(JERSEY CITY, NJ) -- Nimbus Dance and the Asbury Park Dance Festival present On the Rise on Saturday, March 29, 2025 from noon to 5:00pm. This is an exhilarating day of free masterclasses and performances for pre-professional dancers ages 9-18! Train with world-class artists and showcase your choreographic work on a professional stage.
The masterclass teachers include Brad Beakes, Tamisha A. Guy, and Michael Trusnovec.
In addition to these masterclasses, participants can submit their choreography to be featured in a professionally produced Showcase Performance. This is a rare opportunity for aspiring dancers to refine their technique, gain invaluable performance experience, and be inspired by accomplished artists and educators.
Workshops are completely FREE, thanks to the support of Asbury Park Dance Festival, Monmouth Arts, and John & Jody Arnhold. Performance registration is $75 for groups of 1-4 and $150 for groups of 5+. Register online here. Nimbus Arts Center is located at 329 Warren Street in Jersey City, New Jersey.
This program is made possible in part by funds from Monmouth Arts, a partner of the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, and the Monmouth County Board of County Commissioners.
The Instructors
Bradley Beakes is a New York City based dance artist originally from Glendora, California. He attended California State University, Fullerton, where he majored in dance with additional training at the American Academy of Ballet, Limón West Coast summer intensives, and the Ailey School. Over the past decade he has been honored to dance with the Limón Dance Company, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, BARE Dance Company, Julia Ehrstrand Collective, Project 44, NOW-ID, Keith Johnson/Dancers, Naganuma Dance, and Visions Dance Theatre where he was named the 2010 Lester Horton Award Winner for "Outstanding Male Performance". Bradley has been a member of Doug Varone and Dancers since 2017.
He has been privileged to guest teach in over a dozen universities across the United States and in summer intensives by Doug Varone and Dancers, Limón West Coast, Ballet West Academy, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, Ballet Lubbock, and New Jersey Dance Theatre Ensemble. Bradley recently taught for the Dance International Program in Japan to institutions including D.A. Tokyo, Fukuoka School of Music, Nagoya School of Music, D.A. Osaka, and the Tokyo School of Music and Dance. In NYC, Bradley currently teaches for the Limón School and intermittently at Gibney and Peridance. His choreography has been presented at the American College Dance Festival, Great Salt Lake Fringe Festival, Palm Desert Choreography Festival, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company's 'Momentum', INKUBATE Dance Festival, and the Utah Arts Festival.
Tamisha A. Guy, a native of Trinidad and Tobago, began her formal dance training at Ballet Tech, under the direction of Eliot Feld. Later, she attended Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School and SUNY Purchase College as a double major in dance and arts management. In 2013, Guy graduated with honors from SUNY Purchase College and joined the Martha Graham Dance Company shortly after. In 2016, Guy was selected as one of Dance Magazine's Top 25 to Watch, and she also received the 2016 Princess Grace Award. In 2017, she was named one of the Best Dancers of the Year by Dance Europe. In 2021, she received the 2022 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Dance.
Tamisha currently dances with A.I.M by Kyle Abraham, is a current Lecturer in Dance at Barnard College, and is the Founder of HUETAPE, a skin-toned kinesiology tape brand with the mission to produce quality tape products while celebrating the unique needs of melanated individuals.
Hailed by the New York Times as “one of the world’s most luminous dancers,” Michael Trusnovec was a Principal Dancer with the Paul Taylor Dance Company from 1998-2019 performing in works by Mr. Taylor, as well as by Pam Tanowitz, Brian Arias, Margie Gillis, Doug Varone and more. Additionally, he was Associate Rehearsal Director and served as the Director of Worldwide Licensing. Michael received a 2018 Dance Magazine Award, a 2006 Bessie Award, and was a 1992 YoungArts awardee and Presidential Scholar in the Arts.
He is co-founder of the Asbury Park Dance Festival, co-curator of the Dance on Camera Festival and continues to stage Mr. Taylor’s dances, teach, and perform, most recently in the 2021 Joyce Theater presentation of Molissa Fenley’s State of Darkness and in New York City Ballet’s 2020 Lincoln Center performances of George Balanchine’s Episodes. Michael currently serves as the Dance Co-Director for The Metropolitan Opera.
The Nimbus Arts Center is a vibrant 14,900 sq. ft. hub for the arts in Jersey City, anchoring creativity and community in the heart of The Lively. The comprehensive arts center includes a 150-seat black box theater, studio and rehearsal space for Nimbus’ Dance Company and School of Nimbus, and administrative offices. The center is fully ADA accessible to audiences and artists alike.
The mission of the Asbury Park Dance Festival is to present dance and raise funds for arts education advocacy through a partnership with Arts Ed NJ. Together, they want to ensure that the next generation of budding artists and arts-lovers have access to what they need to pursue their dreams of living a life in the arts or a life that is enriched and made full by the arts.
