ARB Position: Teacher

Emily Cordies-Maso started her training at her mother Rebeca Maso’s studio in Somerset, NJ at a young age. At age 12 she attended Ballet Hispanico under the direction of Dr. Ana Maria Correa and later with current director Michelle Manzanales. Cordies-Maso was part of the Pre-Professional program for her last three years there under a full scholarship. During that time she was able to travel to Cordoba Mexico for the Festival de Danza and to Havana Cuba for the Ballet Nacional Festival International de Danza. In 2019 Cordies-Maso started studying under the direction of Aydmara Cabrera at the Princeton Ballet school and was later a trainee with the ARB/PBS in 2021. In December 2020 Emily left to Switzerland to study as a stagiare at Ecole Rudra Bejart in Lausanne with a full scholarship, under the direction of Micheal Gascard and Julio Arrozarena where she got to perform at Vaison la Roman, France and Martingy, Switzerland. Cordies-Maso has also attended various summer intensives including Sarasota Cuban Ballet School, Taina Morales and Jesus Corrales Summer Intensive in Montreal, Canada, and Leonel Morales & Friends Dance Course in Granada, Spain. Her American Repertory Ballet credits include The Nutcracker, Da’Von Doane’s Kaleidoscope Mind, Ethan Stiefel and Johan Kobborg’s Giselle, Arthur Mitchell’s Holberg Suite, and Stiefel’s VARIANTS.

Yuliya Rakova was born in Russia and began her ballet training at the age of ten at the Perm State choreographic college in Russia, home of the famed Russian ballet traditions, where her studies included classical ballet, history of theater, history of art and music, acting, stage makeup, history of European and American ballet, character, historic dance, and pas de deux. Upon graduation in 1995, she was invited to join the Perm Tchaikovsky Opera and Ballet Theater. Rakova danced with the company for five years before moving to Moscow. She joined the Moscow Dance Theater of Alexei Fadeechev as a soloist. She was featured in the modern dance choreographer Stanton Welsh`s world premiere Opus X. In 2001 she was invited to join Russian National Ballet and danced with the company until she moved to the United States to teach. She toured nationally and abroad, enjoying great success and quickly building a classical repertoire while performing such roles as Odile, the Sugarplum Fairy, Lilac Fairy and Maria Taglioni from Pas de Quatre. Rakova has worked with notable choreographers such as Trey McIntyre, Ben Stevenson and Alexei Ratmansky. Her repertoire includes soloist roles in Swan Lake, Coppelia, Don Quixote, Paquita, Raymonda, Nutcracker, Chopiniana, The Sleeping Beauty, Le Corsaire and others. She taught for professional ballet schools such as Kirov Academy of Ballet, Ellison Ballet, Joffrey Ballet School, and Pennsylvania Ballet. Rakova continues to teach as well as stage classical productions and original works around the country and abroad. As an accomplished dancer and experienced teacher, Rakova would like to share her knowledge with passion for young dancers.

Shari Nyce started dancing at Princeton Ballet at the age of eight where she was offered a scholarship by its founder, Audrée Estey. Shari was offered the role of an apprentice at age 15 when The Princeton Society first formed their professional company, later known as ARB. A year later, she became a company member while finishing high school. Shari danced with Princeton Ballet for a few years and then moved to New York City, where she joined the new contemporary company, Keith Young Dance. At age 24, Shari moved to Los Angeles. Here, she continued her work with various contemporary companies as well as exploring the film and television industries, both as a dancer and as an actress. She had the honor of working with many talented artists including Twyla Tharp, Bon Jovi, Will Smith, Nick Nolte, Albert Brooks, Carole King, Woody Harrelson, Whoopi Goldberg and many more. Shari had her last professional engagement at the Ford Amphitheater when she was 38; she found out she was pregnant with her first of three daughters two weeks after the performance. Shari then embarked on a new career: that of a single mom. At this point, Shari went back to school and after moving back East, completed her Associate’s degree in Exercise Science. She will be obtaining her BS in Kinesiology and Exercise Science this coming Spring. In addition to teaching at Princeton Ballet School since her return to NJ, Shari has been teaching Pilates, Yoga and various other movement techniques for nearly forty years. She maintains her own studio, Nyce Bodies Pilates, in Pennington, NJ. Shari is passionate about working with dancers to not only strengthen but to educate. She is a firm believer that understanding movement is the key to smart, efficient movement, which will lead to the best combination of strength, power, longevity and freedom of ultimate artistic expression.

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.

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.

Susan Tenney (Modern Dance, Ballet) is an award-winning Director and Choreographer. Her eclectic career has had her working professionally in dance, theatre and film, performing or having her work produced in venues that include the Kennedy Center, Off Broadway, Edinburgh Festival, Williamstown Theatre Festival, La Mama, Florence Gould Hall, Jacobs Pillow, France, Princeton University, and regional theatres including Cincinnati Playhouse, and McCarter Theatre. She received four commissions from the Coalition for Peace Action to create commemorative pieces, and a grant from the Princeton Arts Council to create The Tower a multi-disciplinary work. Her evening-length work Je me Souviens…I Remember was called “stunningly dramatic” by Princeton Patch. In 2020 she was a Resident Artist with New York Stage & Film developing McCourt a new play about the Pulitzer Prize winning memoirist Frank McCourt. She began her dance training at the Princeton Ballet School with Audree Estey and remembers Audree asking her and all the five year olds in the class, to whisper in her ear what “kind” of bird they would like to be, before they “flew” across the studio floor. For Princeton Ballet School she has taught Ballet, Modern Dance, and Choreography to students ages 4 to 84, and set her Mozart Divertimento in F on PBII and students from the Summer Intensive. Her fundraiser for the organization brought over 150 dancers, musicians and community members on to the fields of Princeton University for an outdoor performance featuring her choreography and structured improvisations danced by the community. Her initiative “Got Dance?” was a set of yearly weekend performances which she produced and directed that had the Adult Students of the school dancing in sold out shows in Studio A. She holds a B.F.A. in Dance from SUNY Purchase.

Amy Megules began dancing with the Vineland Regional Dance Company and received her BFA in dance from SUNY Purchase, where she received the Bert Terborgh Dance Award. She apprenticed with the Joffrey Ballet of Chicago, and then danced with American Repertory Ballet. Amy has also been on faculty at Today’s Dance Center, the National Dance Institute of Trenton, and Mercer County Community College. Amy taught and choreographed for the Otto M. Budig Academy of Cincinnati Ballet, the College Conservatory of Music Preparatory Division of the University of Cincinnati, and was the ballet instructor for the elite and accelerated gymnasts at the Cincinnati Gymnastics Academy. Amy enjoys teaching the littlest dancers through adults. She is a children’s rehearsal director for ARB’s “Nutcracker” and Princeton Ballet School’s Spring productions.

Cheryl Whitney (Ballet) received an M.S. in Ballet from Indiana University and a B.A. in English Literature and Music from St. Lawrence University.  She was trained and performed professionally in the Baltimore/Washington, D.C. area. For more than 30 years, she has been involved with Princeton Ballet School and American Repertory Ballet, serving as a faculty member, rehearsal director for both the ARB productions of The Nutcracker and the Princeton Ballet School shows, and Coordinator for Princeton Ballet Workshop. Ms. Whitney is the 2008 recipient of the Audrée Estey Award for Excellence in Dance Education. She is an Adjunct Associate Professor in the dance programs at Rider University. 

Guest teaching credits include Brandywine Ballet, Peabody Conservatory and NJ Governor’s School. Her teaching in academic settings includes Princeton University, Howard University, Indiana University, The Lawrenceville School, Foxcroft School and Latin School of Chicago. and has received grants from the New York and New Jersey State Councils on the Arts. She is Artistic Director of Reverence Dance Company.