Training + Performing

TRAINING + PERFORMing

In daily, intensive sessions Mondays through Fridays 10 AM to 5 PM, the company explores dance-making processes including improvisation, composition, various styles of dance technique and training, as well as musicality. Our summer season starts at the Mark Morris Dance Center in Brooklyn and continues at the Fieldston School in the Riverdale section of the Bronx.  

2026 Season Training Locations

June 29 - July 7

Mark Morris Dance Center

3 Lafayette Ave, Brooklyn 11217

July 8 - July 28

The Fieldston School

3901 Fieldston Road, Bronx NY 10471

July 29 - August 6 

Citywide Performance Tour

In the Guest Repertory Project, students learn the work of a master choreographer, beginning each morning with a dance class, followed by repertory work, culminating in a piece that will be performed on tour.

For the 2026 summer season we are honored to welcome legendary dancer, choreographer and master teacher of the Lester Horton technique Milton Myers as our Repertory Guest Artist. A leading figure in the dance world for more than four decades, Myers served as Program Director of the Contemporary Program at Jacob’s Pillow for nearly 40 years and has taught and inspired generations of dancers around the globe.

A former member of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and former Director of the Joyce Trisler Danscompany, Myers has set work on major companies worldwide and has been recognized by the International Association of Blacks in Dance for his extraordinary teaching and mentorship. He is a longtime instructor with the Ailey School and Philadanco!, and became the first Horton instructor at The Juilliard School in 2008. His additional faculty appointments include the Ailey/Fordham BFA Program, North Carolina School of the Arts, NYU Tisch, Brown University, Howard University, and many more institutions across the U.S., Europe, Israel, South America, and Canada.

This season, YDC dancers will learn and perform a new staging of Seasonal Fire, one of Myers’ signature works. Premiered in 1994, the piece marks a landmark collaboration between Myers and composer William Catanzaro, who also serves as YDC Music Director. 

Supporting the restaging is Charles Scheland, a New York based modern dance artist and certified Ailey Horton Technique instructor. Scheland is a faculty member at The Ailey School, Kanyok Arts Initiative, and the School at Jacob’s Pillow, and has served as Myers’ demonstrator and assistant since 2019. Together, Myers and Scheland will guide YDC students through a unique version of this powerful work, blending original sections with newer additions developed after the premiere.

We are thrilled to offer our dancers the opportunity to study directly with these remarkable artists and to embody a piece that carries such rich lineage, history, and craft.

Past repertory projects have included the work of Ronald K. Brown/ EVIDENCE, A Dance Company, Donald McKayle, José Limón, Alvin Ailey, Merce Cunningham, Sean Curran, Mark Morris, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane, Jane Comfort, Robert Battle, Pam Tanowitz, John Heginbotham, Ballet Hispánico, Larry Keigwin, Kyle Abraham, Ephrat Asherie and others. 

In our Choreographer + Composer Project, company members who propose an original work will be paired with a professional composer, to collaborate on the work from start to finish. 

Guest Workshops focusing on partnering and more are offered throughout the summer, as well as a YDC alumni panel.

Members of the company are encouraged to choreographer their own dances, based on themes that are meaningful to them. Each selected choreographer will lead their own rehearsals, collaborate with a professional composer and costume designer as they develop their piece for the performance tour.

The company performs their own original choreography, as well as a work by the guest repertory artist, at various sites during our City-Wide Performance Tour. These performances are often followed by interactive dance-making workshops involving the entire enthusiastic audience, led by the company, with musician William Catanzaro, exploring the elements of dance through improvisation and on-the-spot choreography. 

YDC has been aired on Channel 13, and on NY1, has performed with professional companies as part of the Dancenow/NYC Festival, and at prime NYC venues such as Dance Theater Workshop, Ailey Citigroup Theater, Symphony Space, the 92nd St. Y, Danspace Project at St. Mark’s Church, the Joyce SoHo, Chelsea Piers, Kumble Theater for the Performing Arts, City Center Studio 5, Hostos Arts and Culture Center, Brooklyn Museum, the Lovinger Theater at Lehman College, Pace University’s Schimmel Center, Abrons Arts Center, BAAD, Jamaica Performing Arts Center, Fordham University at Lincoln Center, the World Trade Center, the Arts at University Settlement, Harlem School of the Arts, Chelsea Art Museum, The Queens Museum, RIOULT Dance Center, among many others throughout the city boroughs.

Outdoor performances have included Washington Square Park, Socrates Sculpture Park, Snug Harbor, Dancing in the Streets, Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, the Downtown Dance Festival in Battery Park and a pace-setting performance on Chelsea’s High Line.

Out of town, YDC has been presented twice by the Jacobs Pillow Dance Festival in Lee, Massachusetts, by The Yard in Martha’s Vineyard, and three times by Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY. The company had the honor to perform in Washington, DC as part of the International Conference 2000, “Dancing in the Millenium,” held by the National Dance Educators Organization at the Kennedy Center.

Photo credits from L-R: 1) 2019 Jacob's Pillow Contemporary Dance School, Milton Myers, photo by Christopher Duggan 2) 2011 Jacob's Pillow Contemporary Dance School, Milton Myers, photo by Christopher Duggan