she worked on staff at The List, as Assistant Editor, Dance Editor/Critic and whatever else was thrown her way. During this time she also wrote on dance and general features for Sunday Times Scotland, The Guardian, Company magazine amongst others and appeared regularly on BBC Radio Scotland’s arts review show The Usual Suspects as both presenter and contributor.
Following maternity leave she worked on Scotland on Sunday as Fashion and Lifestyle Editor, Associate Editor (Spectrum magazine) and then Arts Editor (Seven magazine)
Between 2001 and 2007 she worked freelance as dance critic for the Sunday Herald and as a features journalist for a wide variety of publications. These included the Sunday Herald, The Herald, Sunday Times Scotland, The Independent, Metro, The Sunday Tribue (Ireland), The Guardian, Edinburgh Festivals magazine, Dance Europe, Scottish Ballet (magazine). She also worked regularly for BBC Radio Scotland as a contributor on The Radio Cafe, The Fred MacAulay Show, The Gary Robertson Show.
From 2007-2008 she worked as Marketing & Development Manager for Pilates Works whilst undertaking training as a Pilates instructor with Body Control Pilates in London. She qualified as a Pilates instructor in 2008 and is delighted to be involved in bodywork once again.
"I am an independent dance artist and work across a number of disciplines.
My original training is in Laban Movement. My first job in dance 1980-1987 was in a hospital setting. From 1987 – 1989 I was Arts and Disability officer with The Arts in Fife, followed by Director of Dance for ProjectAbility during Glasgow’s year as European Capital of Culture in 1990.
Since 1991 I have worked with numerous large and small scale organisations, dance companies and individuals here in Scotland, in Europe and for a number of years, in Canada. I initiate, direct and produce projects, act as consultant and advisor as well as choreograph, teach and occasionally perform.
I have a strong focus on bringing the professional and community dance worlds together. I am interested in the performance potential and contribution of people who are not traditionally trained and am particularly experienced in collaborating with people with disabilities. I create live performance and dance for camera in theatre settings and site specific situations, ranging from 100 or more performers to solo work and I often collaborate with other artists and art-forms.
In 2005 I was the recipient of a Creative Scotland Award which resulted in the publication ‘Take A Look At What Is Actually There’.
Recently I was part of the Artist as Leader arts lab run by the Cultural Enterprise Office; was a core group member of Working in Public with Suzanne Lacy and On The Edge Research; and had an article published in Animated
Currently I am on a Scottish Arts Council pARTners residency to develop work in collaboration with people with complex learning disabilities in their home environments; am working in various parts of Germany on large scale community choreographies while mentoring German based dance artists to work as artists in residence; and I am a member of the Public Art Reference Group for the Scottish Arts Council."
Jean Cameron is the Producer for Glasgow international Festival of Contemporary Visual Art (the Gi Festival). On an occasional basis she develops independent initiatives as The Arts Practice, which instigates projects that are “practice” led rather than artform led, spanning dance and performance, discursive events and interactive audio works, the most recent of which being her choreographic residency “Vote with Your Feet” at DanceBase in October 2007.
In 2006, Jean was awarded an inaugural Creative Producer’s Bursary award from the Scottish Arts Council and she was a core member of Gray’s School of Art’s Group working with the seminal artist Suzanne Lacy on Arts Practice, Public and Policy in 2007.
Jean’s freelance portfolio spans live art, contemporary dance, theatre and visual arts, including project manager for Selective Memory: Scotland & Venice 05, Scotland’s national presentation at the Venice Biennale; Arts Programmer at The Arches; co-ordinator for the Dance Producers’ Network Guardians of Doubt and producing a range of Scottish artists at the Eccentrico theatre festivals in Turin, including Al Seed, Highway Diner, Dudendance Theatre and Stillmotion.
Jean has also worked as Dance and Performance Programmer at CCA and as Programme Manager for the New Territories and NRLA festivals, as programme co-ordinator for Dance Productions and festival administrator for Scottish Youth Dance Festival. She has worked on projects with a range of internationally acclaimed artists including Saburo Teshiguwara, Fabrik Potsdam, Derevo, Lone Twin and Bock & Vincenzi.
Biography to follow
Biography to follow
Born in Australia, Steven trained as a dancer at the Victorian College of Arts and the Australian Ballet School. He joined NDTII under Jiri Kylian in 1986. In 1988 he joined Rambert Dance Company under Richard Alston, dancing there for 10 years. He became a rehearsal director under Christopher Bruce being appointed the Associate Artistic Director in 2000, a position he continued to hold after the appointment of Mark Baldwin as Artistic Director. As well as sitting on the senior management team planning the artistic and strategic goals of the company, his responsibilities also covered all aspects of maintaining and rehearsing the full repertoire; dancers scheduling and health; the public face of the company including interviews; and all liaising with artistic partners (choreographers, designers, technical team, marketing).
In 2004 Steven joined the British Council as a Drama and Dance Projects Manager covering the geographical areas of Western Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Southern Africa. Responsibilities for the job included advising and managing a diverse range of projects from capacity building projects to large scale showcases for dance, new writing, live art, physical theatre, outdoor performance in the UK in partnership with festivals and producing venues. |