Reggie Brown (lyrical modern) was born and raised in Los Angeles and began his formal dance training at Santa Monica Dance Center while pursuing an acting career. After accepting a work-study position at Steven Peck Dance Studio in L.A., Mr. Brown became a member of the Los Angeles Contemporary Dance Theater under Lula Washington. Mr. Brown has been featured on television in commercials for Cherry Coke and L.A. Gear, acting and choreographing his own dance segments, and he has also been on radio stations B104-Baltimore, WZAK-Cleveland and WVEE-Atlanta. He has worked with a wide variety of talent - professional cheerleaders, recording artists, fitness competitors and actors. His commercial choreography includes two routines for the NBA Los Angeles Clipper Spirit Cheerleaders and the music video "Paradise" that was featured on Caribbean Vibes on the B.E.T. cable network.
One of L.A.'s most respected dance teachers, Mr. Brown is known for his ability to nurture a dancer to a higher technical and performance level. His concert work exudes both spiritual and social awareness. He has taught and facilitated master classes at many popular dance studios in Southern California including Tremaine Dance Center, Loyola Marymount University, Santa Monica College and Moro-Landis Dance Center. Mr. Brown was a participating choreographer for the annual Jazz Dance L.A. concerts from 1994 to 1997. In 1998, he was a featured choreographer for the highly successful Men Dancing at the John Anson Ford Amphitheater. In the spring of 1999, he was commissioned to choreograph a piece for the Synapse Modern Dance Theater at Santa Monica College. During the fall of 1999, Loyola Marymount University also commissioned a piece for their spring 2000 faculty concert.
Mr. Brown used his talents to encourage and inspire at-risk children and youth at Hollygrove Youth Home in Hollywood from May, 2002 to the spring of 2004. He also worked with former Balanchine dancer Zina Bethune's Foundation "Unbound Dreams" to support mentally and physically challenged youth. Mr. Brown has been teaching at Katnap Dance Center in West Los Angeles since 1991 and has been privileged to work with and to mentor the gifted performing arts students at at Los Angeles County High School for the Arts since 2001. Mr. Brown has aspirations of producing and directing and wants to form a multimedia performing artist group that will challenge and uplift the human spirit.
Classes
Lyrical Modern
Ka-Ron Brown Lehman has worked extensively as a dancer, teacher and choreographer, as well as on TV and the Concert stage. Carolyn Skyers and J. Erglis Smaltzoff trained her. James Truitt was very influential on her development in modern dance, and Doug Rivera provided much of her jazz training. Others who had a major impact on her style are Joseph Richard, Karol Shook and Thelma Hill. Maestro Smaltzoff used her extensively in his ballet and eastern European folkloric companies, and she performed with the Joseph Richard African-American Ballet Co., Jimmie Fields Afro-Cuban Ballet, Andre Tremaine's Pacific Ballet Theatre, and Tommy Johnson Afro-Cuban Dance Co. Her first professional theatre experience came in Don't Bother Me I Can't Cope at the Huntington Hartford, followed by Oscar Brown Jr.'s It's About Time and Jon Hendricks Evolution of The Blues, which won her the Drama Logue Critics Award. She appeared in Sancocho at the Public Theatre, and Rockín Roll-The First 5000 Years, at the St. James Theatre on Broadway. Some of her choreography credits include numerous shows at Inner City Cultural Center, e.g. Showgirls, Wings'n Things, Four Seasons, If They Come Back, Sang Sista Sang, Brilliant Colours and Othello with Ted Lange. She also choreographed NAACP Image Award Shows, and Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame.As a teacher Ka-Ron's special gifts are, spotting talent, motivating students to work and helping students to unlock their emotions through dance. She won A Distinguished Teacher Award by the White House Commission on Presidential Scholars. Currently Ms. Lehman is the Artistic Director of the Dance Department at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts (LACHSA). In the last ten years, she has devoted much of her energy toward the development of two projects, the Lehman Dance Co. and the Annual Lehman Awards. The Lehman Awards were created in 1993, to honor members of the dance community, and to educate todayís young dance students about the pioneers of dance. The Lehman Dance Co. has been seen in Kaleidoscope and at various venues in the Los Angeles area, e.g. California State University at Northridge, AFI Awards and The Alex Theatre. In 1999, the company was invited to perform a series of concerts at the premiere gala opening of Latria, a new Performing Arts Center in Martinique. Recently, Ka-Ron paid tribute through dance to Beah Richards together with Mel Carter, Danced the Spirit of Billie Holiday in Stephen Semien's Elegy for a Lady, a birthday bash tribute for Ms. Holiday and choreographed a national commercial for Bayer Aspirin, starring Ben Vereen.
The past three Spring Dance Concert Productions for LACHSA (2002-2004), Ka-Ron successfully re-staged, produced, directed as well as choreographed along with her talented faculty, three complete Ballets; Stravinsky's Firebird, at the Luckman, Stravinsky's Rite of Spring and Prokofiev's Cinderella, and Peter Pan, at the Alex Theatre in Glendale.
Classes
Contemporary Modern Ballet
Don Martin’s association with Lester Horton began when Don Martin was invited by a friend and classmate (Alvin Aliey) to observe a class in modern dance which another classmate (Carmen de Lavallade) was taking at The Lester Horton Dance Theater. Sitting in the back of the theater, Mr. Martin was transfixed and completely engulfed by the experience. There was Mr. Horton teaching an advanced class with Bella Lewitzky demonstrating. Mr. Martin could not believe what he was seeing nor did he know that this was the beginning of a major change in his life. He walked away from the theater that night knowing that this was what he wanted to do and be a part of.
Mr. Martin enrolled in classes and was given a work scholarship. He was exposed to everything under the watchful eye of Mr. Horton. He studied all aspects of theater life at the Horton School, from box office to backstage, theater crafts and costuming. After the dissolution of the partnership between Horton and Lewitzky, Mr. Horton completely recodified his technique using his dancers, Carmen de Lavallade, James Truitte, Joyce Trisler, Lelia Goldoni, Misaye Kawasumi and Mr. Martin. They had to write in long hand and demonstrate the new movement. Not only did Mr. Martin learn the technique but Horton taught him to find the spirit of the dance because he said, "One does not exist without the other." Mr. Martin was asked to start learning some of the dances of the current season and was soon an understudy in the company. He later became a full member of the company and a teacher at the school.
After the death of Mr. Horton in 1953, Mr. Frank Eng took over leadership of the theater and school and kept it in operation with the assistance of James Truitte, Yvonne de Lavallade, Lilyan Silver and Mr. Martin. The theatre finally closed its doors in 1960. Mr. Martin then went to New York where he worked with Donald McKayle and later joined the Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre of America. While in New York, he and Mr. Truitte taught at the Clark Center, headquarters for the Ailey company. Martin did the first tour (Asian tour) with the Ailey company. Mr. Martin later returned to Los Angeles for a visit and again went through a major change. He taught master classes at Inner City and at other venues in the Los Angeles area including UCLA; CSU, Northridge and CSU, Long Beach. Eventually Mr. Martin made the decision to leave dance for a more 'secure' living and went into the retail clothing business, working for Mr. Guy as his assistant and buyer.
After a very long lapse away from dance, Mr. Martin was called back into the field. The Horton papers and memorabilia were purchased by the Library of Congress. In September of 1996, as part of the American University Department of Performing Arts season in conjunction with the Library of Congress, they put on a 'Horton' week, displaying photographs and drawings and a five-day dance concert. Martin was asked to come to Washington, DC to teach for the fall semester and to reconstruct some of the choreographies. He attempted the project with much trepidation as he had only three months to teach graduate students a technique that takes years to learn. Aside from the extreme difficulty of the technique, the ballets are some of the hardest to perform. The project was a tall order and a very demanding one but with much hard work and cooperation from the students, the concert came off far better than expected.
Mr. Martin has taught at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts for the last three years and also teaches classes at the Dance Arts Academy. He continues to develop the corporation (LHDT, Inc.) whose objective is to preserve the legacy, works and technique of Lester Horton to be passed on and made available to future dancers and educators.
Classes
Horton Technique
Anthony Johnson
is the Founder/Co-Director of Ballet Magique, a performance company that fuses dance with other movement arts and magic and illusions. He has trained and danced as a soloist for many prestigious ballet, modern, opera companies across the United States. Mr. Johnson has performed in every genre of dance performance, working from theme parks to cruise ships, Broadway to regional theatre, music video to live concert tours, film television and commercials. Some of his credits include “Drivin’USA” tour with Paul McCartney, television show “Son of the Beach,” Royal Caribbean Cruises, Busch Entertainment, Arista Records 25 th Anniversary, Dream Girls, A Chorus Line, White Castle commercial, Jenny Jones with Little Ritchie, Randy Newman’s Faust, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, International Ballet Rotatu, Ballet Theatre of Chicago, The Chicago Festival Ballet, The Lula Washington Dance Theatre, Atlanta Ballet, the LA Opera, Physical Rhythm Project, James Kelly Project, Second City Ballet, “Those Funny Little People,” Colors Dance Theatre, Contemporary Ballet Theatre, River City Ballet and the Tampa and Colorado Ballet. Mr. Johnson received a nomination for “Outstanding Achievement in Choreography” at the 2004 Lester Horton Awards for his work “Ring of the Rose” which also received nominations for “Outstanding Achievement in Lighting” and “Outstanding Achievement in Costume Design.” He has worked with choreographers Debra Brown (Cirque de Soliel), Shamiel Yagudin (Bolshoi Ballet), Donald MacKayle (Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre) and Laura Alonso (National Ballet of Cuba). He received scholarships to train at the famed Second City School in Chicago, Wright State University, University of South Florida and Point Park College in Pittsburgh. He has performed leading roles for ballets and operas that include: “The Prodigal Son,” “Afternoon of a Faun,” “The Rite of Spring,” “Giselle,” “Petruska,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Aida,” “Faust,” and “Swan Lake.” Nominated for “Best Choreography” by the Black Theater Alliance Awards of Chicago, he was a;so nominated for “Best Actor” for his role as Tommy Gomez in the Katherine Dunham Story at the Black Ensemble Theatre. He has taught ballet classes all over the United States and at regularly at The West Side School of Ballet in Santa Monica, Millennium Dance Complex in North Hollywood and Hama’s Dance Studio in Hollywood. His private students have been accepted at American Ballet Theatre, School of American Ballet, The San Francisco Ballet School, The Houston Ballet, Boston Ballet School, and Alvin Ailey Dance Theatre of America. Classes
Contemporary Modern Ballet