Famous Choregraphers, Dance Teachers “A...-B...-”
for performance, language & visual arts, music, social studies, classrooms, home schoolers.

Paula Abdul
Alvin Ailey
Debbie Allen

Frederick Ashton
George Balanchine
Mikhail Baryshnikov

Paula Abdul, Photograph

Paula Abdul
b. 6-19-1962; San Fernando, CA

Dancer and choreographer Paula Abdul is also a pop singer, record producer, actress and television personality. She was “discovered” while a cheerleader with the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team by members of the Jackson Five and hired to choreograph one of their videos.

Alvin Ailey, Photographic Print

Alvin Ailey
b. 1-5-1931; Rogers, TX
d. 12-1-1989; NYC

Alvin Ailey, Jr., a choreographer and activist who founded the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in New York, popularized modern dance and African-American participation in 20th century concert dance.

As the “Cultural Ambassador to the World” Ailey's troup did extensive international touring. Ailey's choreographic masterpiece Revelations is believed to be the best-known and most often seen modern dance performance.

FYI - Alvin Ailey and Maya Angelou sometimes performed together as “Al & Rita.”

Debbie Allen
b. 1-16-1950; Houston, TX

Debbie Allen, actress, dancer, choreographer, television director and producer, and a member of the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, introduced the character of the dance teacher Lydia Grant in the movie and television program Fame. She also appeared in Broadway musicals Purlie, West Side Story (1980), Sweet Charity; television shows Good Times, A Different World, and Roots: The Next Generations, and is a judge on So You Think You Can Dance.

Allen is the younger sister of actress Phylicia Rashad, mother of dancer Vivian Nixon, and teacher of choreography to Paula Abdul.

Debbie Allen quote ~
• “You've got big dreams? You want fame? Well, fame costs. And right here is where you start paying ... in sweat.” - as Lydia Grant in Fame.

Frederick Ashton
b. 9-17-1904; Equador
d. 10-18-1988; England

Frederick Ashton was inspired to become a dancer after seeing Anna Pavlova on tour in Lima, Peru, when he was thirteen. Due to his late start in dance education he couldn't perform as he wished and instead became a choreographer. His first major work was a three-act ballet version of Sergei Prokofiev's Cinderella (1948).

• Frederick Ashton

George Balanchine
b. 1-22-1904; St. Petersburg, Russia
d. 4-30-1983; NYC

George Balanchine was one of the 20th century's foremost choreographers. Balanchine was briefly married to Maria Tallchief, the first to dance the Sugarplum Fairy in his version of The Nutcracker.

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Mikhail Baryshnikov
b. 1-27-1948; USSR

Dancer, choreographer, and actor Maihail Baryshnikov is considered as one of the greatest ballet dancers of the 20th century alongside Vaslav Nijinsky and Rudolf Nureyev. Baryshnikov defected to the West from the Soviet Union in 1974.

Busby Berkeley Dance Number, Giclee Print

Busby Berkeley
b. 11-29-1895; Los Angeles, CA
d. 3-14-1976; Palm Springs

Busby Berkeley was a choreographer of musicals for both stage and film. His signature “look” was the highly regimented chorus lines with complex geometric patterns.

• The Busby Berkley Disc, DVD

Auguste Bournonville
b. 8-21-1805; Copenhagen
d. 11-30-1879

Auguste Bournonville was a ballet dancer and choreographer noted for his innovative style in such works as Le Sylphide in 1836 and Napoli in 1842.