Born in Bayombong Nueva Vizcaya, Philippines and raised in Los Angeles, CA Norbert De La Cruz III is recognized for his versatility in performance and choreography. He is a collaborative artist with roots in classical and contemporary dance.  After moving to New York in 2006, he received a BFA in Dance from the Juilliard School followed by an MFA in Dance from Hollins University. He is a New York and Los Angeles based freelance dance artist. Norbert's movement practice has brought nationwide attention to dance companies and educational organizations. His physicality is shaped by his training experiences from Everybody Dance! The Gabriella Foundation, LA County High School for the Arts, Marat Daukayev School of Ballet, The Juilliard School, and through his performance career as a professional dancer. He started training in classical dance at age 11 (Cecchetti and Vaganova) with ballet masters Vera Ninkovic and Marat Daukayev. 

Jiří Kylián (Czechoslovakia, 1947) started his dance career at the age of nine, at the School of the National Ballet in Prague. In 1962 he was accepted as a student at the Prague Conservatory. He left Prague when he received a scholarship for the Royal Ballet School in London in 1967.  After this, he left to join the Stuttgart Ballett led by John Cranko. Kylián made his debut as a choreographer here with Paradox for the Noverre Gesellschaft. After having made three ballets for Nederlands Dans Theater (Viewers, Stoolgame and La Cathédrale Engloutie), he became artistic director of the company in 1975. In 1978 he put Nederlands Dans Theater on the international map with Sinfonietta. That same year, together with Carel Birnie, he founded Nederlands Dans Theater II, which served as a bridge between school and professional company life and was meant to give young dancers the opportunity to develop their skills and talents and to function as a breeding ground for young talent. He also initiated Nederlands Dans Theater III in 1991, the company for older dancers, above forty years of age. This three dimensional structure was unique in the world of dance. After an extraordinary record of service, Kylián handed over the artistic leadership in 1999, but remained associated to the dance company as house choreographer until December 2009. 

José Limón (1908-1972) electrified the world with his dynamic masculine dancing and dramatic choreography. One of the 20th century’s most important and influential dance makers, he spent his entire career pioneering a new art form and fighting for the recognition and establishment of the American Modern Dance. Born in Culiacán, Mexico in 1908, he immigrated to California in 1915, and in 1928 Limón came to New York and saw his first dance program. Limón enrolled in the dance school of Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman and, from 1930 - 1940, performed in works created by his teachers. In 1946, with Doris Humphrey as Artistic Director, Limón formed his own company. Over the following 25 years, he established himself and his company as one of the major forces of 20th century dance. Limón was a key faculty member in The Juilliard School's Dance Division beginning in 1953 and continued choreographing until his death in 1972. Limón choreographed a total of seventy-four works, including The Moor’s Pavane, Missa Brevis, There is a Time, The Traitor, and Psalm.

Robert Battle became artistic director of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in July 2011 after being personally selected by Judith Jamison, making him only the third person to head the Company since it was founded in 1958. Mr. Battle had a long-standing association with AILEY before leading the Company. 

JOSHUA L. PEUGH (he/him) is the Founder and Artistic Director of Dark Circles Contemporary Dance and Co-founder of Fair Assembly. A graduate of Southern Methodist University and an alumnus of Universal Ballet (under the direction of Oleg Vinogradov), he has created work for festivals in Asia, Europe, and North America, winning awards for his choreography in South Korea, Japan, Canada, and the USA. He was the recipient of the Grand Prize at the McCallum Theatre's 18th Annual Choreography Festival, and Dance Magazine chose him as one of their "25 to Watch." Joshua served as choreographer for legendary soprano Kathleen Battle's concert Underground Railroad - A Spiritual Journey and was the 2018 recipient of the Natalie Skelton Award for Artistic Excellence. He has created over 40 new works for BalletX, Ballet Memphis, The Big Muddy Dance Company, BODYTRAFFIC, Bruce Wood Dance Project, Collage Dance Collective, Company E, Dallas Black Dance Theatre, Dallas Theater Center, Dance Lab NY, DanceWorks Chicago, Eisenhower Dance, Korea National Contemporary Dance Company, MADCO, METdance, Missouri Contemporary Ballet, Tulsa Ballet, Verb Ballets, and Whim W'Him, among others.

Jessica Lang is an American director and choreographer based in New York City. Since 1999, Lang has created more than 100 original works on companies worldwide including American Ballet Theatre, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, the National Ballet of Japan, The Joffrey Ballet, and her eponymous company Jessica Lang Dance, among many others. For more than two decades, Lang has worked extensively for American Ballet Theatre. Her original creations on the main company include Her Notes, Garden Blue, and ZigZag with the legendary Tony Bennett, as well as Let Me Sing Forevermore which was performed on the ABT Across America nationwide tour and featured regularly on Celebrity Cruise entertainment programs. Lang has created seven ballets on ABT Studio Company including Children’s Songs Dance in collaboration with music icon Chick Corea. Additionally for ABT, Lang was part of the founding faculty of the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School, a teaching artist for the summer intensives and the Make-a-Ballet program, and served as a mentor and panelist for the Incubator program.