Instructors

Ann Ellsworth has preformed and taught all over the world.playing “outrageous” and “splendidly projected.” She is the solo horn player for the Grammy-nominated Absolute Ensemble and has been a member of the Esbjerg Ensemble, Manhattan Brass, Baltimore Opera, Phoenix Symphony, and Philharmonica del Bajio. An active soloist and chamber musician, Ms. Ellsworth has performed on several continents and can be heard in numerous recordings, film and television scores, and radio broadcasts. As Artist in Residence at the Lang College of the New School, she led many ground-breaking interdisciplinary events involving improvisation, dance, videography, and landscape architecture. Ms. Ellsworth is committed to early music and has presented a lecture recital at the Metropolitan Museum of Art using original instruments from their collection. As an advocate of new music, she is a founding member of the New Music and Culture Symposium and has premiered six new works in the past three years. In the summer of 2008 she performed Peter Maxwell Davies’ Strathclyde Concerto with the Dartington Festival Orchestra in England. Ms. Ellsworth attended the Eastman and Juilliard Schools, with further study in Oslo, Norway and St. Petersburg, Russia. She has held faculty positions at numerous schools in the New York City area and joined the Stony Brook faculty in September 2009.

was born in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. His professional dance career, deeply rooted in traditional African dances, later merged with contemporary influences to create a uniquely African choreographic expression. As a teenager, he was a member of urban Dodo groups and continued to explore his tradition by joining Les Bourgeons, a traditional dance and theatre company. In 1990, he joined the traditional dance company Kongo Bâ. Three years later, Lacina began his studies of contemporary dance with the well-known choreographer Lassann Congo (who was himself trained at the acclaimed Mudras-Afrique, Senegal). In 1995, Lacina created the Cie Kongo Bâ Teria with Souleymane Badolo and Ousseni Sako. Their creations, Frères sans stèles (1999), Vin Nem (2001) et Hydou Bye (2004) toured the world and won international awards, including the award of 3rd place at SANGA, les Rencontres Choréographiques for Vin Nem (2001) which toured more than 30 cities in Europe in 2002 and throughout the United States in 2004 on the Movement (R)Evolution tour. Beyond his continuing work with his company Kongo Bâ Teria, he has danced and choreographed with other international dance companies, such as Salia ni Seydou, Faso Danse Theatre, and TchéTché, he has also collaborated artistically with individual artists, such as Emily Coates (USA) and Catherine Young (Ireland). Since 2007 he has conducted major residencies in American universities, including Yale, Brown, and the University of Florida: his unique blend of traditional and modern influences results in dynamic intellectual and artistic processes that intrigue and inspire young artists, and audiences. Lacina’s choreography often provokes questions of the (dis)integration of the traditional and the contemporary. His newest work, entitled Transcendence, is a solo that explores the place of faith in urban life. It premiered at Cornell University’s Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts (USA) in March 2009. He and his company Kongo Bâ Teria were recently featured in the documentary film Movement (R)Evolution Africa (2007), available from Documentary Educational Resources (der.org).

Since 2005 Lacina works with Universities in USA( Brown University, Yale University, University of Florida, Cornell University, UCLA, Colombus University and so on) and dance school( ECA in New Haven) like Guest lecturer , artist-in-residence, teaching workshop and performer.