Teaching Artists

Akilah Briggs-Melvin

Akilah Briggs-Melvin

Step dance, also known as stepping, is a style of percussive dance where a dancer uses their entire body as an instrument to make rhythms and sounds through a mixture of footsteps, spoken words,and hand claps. Traditionally stepping was rooted and developed after the...

Maxwell Kofi Donkor

Maxwell Kofi Donkor

Maxwell Kofi Donkor is an internationally recognized artist and master cultural educator who is most known for his performances and teaching of African Drumming and Dance, through the Sankofa African Drum and Dance Ensemble.  For many decades, he has focused on...

Mateo Cano and Maria Puentes Flores

Mateo Cano and Maria Puentes Flores

Musicians Mateo Cano and Maria Puentes Flores are founders of the musical ensemble, Pulso de Barro, or "pulse of the clay," that performs the Son Jarocho music from the Mexican state of Veracruz.  Son Jarocho is a highly rhythmic musical style that came about through...

Lalita Ramnauth

Lalita Ramnauth

Lalita Ramnauth was born and raised in Guyana where, at a young age, she and her family discovered her natural talent for singing. Having moved to the United States from Guyana in 1992, she eventually relocated to Schenectady.  Lalita possesses a large repertoire of...

Felix Nelson

Felix Nelson

FELIX NELSON was born in 1988 and grew up in the Jamestown area of Accra. He followed in the footsteps of his talented parents to become a highly skilled musician, singer, dancer and dance educator. Felix came to the US in 2006 to join his father Zorkie in upstate NY...

Artist Spotlight: Devesh Chandra

Artist Spotlight: Devesh Chandra

DEVESH CHANDRA has been learning the Tabla since the age of 3. He learned Indian Classical Music by accompanying his mother, renowned Sitar exponent Veena Chandra and he continues to perform with her.  Their mother and son duo has received national and international...

Artist Spotlight: Zorkie Nelson

Artist Spotlight: Zorkie Nelson

                               ZORKIE NELSON is a master percussionist, traditional flute player and vocalist specializing in the Ga cultural tradition. Born into a family of musicians in the West African city of Accra, Ghana, Zorkie has studied music since the age of...

Artist Spotlight:  Veena Chandra

Artist Spotlight: Veena Chandra

Veena Chandra is an internationally renowned sitarist, composer, teacher, and choreographer.  She is the founder and director of the Dance and Music School of India in Latham, NY, which celebrates over thirty years.  She has been a faculty member at Skidmore College...

Artist Spotlight: Efthimios (Altin) Stoja

Artist Spotlight: Efthimios (Altin) Stoja

Efthimios (Altin) Stoja is an Albanian and Greek artist and iconographer. Ancient frescoes decorating the church walls in his father’s village in Albania first inspired his love of art. Altin trained in the Byzantine/ Macedonian style iconography under master artist...