Terry Boyarsky
Music, Dance/Movement
With over 45 years of experience as a teacher of Dalcroze Eurhythmics and a lifelong performer of chamber music, pianist Terry Boyarsky believes that every person is musical. Her thirst for musical collaboration led to chamber music, choral singing, improvisation, folk dance, accompaniment, and creating ceremony. She specializes in integrating music and movement into the curriculum. Her unique, multifaceted approach evokes deep listening and playful experimentation.
A favorite interdisciplinary project was a collaboration with a Taipei puppeteer and Cleveland dancer to create “Young Dreams – Life in 3 Parts,” an intimate work of puppetry, dance, and improvised music, sponsored by Cleveland Foundation Creative Fusion Program.…
Diana Chittester
Music, Singing/Songwriting, & Guitar
Diana Chittester has been building a reputation as one of the area’s most gifted guitar players, intimate songwriters, and forceful vocalists over the past decade, releasing a series of albums that display her growing confidence and ability to communicate feelings that are deeply personal yet universal. Diana has shared the stage with Lyle Lovett, Gin Blossoms, The Accidentals, Joan Osborne, Peter Mulvey, Chris Trapper, Lisa Loeb, and Colin Hay; performing at performing arts centers (PACs) and venues across the eastern U.S. and Canada including Kent State PAC, Stocker Arts, Showplace Centre, Evening Muse, Music Box Supper Club, and The Ark.…
Sheela Das
Music, Multi-Instrumentalist & Songwriting
Sheela Das is the artistic director and founder of Creative Concepts in Music. With more than a decade of teaching through the arts, she has directed, produced, and delivered compelling workshops and original stage productions for students, community members, and professional venues alike.
From songwriting workshops, instrumental music, and playwriting and puppetry camps, to classroom residencies, Sheela brings her multi-instrumental talent to the joy of hundreds of audiences each year. She has composed more than 350 original, interactive songs to teach the curriculum in grades K-12 in subjects from social emotional learning to language arts and science.…
Tom Evert
Dance/Movement
Tom Evert has been a creative force in creating and performing original choreographic works with a company of dancers, working intensively in arts-education programming and creating festival-like community events in Ohio for 33 years.
Tom currently serves as artistic director of DANCE EVERT, which he founded in 1986. He holds BFAs in both painting and dance from Ohio University and has enjoyed a world-class touring career with the Paul Taylor Dance Company in New York City. He has created a major body of work for which he has received eight Individual Excellence Awards in choreography.…
Sara Lawrence-Sucato
Dance/Movement
Sara Lawrence-Sucato, from Columbus, OH, graduated with honors from Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pennsylvania, with a degree in dance and is currently working in Cleveland, OH. She is the Dancing Wheels Company and School’s director of outreach and community engagement, rehearsal director, a 10-year-plus company member, and served as the company’s tour manager for over a decade. During her professional performance career with the Dancing Wheels Company, Sara has performed works by noted choreographers Marc Brew, Nai Ni Chen, David Dorfman, Christopher Fleming, Catherine Meredith, Stuart Pimsler, David Rousseve, Ginger Thatcher, Michael Uthoff, and Robert Wesner, as well as by internationally renowned choreographers Donald McKayle and Dianne McIntyre.…
Andrea Belser McCormick
Musical Theater, Dance/Movement, & Acting
Andrea McCormick is a performing artist and instructor from Cleveland, Ohio who has received her Bachelor of Arts from Wright State University in Theatre Studies, with an emphasis on Dance and Applied Voice. Beginning with ballet at three years of age, she also continued her studies in various dance forms, including tap, African folk dance, liturgical/spiritual, jazz, musical theatre dance, modern/contemporary, hip hop, and Latin ballroom.
Post college, under the stage name “Andrea Belser”, Andrea has remained extremely active in the northeast Ohio theater community, receiving 2008 Best Actress in Cleveland for her role as Juliette in “I Have Before Me a Remarkable Document Given to Me by a Young Lady from Rwanda” at Dobama Theatre, and nomination as 2012 Best Actress in Cleveland for her role as Pecola in “The Bluest Eye” at Karamu House Theatre.…
Ray McNiece
Theatre, Performance Poetry & Storytelling
Ray McNiece is the author of eight books of poems and monologues, most recently Breath Burns Away, New Haiku. He has created two solo theatre works: Dis – Voices From a Shelter and Us? Talking Across America; two music/poetry collaborations: “Mouth Music” and “A Rust bowl Hootenanny;” and an autobiography on stage: The Lives of A Poet. The Orlando Sentinel reporting on Ray’s solo show at the Fringe Festival called him “a modern day descendant of Woody Guthrie. He has a way with words and a wry sense of humor.” In a review of Us?…
In Harmony Therapeutic Services
Music & Music Therapy
In Harmony Therapeutic Services harnesses the power of music as a vehicle for children and adolescents to process information and emotions, express themselves, learn, create, and heal. As an organization, they believe in teaching through a therapeutic lens and use musical interventions and experiences linked to Ohio Content Standards to address academic and social-emotional goals. Their services are provided by highly qualified, board-certified music therapists, and their programs are developed so that children and adolescents are able to achieve individualized goals and live in harmony with themselves and the world around them.…
Demetrius Thomas
Music, Rap & Hip-Hop
I am Demetrius Thomas, also known to the world as Nova The Rebel. I am a Cleveland native and active hip-hop artist signed to the legendary rap group Bone Thugs N Harmony (BTNH). I have been actively creating and recording music since I was seven years old.
Traveling with BTNH, we’ve been on tour with everyone from Snoop Dogg (Puff Puff Pass 2 Tour) to TLC (Crazy Sexy Cool Tour) to Dave Chapelle (Documentary Tour) and the list goes on. I’ve done performances in front of crowds with numbers ranging anywhere from 500 to 15,000 people in the stands.…
Verb Ballets
Dance/Movement, Ballet, Contemporary, Creative Movement, & Modern
Verb, “Ohio Contemporary Ballet” connects with community in meaningful ways to develop appreciation for dance through performances and outreach programs that promote learning and nurture wellness. The company cultivates dance appreciation through community dance classes, school residencies, senior movement classes, library programs, master classes, and college course partnerships.
Education is integral to the mission of Verb. Our programs integrate how movement relates to subjects such as science, social studies, language arts, and math. Through improvisation and dance composition exercises, students create dances to explore and reinforce themes they are learning in other subjects.…
Errin Weaver
African, African Contemporary & Black Spiritual Dance
Errin Weaver is a teaching artist, wellness advocate, and community activator. She began her dance training in African dance as a company member of Dance Afrika Dance of Cleveland, OH. Errin attended Tennessee State University on a university performing arts scholarship and then relocated to Chicago where she performed with the renowned Muntu Dance Theatre, under the direction of Amaniyea Payne.
Errin is certified at the M’Singha Wuti level for the Umfundalai Contemporary African Dance technique and has taught spiritual and African-based dance forms extensively. She has worked with such notable choreographers as Abdel Salaam, Jeffrey Page, Monique Haley, Ronald K.…
George Woideck
Visual Arts, Ceramic Tile & Glass Tile Mosaics
George Woideck trained as a painter and took time off to tour and record as a rock musician before launching a career as a ceramic artist, learning from national master ceramic artists. Since then he has been an artist-in-residence in schools throughout Ohio and Michigan.
George has been named a National Young Audiences Artist of the Year and his work as a teaching artist has been recognized by the Ohio Art Education Association. He participates in long term residencies for the TeachArtsOhio program of the Ohio Arts Council and is a roster artist for the Center for Arts-Inspired Learning.…
