Kaleidoscope Dance Theatre Travels Upstate for Executive Work & Celebration

Kaleidoscope Dance Theatre Company Members learned from the Executive Team about the business, design, and communication, that goes on behind all the dancing with which they are familiar.  A great opportunity wrapped in the bridge being forged between Upstate and NYC Dance.  

This week, several Kaleidoscope Dance Theatre Company Members traveled from NYC to Auburn, NY to work with the American Choreographer and New York Institute of Dance & Education President and CEO, Sean McLeod, at the company’s upstate base of operations.  NYC Director of NYIDE Hana Ginsburg Tirosh, NYIDE Junior Associates Chelsea Blakeburn and Joseph Akin, NYIDE Associate Ruth Rae, and KDT Company Apprentice Jillian Sawyer all came to spend time in Auburn.  KDT, which is about to launch its year long 25th Season Anniversary Tour, calls both NYC and Auburn home!  In Auburn, the dancers delved into the business side of NYIDE to learn administrative skills side by side with members of the Executive Team.  When working with Sean, one must be multi-faceted: business mind, dancer, writer, videographer, editor, and more.  You learn to solve problems easily by making decisions based on emotional integrity, garnering the best outcome for all and for the right reason.  The company firmly believes that “no deal is a big deal!” and the visiting company members learned that attaining that mindset is possible when you’re surrounded by such extraordinary individuals running a multi-national corporation with so much acceptance and fun!

NYIDE Product Director and KDT Second Soloist Kierstyn Zaykoski cutting the first slice of a beautiful surprise birthday cake that she received from Anita Tuccillo, Gregory Livingston, Sean, the Executive Team, and fellow Company Members!

Kaleidoscope Dance Theatre/Sean McLeod Dance Experience is not going to miss a chance to celebrate Company Apprentice Kaley Pruitt Ozminkowski on her July nuptials to Dan Ozminkowski!  Kaley and Dan spent several weeks honeymooning through the great National Parks of the US and returned to New York to celebrate with Dan and Kaley’s family and friends in Skaneateles, NY, just a five minute drive from Auburn.  Celebrating one another is what it means to be a member of KDT/SMDEx, whether you are Company-In-Training or a Principal Member.  Joining the company means wanting to have a tangible relationship with the women and men that you dance with for the next twenty-plus years.



A few of the Kaleidoscope Dance Theatre Company Members take a moment to share smiles with company sister Kaley Pruitt Ozminkowski and husband Dan Ozminkowski at the New York Celebration of their wedding that took place in July in Idaho. 

Sean graciously opened his home to the company for the duration of the visit.  The company took robust MT Master classes with him in his home studio, studied Reinforced Motor Function Application for Reformer in his Pilates studio, viewed breathtaking archival footage in the office, and shared conversation and meals together, many times prepared by Sean himself!  At this level of dance, it is rare for an executive or producer to take this kind of time and effort to grant such intimate access to their home and family, something that Sean does with utter ease and hospitality. And the company is incredibly grateful!  Sean has created a studio culture of inclusion; it is something that he lives and requires the company to exemplify as well.   In Sean’s own words, “If you are not actively practicing and teaching love you are actively practicing and teaching hate.”  This principle is embraced incredibly by NYIDE European Liaison and International German Choreographer Gregory Livingston, who extended his visit to the States after the New York Dance Festival last month.  Sean (and in turn the whole company) calls Gregory “Maestro” “for the way he conducts my life.”  Gregory Livingston has been integral to the development and continued growth of McLeod Technique.  His emotional signature and near three decades of understanding and assisting Sean are an amazing example of commitment to friendship and the family you pick for yourself.  Sean says, “Gregory ushers in a sense of calm and peace to every room he enters.  He can tell me what to do.  And that is good, every person needs to be told to be quiet from time to time.”  It is clear that Sean and Gregory, brothers by bond, nurture and encourage one another in their careers and personal lives.  Learning from two master teachers in dance and in life created an impact that will reach far beyond this weekend, leaving the company in high spirits, skilled in their knowledge, humble in their ability, and ready to spread that light back in New York City and beyond.



NYC Dancer Ruth Rae and NYC Director of the New York Institute of Dance & Education Hana Ginsburg Tirosh are seen here studying McLeod Technique in a special class with founder Sean McLeod himself in Auburn NY.