Jazz Khai Bynum: is a company corps artist with Ballet West. She began training at the age of 5 in Hudson Repertory Dance Theatres’ after school program. She continued her training in Maryland with Maryland Youth Ballet and Dance Theatre of Harlems’ Residency Program at the Kennedy Center. Jazz has also received her B.F.A in Contemporary Performance with an emphasis in ballet from The Boston Conservatory. Jazz came to Ballet West as a Trainee in 2018, joined Ballet West II in 2019 and now is in her fourth season as a Corps Artist with Ballet West. While she continues to enjoy her career as a ballet dancer, she has enjoyed exploring the choreographic process. She is excited to share the premiere of her new work “With Feeling” with you. 

Natalie Desch (she/her): is an artist and educator hailing from New Castle, Pennsylvania. A BFA graduate of the Juilliard School and an MFA graduate of the University of Washington, she performed for five seasons with the Limón Dance Company and eleven seasons with Doug Varone and Dancers in NYC. She additionally danced soloist roles in various productions at the Metropolitan Opera and other regional opera companies around the US. Natalie has restaged the works of José Limón, Doug Varone, Jirí Kylián, and Daniel Charon on performing groups around the world, and her choreography has been presented at venues throughout the country. In 2014 Natalie relocated to Salt Lake City, UT, and began teaching at Ballet West Academy, Westminster College, Utah Valley University, and Salt Lake Community College. Natalie joined the University of Utah’s School of Dance as an Assistant Professor in 2019.

José Limón (1908-1972):  electrified the world with his dynamic masculine dancing and dramatic choreography. One of the 20th century’s most important and influential dance makers, he spent his entire career pioneering a new art form and fighting for the recognition and establishment of the American Modern Dance. Born in Culiacán, Mexico in 1908, he immigrated to California in 1915, and in 1928 Limón came to New York and saw his first dance program. Limón enrolled in the dance school of Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman and, from 1930 - 1940, performed in works created by his teachers. In 1946, with Doris Humphrey as Artistic Director, Limón formed his own company. Over the following 25 years, he established himself and his company as one of the major forces of 20th century dance. Limón was a key faculty member in The Juilliard School's Dance Division beginning in 1953 and continued choreographing until his death in 1972. Limón choreographed a total of seventy-four works, including The Moor’s Pavane, Missa Brevis, There is a Time, The Traitor, and Psalm.

Amy Miller is a NYC-based dancer, choreographer, educator, administrator and advocate.  Recently appointed as Gibney’s new Director of Engagement, she builds on her long dedication to both artistry and social action by facilitating the deepening of reciprocal exchange with educational institutions and building new programming that further acknowledges the fractal nature of transformation both inside and outside the studio in our constantly shifting world.

Originally from Ohio, her youth as a gymnast evolved into training at The Dance Institute at the University of Akron. She spent a decade at the Ohio Ballet where she performed works by a wide-range of choreographers including José Limon, Lucinda Childs, George Balanchine and Alonzo King.  She was a founding member of Cleveland-based GroundWorks DanceTheater where she choreographed numerous works and continues her ongoing connection as artistic advisor.  Since 2012, she has been a Director and a performing member of Gibney Company performing works by Gina Gibney, Bryan Arias, Peter Chu and Shannon Gillen.

Interested in revealing ways to foster both artistic excellence and social engagement in all her work, Miller strives to prioritize both components in equal measure.  For nearly a decade, Miller has focused on Gibney’s Community Action initiatives and has worked closely with social workers toward facilitating movement workshops with survivors of gender-based violence, conducted both local and international trainings for artists interested in engaging in social action, and facilitated healthy relationship workshops for young people to raise awareness about the role of the arts in violence prevention. Miller will steward the expansion of the Moving Toward Justice platform at Gibney providing a supportive curriculum for activating arts-based social justice projects aimed at addressing gaps in the field.  Miller co-facilitates creative spaces for advocacy alongside Gibney’s ‘Move to Move Beyond Storytellers,’ a group of survivors creating performances for audiences and performers alike to deepen our critical consciousness, witness the power of reclaiming one’s agency, and move toward shared liberation. Actively moving toward co-creating spaces that value antiracism as a foundational tenet, Miller is a facilitation committee member of Gibney’s internal Decentering Whiteness Working Group offering white-identifying staff members opportunities to unlearn oppressive structures, as well as dovetail energies with Gibney’s Multiracial Staff Group directly addressing reducing harm to and support of our BIPOC staff and greater community.

Miller has facilitated teaching residencies at Oberlin College, Brown University, NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Bates Dance Festival, SUNY Purchase and The National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron among many others.  Miller is currently a teaching artist for the Bard College Dance Program/Gibney Partnership, a multi-year engagement that represents a wide-ranging vision of what dance can be in a liberal arts curriculum.  She has conducted Gibney Company international residencies at Mimar Sinan University and Koc University (Istanbul), University of Cape Town (South Africa), DOCH: School of Dance and Circus (Stockholm), MUDA Africa (Tanzania) and Gisenyi, Rwanda. Miller has thrice been a Dance/USA Mentor through their Institute for Leadership Training. Miller was honored to receive an Arts & Artists in Progress “Pay it Forward” Award from Brooklyn Arts Exchange.  Miller holds a BFA in Dance and is a recipient of an Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award for her choreography.

Marius Petipa (1818-1910): was a French and Russian ballet dancer, pedagogue, and choreographer. Petipa is one of the most influential ballet masters and choreographers in ballet history.
 
Marius Petipa is noted for his long career as Premier maître de ballet (First Ballet Master) of the St. Petersburg Imperial Theatres, making him Ballet Master and principal choreographer of the Imperial Ballet (today known as the Mariinsky Ballet), a position he held from 1871 until 1903. Petipa created over fifty ballets, some of which have survived in versions either faithful to, inspired by, or reconstructed from his originals. He is most noted for The Pharaoh's Daughter (1862); Don Quixote (1869); La Bayadère (1877); Le Talisman (1889); The Sleeping Beauty (1890); The Nutcracker (choreographed jointly with Lev Ivanov) (1892); Le Réveil de Flore (1894); La Halte de cavalerie (1896); Raymonda (1898); Les Saisons (1900), and Les Millions d'Arlequin (a.k.a. Harlequinade) (1900).
 
Petipa also revived a substantial number of works created by other choreographers. Many of his revivals have become the basis of the majority of subsequent productions of those works. The most famous of Petipa's revivals are Le Corsaire, Giselle,La Esmeralda, Coppélia, La Fille Mal Gardée (with Lev Ivanov), The Little Humpbacked Horse, and Swan Lake (with Lev Ivanov).

Tyler Schnese (he/they) is an Assistant Professor in Ballet at Utah Valley University. Born and raised in Appleton, WI, he studied with Jeanette Makaroff before receiving a BFA from SUNY Purchase. Tyler was a Soloist with the Hessisches Staatsballett in Wiesbaden, Germany, and later, Gibney Dance Company in New York City. He has performed works by Alexander Ekman, Crystal Pite, George Balanchine, Nicolo Fonte, Bill T. Jones, Richard Siegal and Marcos Morau (La Veronal) among many others. He received a nomination for the German Stage Prize (Der Faust) in 2016 for his interpretation of the title role in Tim Plegge’s Kaspar Hauser. In addition to teaching at various institutions in the US and abroad, Tyler continues to work with Gibney as a Lead Actionist facilitating movement workshops with survivors of trauma. As a choreographer, movement director, and dancer he has worked on short films and music videos for Steve Aoki, Sting, Damani Pompey, Naima Ramos-Chapman, and Emma Sophia Caymares. Tyler won Repertory Dance Theatre’s Regalia choreography competition and received a commission for the company's 22-23 season.

Christa St. John, MFA, is an Assistant Professor of Ballet, Ballet Program Coordinator, and Co-Artistic Director of Repertory Ballet Ensemble at Utah Valley University (UVU). In addition to directing the company, she teaches ballet choreography, ballet pedagogy, pointe, ballet technique, and dance theory courses, mentors emergent student choreographers and scholars, and regularly presents scholarly and creative works at national and international festivals, conferences, and performance venues. Her appointment at UVU follows a professional ballet performance career that spanned over a decade and four years as a division director of an integrated academic and ballet conservatory for pre-professional dancers.

Christa is a prolific choreographer and has premiered numerous works for professional and university dancers and frequently collaborates with professional and university orchestras as well as university theatre, opera, and visual arts programs. Since launching her choreographic career in 2014, she has earned significant commissions including the creation of her own full-length version of The Nutcracker for Ballet Indiana. In addition to her work at UVU, Christa teaches masterclasses across the US and regularly serves as a faculty member and choreographer for Joffrey Ballet School’s summer intensive programs. Christa holds an MFA in Dance from the University of Oklahoma.

Corinne Wallentine (1989-2024): began training at Jacqueline's School of Ballet (1993-2001) and later joined The Dance Conservatory (2001-2008). Graduating with honors, she received her BFA - Ballet Emphasis from Utah Valley University and was the recipient of the Award of Merit in Dance from UVU College of Fine Arts while attending under a full dance performance scholarship (2009-2012). While at UVU Corinne performed with Repertory Ballet Ensemble (2008-2011) under the direction of Nichole Ortega and Shayla Bott. Performing credits, among others, include principal roles in La Slyphide and Paquita. With Repertory Ballet Ensemble, she participated in the Regional Dance America Festival (2010-2011) and was named Honors Dancer at the festival in Las Vegas, Nevada (2011). In 2011, Corinne performed with Utah Metropolitan Ballet under professional contract. With this company she enjoyed dancing in works including A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Nutcracker, Le Corsaire and various contemporary works with professional choreographers. 
 
While at UVU, Corinne was educated in the method and practice of ballet theory and technique. From her training and academic work, she developed a comprehensive ballet curriculum, which is the basis for ballet instruction at TDC. In (2018, 2021), she attended the Central Pennsylvania Youth Ballet teacher workshop and received training (pre-ballet to pre-professional levels) from notable ballet instructors, Marica Dale Weary, Darla Hoover and Alan Hineline to name a few. Corinne is certified in Progressing Ballet Technique, an innovative body-conditioning and strengthening program that assists her students’ development of the muscle memory required in each exercise in all forms of dance. 
 
In addition to her role as Ballet Director at The Dance Conservatory, Corinne was a ballet faculty member at UVU, teaching multiple levels of ballet technique and pointe, Dance as an Art Form, and Dance Conditioning, until she passed away in August of 2024.