CLASS INFORMATION

KYL/D has two dance class offerings for pre-professional and professional dance artists: the Summer Workshop Series and Open Company Classes. The Summer Workshop Series runs from mid or late July-August to mid-August. Open Company Classes run mid-August to mid-March or mid-April. PAYMENT POLICY: Class payments do not expire. Unused class payments are provided class credit, refunds will be given on a case by case basis. We encourage you to observe a class before purchasing one if you are unsure about if the class is the right fit for you. Questions? Contact Exec. Director, Katie Moore-Derkits: katie@kyld.org.

The company also rents its space for classes run by external artists and organizations. Public class details are listed below. If interested in renting the space for a class, please visit our Space Rental page.

August 4- August 8, 10:00-11:30am (Monday-Friday)
CHI Awareness Practice Contemporary Dance with Kun-Yang Lin

Lin’s signature CHI Awareness Practice is the foundational technique for Kun-Yang Lin/Dancers (KYL/D). It explores the spaces where Western dance forms including ballet, modern, post-modern and hip-hop meet the impulses of Eastern philosophies, including Taoism and Zen Buddhism. The class focuses on how, through modulation of breath (or “chi” in Mandarin), weight and weightlessness co-exist simultaneously and energy seamlessly transitions among explosive bursts of rapid, expansive phrase work, and absolute stillness. Class begins quietly and gradually builds in complexity, culminating in dynamic phrase work. CHI Awareness Technique expands the perimeter of Western dance practices through an Eastern perspective that reflects Lin’s conception of dance as the ultimate integration of body, spirit and mind. 

KUN-YANG LIN (Founding Artistic Director ) has been widely recognized in the United States for his dancing, teaching and choreography. Lin has been called “an extraordinary dancer” (New York Times), a “theatrical visionary…outstanding choreographer and a compelling performer.” (Philadelphia Inquirer). Lin’s devotion to artistic excellence, movement research, education and community building inspired him to found the CHI Movement Arts Center (CHI MAC), described by former Gov. Rendell as “a place where the entire Philadelphia community can experience the art of multicultural creative dance expression.” In 2009, Lin was named an “Artist of the City'' for his outstanding contributions to the arts and culture of Philadelphia by the Painted Bride Art Center. In 2010, the Mayor of Hsin-Chu, Kun-Yang’s hometown, honored him as a “son of the City'' for his cultivation of artistic excellence at the international level and in 2011, he was named a “Creative Connector'' through a nomination process coordinated by Leadership Philadelphia. As well, in 2017 Lin was selected by NBC News as one of 30 LGBTQ “changemakers, innovators and rising stars” for it’s inaugural Pride Month list of leaders nationwide. Recently Lin was selected by Metro Philadelphia as one of the “AAPI Power Players 2024” and Quoted by the Broad Street Review in 2005 as “ Philadelphia treasure”
Lin’s choreography, described as “deeply spiritual, remarkable” (Dance Magazine), has been presented throughout the United States as well as in Asia, London, Vienna and Mexico. Lin’s choreography has been commissioned by numerous companies including Dance Ensemble Singapore, Ballet Nacional de México, Ballet Philippines and Cleo Parker Robinson Dance.
Highly sought as a teacher, Lin is regularly invited to offer master classes and workshops throughout the U.S. and abroad.  Lin served as Full Professor at Temple University’s Boyer College of Music and Dance in Philadelphia from 2003-2022. visit: kyld.org/kun-yang-lin

August 11-15, 10:00-11:30am (Monday-Friday)
Modern with Zane Booker

Zane teaches a Horton-based modern class. He stresses anatomical alignment and the dynamics of physics as a way to master physical movement. Form, momentum, opposition, intention, elongation, and multi-dimensional exploration are common themes you will investigate in class.

Mr. Booker has been a member of numerous dance companies including The White Oak Dance Project, Complexions Contemporary Ballet, Les Ballet Des Monte Carlo, Netherlands Dance Theater, and Philadanco. As a performer, teacher, and choreographer most recently, Zane was part of "The Elephant is in the Room" with Rennie Harris and Raphael Xavier. The film was created by Roni Koresh in response to the death of Mr. George Floyd. In the COVID era, Booker's online and radio talk show appearances include Black Dance Stories, Rhetorically Speaking/Phillip Roundtree, The Lounge on WURD radio/Phillip Roundtree, Conversations with Roni Koresh, and My Mortality Matters/ John Taylor. Mr. Booker teaches company class for PHILADANCO. Before ZBE productions (Zane's present company) in 2006, Zane, Brandi, and Elaine Booker co-founded the Smoke, Lilies and Jade Arts Initiative (SLJ), a socially conscious, multimedia, dance theater company, promoting HIV/ AIDS awareness. Mr. Booker has choreographed for Contemporary West Dance Theater, Philadanco, BalletX, Brandywine Ballet, Kathy Sledge, Danse4Nia, just to name a few. Mr. Booker’s choreographic film credits also include Nadine Patterson’s, Tango Macbeth. As a faculty member, Zane has taught at the University of the Arts and Howard University. Dance Magazine chose SLJ as one of 25 companies to watch in 2007. Zane has received awards from Philadelphia Black Gay Pride, Men of All Colors United and in 2011 was honored by Equality Forum with an award and Tribute Concert. SLJ produced its last work in 2011 in residency at Swarthmore College's Window on the Work series.

AUGUST 18, 10:00am-12noon (Monday)
Special Taiko Drumming workshop with Joe Small

Taiko artist and educator Joe Small will lead a workshop exploring the fundamentals of taiko as an intense, whole-body, whole-breath drumming art. Participants will learn and experience concepts including kata (the form and stance-based techniques emphasizing the lower body) as well as its integration with and relationship to furi (choreography) and ma (space-time). The workshop will also include a brief historical and cultural overview of taiko in Japan and North America.

*Participants should wear dance or exercise-appropriate attire and be ready to move and sweat. Earplugs will be provided. No experience in music or dance required.

Joe Small is a taiko drum artist and Associate Professor of Dance at Swarthmore College. Joe’s creative approach, taikography, emphasizes taiko as both choreographic and intercultural, blending traditions and patterns of Japanese culture and its diaspora with contemporary performance practices. Encountering taiko as a Swarthmore student in 2002, Joe trained with Kenny and Chizuko Endo and interned with San Jose Taiko and Portland Taiko before receiving a Fulbright Fellowship to Japan for taiko study. A two-year apprenticeship on rural Sado Island with the renowned ensemble KODO on followed. Since 2012, Joe has been a disciple of taiko artist Eitetsu Hayashi and a member of his ensemble, Eitetsu Fu-Un no Kai, touring across Japan, the U.S., Canada, and the Middle East.

Joe has also been active in the North American taiko community—performing in Marco Lienhard’s Taikoza, co-founding Small Mountain Studios with Isaku Kageyama, teaching at LA Taiko Institute (2016–17), and touring his own production, Spall Fragments. As a guest member of the Australian ensemble TAIKOZ (2015, 2017-18, 2023), Joe has performed at venues such as the Sydney Opera House and the National Institute of Dramatic Art. As director of Swarthmore Taiko Ensemble, Joe has led students to national and international performances, including in Japan and Australia. Recent projects with students include Moontides, a full-length collaboration with Cameron McKinney and Kizuna Dance (2023), and Sonic Bodies: Taiko Legend Eitetsu Hayashi in Concert (2024). Joe holds a BA in Dance from Swarthmore College and an MFA from UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance.

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