Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic

(she/her) A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Ayodele Casel, a Doris Duke Artist in the dance category, is an award-winning and critically acclaimed tap dancer and choreographer. Casel is hailed as a “tap dancer and choreographer of extraordinary depth” (The New York Times). Known for her skilled and imaginative improvisation, Casel’s projects include her concert and Bessie Award-winning film Chasing Magic, and her Drama Desk-nominated work as tap choreographer for the Broadway revival of Funny Girl. Casel was a 2019/2020 fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, an Artist-in-Residence at Harvard University, and is the recipient of a United States Artist Fellowship, Herb Alpert Award, Doris Duke Artists award, a Bessie, and Flo-Bert Award. In 2021, Casel was depicted on a U.S. Postal Service Forever Stamp celebrating tap dance.

Torya Beard is a New York-based director, creative consultant/strategist, choreographer, and producer specializing in dance and theater. Her curvy professional path reflects a deep curiosity about and belief in the boundless possibilities at the intersection of creativity, artistic expression, and social justice. After studying dance at The University of Michigan, she toured with Cleo Parker Robinson Dance Ensemble, David Rousseve/Reality, The Kevin Wynn Collection, Ronald K. Brown/Evidence, Earl Mosely’s Diversity of Dance, Deeply Rooted Chicago Dance Theatre, and Donald Byrd’s The Harlem Nutcracker, among others. Torya was a featured dancer in the film Idlewild and made her Broadway debut in Disney’s The Lion King. It has been an absolute joy to collaborate with Ayodele Casel on various projects. Among them: Ayodele Casel + Arturo O’Farrill (Creative Director/Assistant Choreographer), The Joyce Theater; Diary of a Tap Dancer V.4 (Director); While I Have the Floor (Producer); Really Rosie (Assistant Choreographer), City Center Encores! Off-Center; “Rooted” (Creative Director), for the inaugural five-borough tour of New York City Center’s On the Move; Diary of a Tap Dancer V.6: Us (Co-Curator/Co-Director), commissioned by New York City Center. She and Ayodele are Resident Directors of Dance Lab New York’s inaugural Tap Project.

A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Crystal Monee Hall is a singer/songwriter, composer, vocal arranger and producer and music director based in New York City. Her varied career has included roles on Broadway (RENT and Kristen Chenoweth’s For the Girls), sold-out tours with Mickey Hart (Grateful Dead) and Ben Platt, and guest appearances on the CW’s “Walker” and HBO’s “High Maintenance.” She has released three original albums, with work from her recent EP If You Breathe called “riveting” by Billboard Magazine. Website: crystalmoneehall.com / Social media @crystalmonee / https://linktr.ee/crystalmonee

(he/him) A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Current member of Arturo O’Farrill & the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra and Ayodele Casel’s ensemble. Performances with the Symphony Orchestra of Louisville and Los Angeles Philharmonic. Collaborations include Isaac Delgado, Orlando “Maraca” Valle, Alexander Abreu and Havana D’Primera, and Jon Batiste. Owner, One Way Beat. Awards: Grammy Award for Best Latin Jazz Album. Education: MM, The New School.

A.R.T.: Debut. Anibal Cruz is a Cuban pianist, composer, arranger, and educator from Camaguey, Cuba. He produced his first single, “La Raza,” with Cuban Percussionist Keisel Jimenez in 2021. His music is rooted in classical, Afro, and Traditional Cuban Music with jazz, R&B, and gospel influences. He has recorded and performed with legends including Paquito de Rivera, Berta Rojas, Armando Manzanero, Alain Perez, Joe McCarthy, Pedrito Martinez, Nacho Gonzales, Flavio Lira, Manolo Mairena and Juan Ruiz, and many others.

A pianist, composer, and educator, Arturo O’Farrill was born in Mexico and grew up in New York City. Arturo’s professional career began with the Carla Bley Band and continued as a solo performer with a wide spectrum of artists including Dizzy Gillespie, Lester Bowie, Wynton Marsalis, and Harry Belafonte. In 2007, he founded the Afro Latin Jazz Alliance as a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the performance, education, and preservation of Afro Latin music. An avid supporter of all the arts, Arturo has performed with Ballet Hispanico, Ron Brown’s EVIDENCE Dance company, and the Malpaso Dance Company, for whom he has written two ballets. Arturo’s well-reviewed and highly praised “Afro-Latin Jazz Suite” from the album CUBA: The Conversation Continues (Motéma) took the 2016 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition as well as the 2016 Latin Grammy for Best Latin Jazz Recording. In addition, his composition “Three Revolutions” from the album Familia-Tribute to Chico and Bebo also received the Best Instrumental Composition Grammy in 2018. Arturo’s most recent album, Four Questions won yet another Grammy award in 2021.

A.R.T.: Debut. TV: “So You Think You Can Dance” (Emmy Nomination), “The Arsenio Hall Show,” “America’s Got Talent,” “The Tony Danza Show.” Producer, Director, and Choreographer at AM Dance Productions: The Text, The Subtext, When Snow Falls, Matt and Anthony, flood (in the dark corner, and flood (redux). Other Performances: Tapaholics, Still Motion, Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic, and Diary of A Tap Dancer v.6. Founder and Co-Director at Operation: Tap.

(he/him) A.R.T.: Macbeth in Stride, Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Off-Broadway: for all the women who thought they were Mad, Soho Rep; Drunk Shakespeare, vol. I-III, Brass Jar. Regional: The Amen Corner, The Shakespeare Theatre Co.; An Iliad, Long Wharf Theater; Othello, Trinity Rep. Exhibition: Definition: An Installation Experience, Bushwick Starr; Camp: Notes on Fashion (Design Associate), Metropolitan Museum Costume Institute. Educational: Head of Scenic Design Training, NYU-Tisch Dept. of Drama. Education: MFA, NYU-Tisch Dept. of Design.

A.R.T.: WILD: A Musical Becoming, Macbeth In Stride, Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic, ExtraOrdinary. Broadway: Kimberly Akimbo, The Thanksgiving Play, Left on Tenth, Macbeth. Off-Broadway: The Blood Quilt, The Connector (Lortel and Drama Desk nominations), Relevance (Lortel nomination), MCC; cullud wattah (Drama Desk nomination); Golden Shield, The Nosebleed, Gloria: A Life. Regional: The Lehman Trilogy, King Lear, BLKS, Choir Boy. Other: David Byrne’s Theater of the Mind, Emursive’s Life and Trust, Oratorio for Living Things.

A.R.T.: Debut. International Tour: Tap Dogs; New York: White Christmas, Top Hat Lab. Selected Theaters: 42nd Street, Hot Shoe Shuffle, Rhythmic Circus Holiday Shuffle, World Dance-O-Rama, Tap Into the Night, Tap United; Companies: Dorrance Dance, Caleb Teicher & Company, Jam Project, CPD Plus; Film/TV: NBC’s “World of Dance” Season 1 (Rhythmatic), “Speed Racer: The Next Generation”, “Alientologists.” An accomplished filmmaker and founder of Solarc Productions, Kurt filmed Chasing Magic at the Joyce and is honored to join Ayodele and team in this live production! @kurtcsolak

A.R.T.: Hype Man; Cirque of the Dead, Boston Circus Guild/OBERON. Regional/Fringe: Hype Man (Elliot Norton Award), REVOLT. She Said. Revolt Again., The T Party, Company One Theatre; Parade (Elliot Norton Award), Moonbox Productions. Educational: Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare Now!. International: Amour!, Royal Academy of Music. Opera: La clemenza di Tito (Director), Promenade Opera Project. Film: Dialogues of the Carmelites (First Assistant Director), New England Conservatory. Education: BA (Honors), Stage Management, Rose Bruford College.

(she/her) A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Ayodele Casel, a Doris Duke Artist in the dance category, is an award-winning and critically acclaimed tap dancer and choreographer. Casel is hailed as a “tap dancer and choreographer of extraordinary depth” (The New York Times). Known for her skilled and imaginative improvisation, Casel’s projects include her concert and Bessie Award-winning film Chasing Magic, and her Drama Desk-nominated work as tap choreographer for the Broadway revival of Funny Girl. Casel was a 2019/2020 fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, an Artist-in-Residence at Harvard University, and is the recipient of a United States Artist Fellowship, Herb Alpert Award, Doris Duke Artists award, a Bessie, and Flo-Bert Award. In 2021, Casel was depicted on a U.S. Postal Service Forever Stamp celebrating tap dance.

A.R.T.: Debut. Born in Brooklyn, NY and raised in New Haven, CT,  Amanda Castro is a multidisciplinary artist rooted in rhythm. Most recently seen in Chasing Magic by Ayodele Casel (Joyce Theater) and The Mayor of Harlem by Jason Samuel Smith, Derrick Grant, & Dormeshia, Castro is a graduate of California Institute of the Arts, where she studied under Glen Eddy of Nederlands Dans Theatre and Andre Tyson from Ailey Company. An active founding member of the all-female percussive trio Soles of Duende and once principal dancer of the renowned company Urban Bush Women, she has starred in musical theatre productions such as Singing in the Rain (Kathy Seldon), Jared Grimes’ 42nd Street, “atomic” performances in Glimmerglass Festival’s West Side Story (Anita, NYT ‘18) and Lyric Opera of Chicago, among others. Amanda continues to pursue the journey of deepening her practice as a rhythmic storyteller and remains a vessel for the stories that push humanity forward.

A.R.T.: Debut. Anibal Cruz is a Cuban pianist, composer, arranger, and educator from Camaguey, Cuba. He produced his first single, “La Raza,” with Cuban Percussionist Keisel Jimenez in 2021. His music is rooted in classical, Afro, and Traditional Cuban Music with jazz, R&B, and gospel influences. He has recorded and performed with legends including Paquito de Rivera, Berta Rojas, Armando Manzanero, Alain Perez, Joe McCarthy, Pedrito Martinez, Nacho Gonzales, Flavio Lira, Manolo Mairena and Juan Ruiz, and many others.

A.R.T.: Debut. International Tour: Tap Dogs; New York: White Christmas, Top Hat Lab. Selected Theaters: 42nd Street, Hot Shoe Shuffle, Rhythmic Circus Holiday Shuffle, World Dance-O-Rama, Tap Into the Night, Tap United; Companies: Dorrance Dance, Caleb Teicher & Company, Jam Project, CPD Plus; Film/TV: NBC’s “World of Dance” Season 1 (Rhythmatic), “Speed Racer: The Next Generation”, “Alientologists.” An accomplished filmmaker and founder of Solarc Productions, Kurt filmed Chasing Magic at the Joyce and is honored to join Ayodele and team in this live production! @kurtcsolak

(she/her) A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Performances at Infinity Tokyo, Guggenheim Bilbao, Lincoln Center, New York City Center, Radio City Music Hall, Met Gala, Joyce Theater. TV/Film: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic, Ayodele Casel: Rooted, Voices Rising, All Arts; “Gutto Chikyubin,” Japan. Awards: 2023 Princess Grace Award, 2024 Dance Magazine’s 25 to Watch.

A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Crystal Monee Hall is a singer/songwriter, composer, vocal arranger and producer and music director based in New York City. Her varied career has included roles on Broadway (RENT and Kristen Chenoweth’s For the Girls), sold-out tours with Mickey Hart (Grateful Dead) and Ben Platt, and guest appearances on the CW’s “Walker” and HBO’s “High Maintenance.” She has released three original albums, with work from her recent EP If You Breathe called “riveting” by Billboard Magazine. Website: crystalmoneehall.com / Social media @crystalmonee / https://linktr.ee/crystalmonee

(he/him) A.R.T.: Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic. Current member of Arturo O’Farrill & the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra and Ayodele Casel’s ensemble. Performances with the Symphony Orchestra of Louisville and Los Angeles Philharmonic. Collaborations include Isaac Delgado, Orlando “Maraca” Valle, Alexander Abreu and Havana D’Primera, and Jon Batiste. Owner, One Way Beat. Awards: Grammy Award for Best Latin Jazz Album. Education: MM, The New School.

A.R.T.: Debut. John Manzari is an Ovation Award and Helen Hayes Award-nominated artist. Stage: NY Pops Up, 42nd Street, Maurice Hines: Tappin’ Thru Life, The Wiz is 40, and Sophisticated Ladies. Television: “The View,” PBS’s special “Michael Feinstein at the Rainbow Room,” and “The Jerry Lewis Telethon.” John can be seen in the documentary about his mentor titled Maurice Hines: Bring Them Back and the award-winning short film Slip.

A.R.T.: Debut. TV: “So You Think You Can Dance” (Emmy Nomination), “The Arsenio Hall Show,” “America’s Got Talent,” “The Tony Danza Show.” Producer, Director, and Choreographer at AM Dance Productions: The Text, The Subtext, When Snow Falls, Matt and Anthony, flood (in the dark corner, and flood (redux). Other Performances: Tapaholics, Still Motion, Ayodele Casel: Chasing Magic, and Diary of A Tap Dancer v.6. Founder and Co-Director at Operation: Tap.

A pianist, composer, and educator, Arturo O’Farrill was born in Mexico and grew up in New York City. Arturo’s professional career began with the Carla Bley Band and continued as a solo performer with a wide spectrum of artists including Dizzy Gillespie, Lester Bowie, Wynton Marsalis, and Harry Belafonte. In 2007, he founded the Afro Latin Jazz Alliance as a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the performance, education, and preservation of Afro Latin music. An avid supporter of all the arts, Arturo has performed with Ballet Hispanico, Ron Brown’s EVIDENCE Dance company, and the Malpaso Dance Company, for whom he has written two ballets. Arturo’s well-reviewed and highly praised “Afro-Latin Jazz Suite” from the album CUBA: The Conversation Continues (Motéma) took the 2016 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition as well as the 2016 Latin Grammy for Best Latin Jazz Recording. In addition, his composition “Three Revolutions” from the album Familia-Tribute to Chico and Bebo also received the Best Instrumental Composition Grammy in 2018. Arturo’s most recent album, Four Questions won yet another Grammy award in 2021.

A.R.T.: Debut. Regional: Black Odyssey Boston, Bedlam’s Pygmalion, When January Feels Like Summer, Underground Railway Theater; The Women Who Mapped the Stars, The Revolutionists, The Nora Theater; Mamma Mia!, West Side Story, My Fair Lady, Grease, Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music, New Bedford Festival Theater; Edith Can Shoot Things and Hit Them, Company One. Education: Bachelor of Arts, Northeastern University.