Ana Novoa’s repertoire includes all the classics in the company such as Giselle in Giselle, Odette/Odile in Swan Lake, Swanilda in Coppelia, Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, Kitri in Don Quixote, Paquita in Paquita, Lisette in La Fille Mal Gardee, Nikiya and Gamzatti in La Bayadere, Medora in Le Corsaire, lead female in Les Sylphides, and the sylph in La Sylphide. These were performed alongside many notable male dancers including Jose Manuel Carreno. Novoa also danced many modern, contemporary pieces by Cuban and International Choreographers. She performed in Havana and all throughout Cuba and also toured extensively worldwide with the company, dancing on all the renowned stage of the major capitals of the world including Bolshoi in Moscow, Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, Kennedy Center in Washington DC, Liceu in Barcelona, Champs Elysees in Paris, Colon Theater in Argentina and many others.
Archives: People
Ryoko Tanaka
Ryoko Tanaka was born and raised in Wakayama Japan, where she began her training. In 2013, she was selected to be in the Nancy Einhorn Milwaukee Ballet II program. In 2017, she joined the trainee program at American Repertory Ballet and soon moved up to ARB 2, and by 2018, she was promoted to ARB company member. Since joining the company, Ryoko has performed the title role in Ethan Stiefel and Johan Kobborg’s Giselle, Sugar Plum Fairy in The Nutcracker, Odette in Swan Lake (for Princeton Ballet School). She has also performed featured roles in Stiefel’s Wood Work, Overture, VARIANTS, as well as Caili Quan’s Circadia, Amy Seiwert’s Sight Line and World, Interrupted, Paul Taylor’s Airs, Trey McIntyre’s Blue Until June, Meredith Rainey’s Intrare Forma and multiple other roles. In 2021, she made her debut as choreographer for ARB with Saudade. She continued her choreographic work with ARB in 2022, collaborating with composer/pianist Ian Howells to create Hindsight and most recently TSUBOMI, for Princeton Ballet School.
Tanner Bleck
Tanner Bleck started his ballet training at the young age of 7 years old in his hometown of Lexington, KY at Bluegrass Youth Ballet. At 14, Tanner moved to Tampa, Florida to attend Next Generation Ballet at Patel Conservatory on full merit scholarship studying under Peter Stark. Tanner was a multi gold medal winner at YAGP (Youth American Grand Prix) and multi scholarship winner performing variations such as Don Quixote, Coppelia, Diane and Acteon, La Fil Mal Gardee, and Satenella . At 15, he was a finalist at Prix de Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland attaining multiple scholarship offers from prestigious ballet companies around the world. He accepted San Francisco Ballet’s full scholarship offer and moved to San Francisco to continue his dance journey. As a Trainee with San Francisco Ballet, he learned and performed choreography from some of the top choreographers of today and was in several different performances, such as Nutcracker, Christopher Wheeldon’s Cinderella, John Neumeier’s Yondering, and the U.S. premiere of Liam Scarlett’s Frankenstein. Last season, Tanner was with Pennsylvania Ballet II and performed in several ballets such as Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake, and George Balanchine’s Theme and Variations. On Tanner’s off time from ballet, he enjoys computer games, computer programming, graphic design, and visiting with family and friends. This is Tanner’s second season with ARB.
With ARB: 2018
Hometown: Lexington, Kentucky
Shaye Firer
Shaye Firer was born in Cape Town, South Africa, and raised in Vancouver, Canada. She received her early training at the Royal Winnipeg Ballet School and attended various intensive programs such as The National Ballet of Canada, Alberta Ballet, Kaatsbaan International Dance Centre, Houston Ballet’s Ben Stevenson Academy, and Ellison Ballet. Firer joined the inaugural class of American Repertory Ballet’s Trainee program. As a Trainee, she performed company roles in Nutcracker, Our Town, and Glazunov Variations. Since joining American Repertory Ballet, she has performed a variety of lead and featured roles such as Swanhilda in Coppelia, The Chosen One in Douglas Martin’s Rite of Spring, Titania in Martin’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Doe/Duchess in Kirk Peterson’s Beauty and the Beast, as well as other works by Peterson, Martin, Gerald Arpino, José Limón, Mary Barton, and Septime Webre. Firer has received choreographic awards from the Royal Winnipeg Ballet School and was chosen as one of five choreographers in Houston Ballet Academy’s collaboration with the American Festival for the Arts.
Rebeca Maso
Rebeca Maso is a former ballet dancer from Cuba. She received her training at the Professional Ballet School in Cuba. She also obtained her Diploma as Ballet Teacher in Cuba and has been teaching for more than 30 years for professional and school levels. She was one of the founder dancers of the Professional Ballet Company of Santiago of Cuba under the direction of Maria Elena Martinez and worked as rehearsal assistant and maître of this company for a few years. In 1995 traveled to Venezuela where she was a member of the Professional Ballet Company Nuevo Mundo of Caracas under the direction of Zhandra Rodriguez. Maso came to the US in 1999 as a guest artist of Ballet Metropolitano de Caracas participating in the International Ballet Festival in Philadelphia.
In Cuba, she was teaching in regional ballet schools and taking students to examinations and open classes during national seminars. She had been a guest teacher for Milwaukee Ballet School Summer Intensive, San Jose Ballet Festival in Costa Rica, New Orleans Ballet Association, Martha Graham School, Kentucky Ballet Theatre and had the opportunity to participate in the Youth America Grand Prix (YAGP) in Mexico as an invitation of this organization as a part of Ballet Hispanico ballet faculty. She is currently in the ballet faculty of Ballet Hispanico School of Dance in NY, Evolution Dance Center and American Repertory Ballet/ Princeton Ballet School.
Ms. Maso is an ABT Certified Teacher, who has successfully completed the ABT Teacher Training Intensive in Primary through Level 3 of the ABT National Training Curriculum ABT.
Her work includes classical and neo-classical styles of renowned choreographers such as Jose Pares, Paulo Denubila, Dennis Nahant, Alberto Mendez, Carlos Orta, Jorge Lefebre, Lazaro Martinez, Gustavo Herrera, Hilda Rivero, Maria Rovira, Hector Montero, among others.
Tony Lee
Tony Lee graduated from Johns Hopkins University, where he received the Louis Sudler Prize in the Arts, the Arts Innovation Grant, and the inaugural Studio North Grant & Mentorship. While studying at Hopkins, Tony trained in dance at Towson University with Runqiao Du and Susan Mann. He continued his training with American Repertory Ballet first through the summer intensive and later as a trainee. Since then, Tony has gone on to dance with Olympic Ballet Theatre, Connecticut Ballet, and Uptown Dance Company and has performed original works choreographed by Kyle Davis, Connor Walsh, Karina Gonzalez, Chet Walker, and Andre Silva. In addition to his performance career, Tony has worked in ARB’s finance office since 2016.
Julie Diana Hench
Julie Diana Hench (Executive Director) has been a performing arts professional for nearly 30 years. Originally from New Jersey, Ms. Hench studied at the School of American Ballet where she was nominated for the Princess Grace Award. At age 16, she joined San Francisco Ballet as corps member. She became a principal dancer with San Francisco Ballet and Pennsylvania Ballet (now Philadelphia Ballet), performing and originating role in classical and contemporary repertoire. She appeared as a guest artist with New York City Ballet and several international touring groups, and participated in a dancer exchange with The Royal Ballet in London.
Ms. Hench was a private coach and guest teacher for renowned ballet schools across the country, and was appointed to the artistic leadership team at Pennsylvania Ballet. She received Isadora Duncan Awards for her dancing at San Francisco Ballet, and an Association Alumnae Award for her studies at the University of Pennsylvania. She served as Executive Director of Juneau Dance Theatre (JDT), a non-profit arts organization in Juneau, Alaska, where she facilitated collaborations with local artists and arts groups to enrich the dancers’ experience, grow audiences, and broaden the organization’s impact. At JDT, Ms. Hench helped the organization partner with the Kennedy Center’s “Any Given Child” initiative to expand arts education in Juneau public schools. She launched Juneau’s first-ever summer intensive ballet program and was honored to stage works for the George Balanchine Trust, enabling JDT to present Balanchine’s work onstage.
Ms. Hench has written for various publications such as Playbill, Dance, Dance Spirit, and Pointe, and was a Contributing Editor at Dance Teacher magazine where she wrote the monthly “Theory and Practice” column.
She earned a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania, graduating summa cum laude, and served as President of the University of Pennsylvania’s Association of Alumnae. She also completed the Executive Program in Arts and Culture Strategy, a partnership between the University of Pennsylvania and National Arts Strategies. Ms. Hench has been the Executive Director of American Repertory Ballet and Princeton Ballet School since 2017.
Lindsay Cahill
Lindsay Cahill began her career at American Repertory Ballet in 2009 as a Dance Power Teaching Artist. Now in her new role as Access and Enrichment Coordinator she is excited to combine her love of the arts with her students, families and entire New Brunswick community. As a dance and gymnastics instructor for over 17 years, her passion of the arts shine through in her strong, patient and encouraging teaching style. Her past community partnership experience working in the City of New Brunswick’s Mayor’s Office and with New Brunswick City Market, her new role offers the ability to strengthen and improve the great City of New Brunswick she also calls home.
Email: [email protected] | Phone: 732.249.1254, ext. 19
Christopher Chambers
Designs for theater, dance, opera and special events. Dance: Ailey II, American Repertory Ballet, Ballet Memphis, Lustig Dance Theatre, Parsons Dance, Manchester Ballet, Ram Island Dance. Theatre: Cape Playhouse, North Shore Music Theatre, Connecticut Repertory Theatre, York Theatre, Curtain Call Inc., Boston College, Montclair State University, University of Hartford, Dramatics NYC, Gallery Players,Mount Washington Valley Theatre Company, Resort Players, M+D Productions. A Connecticut native, Chris currently lives in New York City and freelances as a designer and consultant. He holds a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Connecticut.
Aydmara Cabrera
Aydmara Cabrera began her ballet studies at the age of nine at the National Ballet School in Havana and became a principal dancer at the National Ballet of Cuba , under the direction of Alicia Alonso. Cabrera’s professional dance experience includes international ballet festivals and worldwide tours, performing lead roles in all classical and contemporary ballets with the National Ballet of Cuba and Ballet Hispanico of New York. She studied with iconic teachers such as Alicia Alonso, Loipa Araujo, Josefina Mendez, Joaquin Banegas, and Ramona de Saa. In the course of her career, Cabrera partnered with some of the most famous male dancers of our time, including José Manuel Carreño, Carlos Acosta, Orlando Salgado, Lienz Chang, Jorge Vega and José Zamorano, before moving to the United States and directing her own school in Miami. She has also been invited to teach at many internationally recognized schools, including Princeton Ballet School, developing a training curriculum that incorporates much of her Cuban roots.