Joan Myers Brown is a Philadelphia icon. She has done more for the world of dance in Philadelphia than anyone and she’s our guest on this episode.
Ms. Brown was born in Southwest Philly during the 1930’s. She’s a self-proclaimed “Woodland Avenue Girl.” A high school gym teacher saw her natural talent for dance and encouraged her to take dance lessons. She wanted to be a ballet dancer, but none of the ballet schools at the time took Black students.
Ms. Brown ended up working as a touring nightclub dancer performing with the likes of Pearl Bailey, Duke Ellington, Nat King Cole, and Sammy Davis, Jr. and talks about how segregation impacted her life back then in the 1950’s.
In 1960, Ms. Brown decided to open her own dance school to provide black students the opportunity still not available to them at traditional ballet schools. Ten years later, in 1970, when Ms. Brown noticed her students weren’t getting positions in dance companies or productions, she started her own dance company, which is now known as Philadanco!
60 years later, Ms. Brown is still teaching children the fundamentals of dance and her dance company, Philadanco!, is revered around the world having toured dozens of countries, performing in front of sold out crowds.
Ms. Brown has won countless awards, including three honorary doctorates, a Master of African American Choreography medal from the Kennedy Center, a 2019 Bessie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Dance, and the 2012 National Medal of Arts presented to her by President Barack Obama.
President Barack Obama has said of Ms. Brown: Joan Myers Brown has made] an artistic haven for African-American dancers and choreographers to innovate, create and share their unique visions with the national and global dance communities.”
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