10 Sep COMMUNITY NEWS – Karen Brown
PRESS RELEASE: September 5, 2020
Karen Brown lands on her toes again and is hired as new Assistant Professor of Ballet at University of Missouri Kansas City Conservatory starting in fall 2020
Kansas City, Missouri — On July 30, Diane Petrella, Dean of Music-Theatre-Dance of the University of Missouri Kansas City Conservatory announced that legendary internationally-renowned former Dance Theatre of Harlem ballerina, Karen Brown, has been appointed as a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Dance for the 2020-2021 school year. “We are very excited to announce that after searching for a year, we are fortunate to hire Karen Brown as a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Dance, and proud to welcome her to the Conservatory faculty,” said Dean Petrella.
Ms. Brown has enjoyed a long career as dancer, educator, arts administrator and teacher. She began her ballet training with Ron Colton of the Augusta Ballet. Her background as a dance professional includes a twenty-two year career as a principal ballerina, featured artist, master teacher, and lecturer with the Dance Theatre of Harlem (DTH) from 1973 to 1995, and she performed roles in all the company’s major ballets giving her the opportunity to work with legendary choreographers like the founder and artistic director Arthur Mitchell, Frederick Franklin, Alexandra Danilova, Agnes De Mille, Geoffrey Holder and Alonzo King.
Early in her career, in recognition of her dance accomplishments and her passion for teaching and passing the legacy of dance on, Ms. Brown was chosen as a master teacher and adjudicator for the inaugural Dance Theatre of Harlem/ Kennedy Center Community Outreach Residency Program and she worked there from 1992 to 1998. Following her tenure with DTH, Ms. Brown was Director of Education at the Atlanta Ballet Center for Dance Education from 1995 to 1997. She founded her own dance support organization, Karenina, Inc. in 1997 to provide quality arts experiences that promote artistic excellence and present opportunities for participants to pursue a professional career, and she continues to run the business. She is a member of and has worked for the International Association of Blacks in Dance since 1998. Her skill-set and artistic virtue were tapped again as Artistic Director of the Oakland Ballet from 2000 to 2006. And, as an Assistant Professor at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia (UARTS) from 2007 to 2013, she taught all levels of classical ballet and shared her experiences and knowledge of the Business of Dance. Her responsibilities at UARTS also included teaching ballet to all undergraduate classes including ballet for non-majors.
In 2010, the School of Dance funded her training in a comprehensive 1st, 2nd and 3rd year pedagogue course of the Vaganova Syllabus, and she was awarded a Certificate of Completion. And in 2011, she was awarded the UARTS Applied Research Lab Grant to experiment with the utilization of computerized motion analysis to train dancers.
Ms. Brown worked with her friends at the American Ballet Theater (ABT) Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School and became certified in all levels of the ABT National Training Curriculum from levels Pre-Primary through Level 7. She was also the bridge Executive Director for Garth Fagan Dance from 2016 to 2017. She was invited to Ballet Wichita as guest artistic director in 2017. Later that year she was awarded the New York Institute of Dance and Education’s Harriet Tubman Freedom Award. Since 2018, she has returned to teaching and conducting research in analyzing movement which is why she became certified in Reinforced Motor Function for Ballet Application founded by Sean McLeod and she has founded the En Pointe Plus Dance Mastery Institute offering coaching sessions for dancers utilizing new computerized motion analysis technology. Earlier this year, she opened the new The Karen Brown International Coaching Studio dedicated to renowned ballet dancer, close friend, former dance colleague and benefactor Mel A. Tomlinson and the legacy of the late Dance Theatre of Harlem founder, Arthur Mitchell. The studio is designed to be used for distance learning, coaching, choreographing, master classes and workshops, teacher training intensives in accelerated learning techniques for ballet application, private career consultations and movement presentations.
For the third year, she has been the Creative and Program Director of the Sand Hills Summer Youth Arts Enrichment Program in Augusta, Georgia. The program designed to be an arts-based multi-disciplinary enrichment experience for children ages 10-14 years, contributes to the development of the next generation of citizens for the community. In addition, she served as a trustee on the Dance USA board for six years and on the boards of two small dance companies in Philadelphia and New York. Her teaching style is also influenced by her training in the Cecchetti, Vaganova and Balanchine techniques.
At the Dance Division of the UMKC Conservatory, some of her responsibilities will include teaching classical ballet and pointe technique, dance scienc and kinesiology and ballet pedagogy. She will create original choreography or stage classical ballets for students and direct a dance concert annually. She will also contribute to dance division efforts in recruiting, retaining and mentoring students, enrich the diverse cultural environment of the Kansas City metropolitan community and more.
“I’m excited for the new opportunity to utilize all of my years of dance skills and experiences to fulfill the University of Missouri Kansas City Dance Conservatory Division’s mission. Honestly, I’m loving the faculty, the administrative team, my new abode, the students and the opportunity to share my knowledge of ballet and expertise in the world of dance,” explained Karen Brown. For more information, please go to https://thekarenbrown.com.