STAY TUNED FOR THE 2023 Instructors
Until then Check out the Amazing Team from 2020!
THE Keynote Speakers
April Jennifer Choi
Keynote Speaker
April Jennifer Choi
Keynote Speaker
April Choi has studied dance and movement arts almost all of her life. She is most well known for her whip skills with several Guinness Book World Records in Whip Cracking, and also as the creator and producer of the Fire Eating Tricktionary.
She has an expansive repertoire of skills with various types of dance, martial arts, and fire performance. She is currently a full-time performer and travels extensively around the country teaching and performing a myriad of dance and movement classes.
Her circus skills have led her to teach and perform on television and at events and festivals all over the planet.
This Keynote addresses some of the most interesting concepts that repeatedly come up when a performers studies the effects of insight and self-awareness. It covers many benefits of being insightful as well as some of the down-falls when improperly used.
Diving into the science and psychology of performing in all aspects, this speech hopes to leave the audience with a cornucopia of inspiration, useful information, and hopefully a few insights for themselves.
Anita DeCastro
Keynote Speaker
Anita DeCastro
Keynote Speaker
Anita is a movement educator and director, confidence coach, performer, and small business owner. She quit her job as the Programs Director at the Eskenazi Museum of Art to pioneer Bloomington’s first Pole and Aerial Yoga Studio, Wild Orchid. Anita has been moving and performing since the age of 5 and has worked professionally in a variety of creative fields.
Prior to Wild Orchid, she ran a mixed movement arts company where she directed and performed both locally and regionally. Anita has also worked as a stunt double for feature films, and was a nationally recognized EDM DJ in her teens. Currently she runs her studio full-time and is developing a second project, Movement Lab, based on her mixed movement arts experience.
One of her dreams with this new pursuit is to offer fun and empowering retreats that get people out of their heads and into their bodies. Beyond her credentials, Anita loves to play, laugh, and bring people together to build meaningful experiences in their communities. She’s an advocate for living a life driven by compassion, self-love, courage, and adventure.
Whether you’re a performer, a community leader, or a small business owner, you can’t avoid criticism. And you shouldn’t want to!
Gain insight into how to lead with a solution driven attitude and learn how to turn even the harshest criticism into a positive opportunity for growth.
Mervyn Alphonse
Keynote Speaker
Mervyn Alphonse
Keynote Speaker
Mervyn Alphonse has taught and practiced Hatha and Kundalini Yoga extensively and is certified to teach ‘Kundalini Yoga as taught by Yogi Bhajan.’ He is a certified Reiki Master and utilizes a 34” gong in his Sound Healing practice.
He has also sat Zazen for several years and has presented Yoga workshops and healing sessions at many festivals across the country. He currently teaches Hatha and Kundalini Yoga in Bloomington, Indiana.
Join us for a Sound Bath to start your weekend off right immediately following opening circle Friday.
Acro & Yoga Team
Adam Ploshay
Acro & Yoga Team
Adam Ploshay
Acro & Yoga Team
Adam discovered acro yoga and partner acrobatics in 2014, and in it, a way to synthesize his partner dance and juggling, by throwing other humans around! He completed certification with LIFT School of Acrobatics in summer 2017 and is always stoked to share a framework for safely exploring movement challenges and creativity in a wholly collaborative setting.
Learn the “Break Dancer” acro yoga washing macine, with options to remix some of its moves for some make-your-own machine fun! Recommended minimum prerequisites: Couch and/or Vishnu’s Couch.
Explore the 4-Step family of acro yoga “washing machines,” which offers a range of variations, from a version accessible to be your first machine — all the way up to very challenging versions, and everything in between! Recommended minimum prerequisites: Star
The first portion of the workshop will consist of a more traditional yoga class, hitting on skills that help build toward a handstand practice. The second portion will focus on working on the pyramid of skills toward handstands, with everyone choosing their own level of practice, and working in partnerships so that we can spot each other.
Taking moves from gymnastics, acrobatics, parkour, and stunt work, this workshop will cover how to fall down, forwards, backwards, and sideways — both in *planned* scenarios (for performance!), and *unplanned* scenarios (just trying to not get hurt)! Learning to fall can help make your acrobatic and aerial practice less risky and more sustainable — *and* more effective, by enabling you to feel more courageous trying new things where you might fall out.
Meghan Halaburda
Acro & Yoga Team
Meghan Halaburda
Acro & Yoga Team
Meghan began her acro yoga practice in 2017. Coming from a background in figure skating and dance, she enjoys performing and sharing her love of flow movement with others. She also dabbles in juggling, rock climbing, and petting dogs.
Learn the “Break Dancer” acro yoga washing macine, with options to remix some of its moves for some make-your-own machine fun! Recommended minimum prerequisites: Couch and/or Vishnu’s Couch.
Explore the 4-Step family of acro yoga “washing machines,” which offers a range of variations, from a version accessible to be your first machine — all the way up to very challenging versions, and everything in between! Recommended minimum prerequisites: Star
Skip Peters
Acro & Yoga Team
Skip Peters
Acro & Yoga Team
Sarah (Skip) has been teaching yoga since 2016 with a specialization in Hot Vinyasa Yoga. She brings an understanding that every body is different and yoga can be adapted to fit a person's specific needs. She instructs clients from the ages of 18-90. She enjoys the creativity of Vinyasa flow and all the possibilities for freedom of personal expression through movement and increased self-awareness. This made acro yoga a natural addition to her personal practice. Acro provides a playful opportunity to create movement, flow, and challenge what you are truly capable of while working with others to accomplish a mutual goal. While yoga is a very introspective practice, acro yoga requires clear interpersonal communication. She hopes to facilitate space to increase awareness of mind and body with each breath as it guides you throughout your own practice so you can live mindfully on and off the mat.
The first portion of the workshop will consist of a more traditional yoga class, hitting on skills that help build toward a handstand practice. The second portion will focus on working on the pyramid of skills toward handstands, with everyone choosing their own level of practice, and working in partnerships so that we can spot each other.
Vince Brown
Acro & Yoga Team
Vince Brown
Acro & Yoga Team
Vince Brown has been training parkour/freerunning for over 7 years. In 2014, he began teaching parkour classes and individual instruction in the Ninja Zone program at Wright's Gymnastics in Indianapolis. He then traveled to Taiwan and taught parkour classes both at private gyms and for public school's extracurricular programs, all while teaching English as well. That being said, he has had much experience failing and falling; learning through the process to find comfort in chaos, to acknowledge the resilience of the human body, and about the psychology of getting back up again.
Taking moves from gymnastics, acrobatics, parkour, and stunt work, this workshop will cover how to fall down, forwards, backwards, and sideways — both in *planned* scenarios (for performance!), and *unplanned* scenarios (just trying to not get hurt)! Learning to fall can help make your acrobatic and aerial practice less risky and more sustainable — *and* more effective, by enabling you to feel more courageous trying new things where you might fall out.
Beginner acro workshop taught by a femme partnership to encourage anyone to fly or base or do both! This workshop aims to encourage everyone to “shake things up” by trying out both sides of the acro postures. Traditional bases: Feel free to fly! Flyers: We promise your legs are strong enough to base! This is a safe space with lots of spots trying to shake up the gender norms in partner acrobatics. Curriculum: Warm up: “bird” and its calibrations. Progression: “throne” to “bird to throne,” then “back bird.” Final skill: “hand-stand walkovers”!
Julia Z
Acro & Yoga Team
Julia Z
Acro & Yoga Team
Julia Z is a local waitress/bartender who discovered yoga in 2010. Her yoga journey began at Know Yoga Know Peace, where she also received her 200 YTT in 2014. She can honestly say it means more to her than her IU degree. Throughout the years, she has returned to her mat, each time with a new purpose. She hopes to share with you the beautiful energy of our vibes through breath and movement. In her classes you will find comfort in asanas as well as opportunities to challenge your body and mind. Her intention as an instructor is to open your being to your inner energy and love that energy you share. Her intention as a student is to always love herself so that she can better love those around her.
Wake up with this invigorating and peaceful morning stretch, designed to prepare you for a busy day of learning.
Alex and Andrea
Acro & Yoga Team
Alex and Andrea
Acro & Yoga Team
Alex is a lighthearted and playful acrobat and yogi who first came into contact with the world of acro yoga 5 years ago. He has been teaching a weekly class in his current home base of Columbus, Ohio, for the past four years. During that time, Alex also completed the LIFT School of Acrobatics teacher apprenticeship and has taught at numerous festivals and workshops across the country. His approach to teaching focuses on maximizing laughter and fun, all while pushing students and helping them achieve their potential. In attending one of his classes, you will be sure to find out just how amazing and talented you really are. Andrea has been fully immersed in the world of acro yoga since 2016. As a certified teacher through LIFT School of Acrobatics, she wishes to empower her students and create a safe space for authentic self-expression. Andrea teaches weekly classes and workshops in her homebase of Columbus, Ohio, as well as throughout the U.S. Her classes consist of careful progressions, with an emphasis on safe spotting, and supporting students at every point of their acro journey. An eternal student, Andrea regularly travels to workshops and festivals around the U.S. to further her skills. Her passion for movement extends past acro into rock climbing, dance and tumbling.
We’ll play with the High Barrel Roll and Corkscrew family of acro yoga washing machines, with options for choose-your-own-adventure on the difficulty level.
Recommended minimum prerequisites: Star, Sidestar
In this class we will be on our feet exploring partner-based standing skills from the world of acro yoga. We will learn to trust and lean on one another to make fun shapes. You will amaze yourself with what you’re capable of as you tower over your friends in all sorts of crazy poses.
Explore the restorative side of acro yoga, with some partner stretching and massage to help you cool down, and get refreshed for tomorrow! We’ll cover some introductory Lunar Acro Yoga — holding each other in the air, for gravity-assisted passive stretching — and come to the ground for some elemental Thai Massage.
We’ll group up in giver/receiver partnerships (and swap roles), so you can bring one with you, or make a new friend!
Aerial Team
Aerialogy
Aerial Team
Aerialogy
Aerial Team
Aerialogy unites a unique band of professional performers and instructors specializing in many fantastic forms of flight, including silks, lyra, aerial chains, trapeze, chandelyra, aerial net, and more. If you can rig it, they will probably hang upside-down on it!
Aerialogy elevates special events with ambient performances, aerial bartending, and daring parter acrobatics. They also offer workshops and private lessons for the brave and foolhardy.
This class is for beginners, though seasoned flyers are welcome to join in and refine their fundamental aerial skills. We’ll explore inversions, spins, balancing poses, and other foundational skills in this low-intensity, close-to-the-ground aerial movement class.
This session is directed toward experienced participants with a current mastery of footlocks, inversions, and climbs. Students will practice challenging climbs, hip key moves, drops, and more based on participants’ ability levels and experience.
Are you looking for a challenge? This advanced aerial silks workshop is the perfect opportunity for those with previous silks experience to upgrade their aerial knowledge in a high-intensity class that will focus on advanced climbing techniques, spins, and drops.
Learn the art of the aerial hoop! We’ll explore mounts, splits, spins, and more, based on participants’ ability levels and experience.
Test your limits and learn something new on the lyra! Learn tricks under, in, and above the hoop. Explore drops and duo moves.
In this workshop, students of all levels can explore this unique aerial apparatus and learn to flip, spin, and create new beautiful shapes.
Aerialogy is a pioneer in chandelyra choreography. Join us to learn original flows, spanset moves, and the art of making lovely shapes on this tipped aerial hoop. Working in groups of 2-3, you’ll hone partner acrobatic communication and counterbalancing skills while spinning your brains out.
Kelsey Jean
Aerial Team
Kelsey Jean
Aerial Team
Meditative Movement in any form allows the body to express and experience emotions long forgotten or locked away. An avid lover of all movement forms, Kelsey enjoys nothing more than teaching others how to tap into our bodies' fundamental purpose. Over the past nine years, she has delved deep into lyra, sling, floor movement, hula hoop, choreography, performances, and instruction.
The aerial hoop (lyra) and stage pole come together to form a lovely and unique aerial apparatus. In this workshop, students will learn foundational lollipop skills. Expect to spin, mount, climb, and pose in this aerial class!
Build onto your foundation of pole and lyra skills to tackle more advanced lollipop transitions. Students will leave this class having a full lollipop combo, utilizing both the pole and hoop! **Prior experience on lyra, pole, or lollipop required.
Poppe Tsunami
Aerial Team
Poppe Tsunami
Aerial Team
Though hoops were her gateway circus props, aerials officially stole her heart in 2016 when Poppe started training at Aerialogy. Currently, she coaches at Cirque Indy in Indianapolis. She has a love for the constant creative and physical challenges of aerial movement, loves cultivating community, and sharing her passions with others.
A fun way to get in the air without the ouchy steel of lyra or the floopiness of split fabric silks, and it’s more dynamic than aerial yoga. Aerial sling is the perfect apparatus supporting you for spinning, and inverting.
You’ve taken a few aerial classes (either intro at Symposium or elsewhere) and can understand your body in space, so now, let’s get all twisted in the sling. We’ll strike several poses, spin like a dervish, and amaze your friends! For the thrill seekers, we might throw in a few drops.
This session is directed toward experienced participants with a current mastery of footlocks, inversions, and climbs. Students will practice challenging climbs, hip key moves, drops, and more based on participants’ ability levels and experience.
Aerialogy is a pioneer in chandelyra choreography. Join us to learn original flows, spanset moves, and the art of making lovely shapes on this tipped aerial hoop. Working in groups of 2-3, you’ll hone partner acrobatic communication and counterbalancing skills while spinning your brains out.
This class is for beginners, though seasoned flyers are welcome to join in and refine their fundamental aerial skills. We’ll explore inversions, spins, balancing poses, and other foundational skills in this low-intensity, close-to-the-ground aerial movement class.
Shelby Rihm
Aerial Team
Shelby Rihm
Aerial Team
This class is for beginners, though seasoned flyers are welcome to join in and refine their fundamental aerial skills. We’ll explore inversions, spins, balancing poses, and other foundational skills in this low-intensity, close-to-the-ground aerial movement class.
Olivia Miller
Aerial Team
Olivia Miller
Aerial Team
Olivia Miller: When she’s not running her aerial business in Indianapolis, Olivia is with her Aerialogy family in Bloomington. Though her first love is aerial silks, she also enjoys specialty apparati such as aerial net, chandelyra, and aerial frame.
In this workshop, students of all levels can explore this unique aerial apparatus and learn to flip, spin, and create new beautiful shapes.
Halle J
Aerial Team
Halle J
Aerial Team
Halle J has been practicing the art of pole dance for four years. She mainly focuses on exotic pole but is well versed in lyrical pole as well. She placed second in her division at the central pole championships put on by the pole sports organization in 2018.
This year she has competed in Miss Pole Dance Taboo and was a performer in Hell on Heels in Indianapolis. Her classes are based on exploring your sensual and sexual side in a safe and comfortable atmosphere.
Join Halle in a short exotic pole class. This all levels class (it is recommended that you have some dance/ flow experience) is geared towards learning a short exotic flow. We will do a short sexy warmup prompt and then learn a short routine. Come get filthy this afternoon!
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Kali the Courageous
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Kali the Courageous
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Hailing from the greater Dayton FLOHIO- Kali's been a major hoop nerd for the past 6 years and teaching hoop workshops across the midwest for the past 3. Although fire hooping is one of her favorite things, she also enjoys playing acoustic music, dogs, magic and occasional craft bartending. Catch her in the fire circle, showcasing some tricks and concepts she will be sharing in her workshops this year. Also come say hi, she's kinda shy.
Within this community of flow/movement/performance artist, we use our physical forms to help us display our art form. By means of dance, makeup, costuming, and otherwise expression, we are essentially exposing our inner selves to the outside world.
In this workshop, we will be openly discussing how to communicate consent, AND ways to translate it from others. Understanding the difference between a “yes” and a “no” and bridging the distance between the two will open possibilities for setting personal boundaries and respecting those of others.
Pauly
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Pauly
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Pauly is a flow artist from Bloomington, Indiana. Primarily focusing on hoop, Pauly also enjoys poi and continually developing flow on different props. Flow arts have become central to all their pursuits since autumn of 2015, becoming the focus of their capstone thesis from IU. Pauly taught their first workshop in India in 2016 and has since started to explore the intersections of queerness with flow arts. Pauly hopes to see the flow arts become accessible to populations around the world, paying homage to the indigenous roots of almost each of the most popular props in flow arts.
In this workshop, discussion prompts will task participants with unpacking the notion of gender and our communal relationship with gender.
Further, participants will be guided through exercises that frame gender as directional flows of energy, challenging one’s relationship with movement itself. These exercises will utilize movement to engage one’s ability to distinguish in from out, pull from push, yin from yang, feminine from masculine.
The primary goal for this workshop is for participants to walk away with new ideas that can facilitate growth in any mode of dance or prop spinning. This workshop is welcome to all, and all perspectives are celebrated; that being said, no hateful language will be tolerated.
In this workshop, we will be openly discussing how to communicate consent, AND ways to translate it from others. Understanding the difference between a “yes” and a “no” and bridging the distance between the two will open possibilities for setting personal boundaries and respecting those of others.
Tree
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Tree
Discussion & Social Circus Team
Tree came in contact with her first set of flowerstix in 2001. She became instantly addicted and couldn’t put them down. She found her favorite dance partner in her flowerstix, a partner that moves with her soul in a dance balanced with give and take, twirling with her however the flow leads. After the birth of her son in 2005, she soon learned to flow with only one hand while holding her son on her hip with the other as she danced. It quickly became clear that children were her favorite audience because they always wanted to play, too. Their eagerness to interact with a new toy led Tree through a natural progression to teaching flowerstix. During her time as a school teacher (her students named her Miss Tree) she came across students that had great difficulty staying focused or finding a productive outlet for their energy. After introducing flowerstix through a lesson on movement, she was amazed to see those same students connect with the stix and focus in a way they never had before. This experience solidified the idea in her mind that a flow state cannot be forced, and must be experienced through play and authentic interest. Tree loves guiding anyone with their journey to flow through flowerstix. She can always be found with an extra set of stix and a willingness to give a quick introduction to her favorite flow toy. All skill levels are welcome to share in the joy of play!
On-the-spot mini workshops offered to the general public that come to attend the Showcase. Free mini workshops with leviwand, poi, and (possibly) flowerstix in the vending area near the Raintree Roots Booth. Presenting the circus arts as accessible to everyone!
April Jennifer Choi
Social Circus Team
April Jennifer Choi
Social Circus Team
April Choi has studied dance and movement arts almost all of her life. She is most well known for her whip skills with several Guinness Book World Records in Whip Cracking, and also as the creator and producer of the Fire Eating Tricktionary.
She has an expansive repertoire of skills with various types of dance, martial arts, and fire performance. She is currently a full-time performer and travels extensively around the country teaching and performing a myriad of dance and movement classes. Her circus skills have led her to teach and perform on television and at events and festivals all over the planet.
In this class, we will be building the foundations of a business as a performance artist or someone trying to make money in the flow arts.
We will cover the outline of creating and running a business with the same skeleton used for business degrees.
We’ll briefly go over categories from Marketing, Advertising, Promotions, Networking, Finances, Budgeting, Cash Flow, Production, Performance, Market Research, Operations, Logistics, Business Tactics, Time Management, Negotiation, and Legal Matters, getting you ready for the business world of flow arts.
Marketing is one of the biggest influences in the success of Flow Artists and Performers.
We will cover marketing for the street, ambient, corporate, stage, and TV gigs. How to use Social Media, Search Engine Optimization, Analytics, Promo Kits, Branding, Networking, and other Marketing tools to boost your visibility so you can improve your gigs, engagement, and prices.
Get some of the top Marketing Strategies and Secrets that have taken some flow artists from an unknown backyard spinner to having 10k+ followers and major TV contracts.
So you are now a performer, but you’re not doing quite as well as you hoped.
Come to this class and we will give you the information to increase your income so you can get better-paying gigs and negotiate better rates. We’ll give you some of the business secrets like the ‘magic email’ (to get clients to respond), the ‘black swan’ (negotiation tactic to double your income), and ways to get those big gigs, sponsorships, and TV spotlights that no one else can get.
From street, to part-time, to full-time performing, you’ll have the tips and tools to tackle taxes, tacky tactics, and triumph in the performing arts.
Once you get your business up and running, you’ll need a way to keep it running at top speed.
You’ll need faster ways to respond to more and more inquiries and ways to save time keeping up with all the clients. This is the class that will take your performing business and push it to it maximum capabilities.
We will cover creating client lists, online and offline documents storage, ways of making quoting, pricing, performance, finance, choreography, collaboration, application and other project planning documents, spreadsheets and tools to reduce the amount of paperwork and increase the percentage of your time doing the fun stuff.
Hoop Team
Katatonic
Hoop Team
Katatonic
Hoop Team
Kat, also know as Katatonic, found flow arts in the fall of 2013 and shortly after discovered The Hudsucker Posse in Bloomington, Indiana. She has been flowing, learning, and growing with the posse for 7 years now and wants nothing more than to share her love for the arts with the world. So far, she has been performing for 5 years and teaching for 4. She recently leveled up her teaching game by completing her 200-hour yoga teacher training at Vibe Yoga studio. This training brought many wonderful insights into teaching that she hopes to integrate into her flow arts classes.
Learn the foundational isolation techniques including one-handed, two-handed, ghosting, and cat-eye isolations. This class is for hoopers looking to start their isolation journey and/or brush up on the basics.
Take your isolations to the next level with plane changes, breaks, and more! This class is designed for the hooper looking to up their iso game.
Walk away with pre-designed combinations as well as the knowledge to cultivate this creative process in your personal practice. This class will cover transitions from isolations into other types of movement.
Reciprocator
Hoop Team
Reciprocator
Hoop Team
Cameron Robert, aka Reciprocator, is an object manipulator and flow artist of 7 years. He began spinning poi but, after a plateau, found an immense passion for multiple hoop manipulations. Cameron is heavily involved in the art communities in Chicago, his hometown. He is an instructor at the Frankfort Circus Center, where he teaches beginner ground act circus classes to all ages. Cameron also volunteers for the Chicago Full Moon Jam, and you can catch him at any of their events.
In this course we will be going over a multitude of iso variations (where one or more hoop is isolating in conjunction with another) and how to transition in and out of each. Tips on how to clean up your flow included. Each student will walk away learning a small choreographed piece.
In this course we will briefly go over the 9-square theory and how that is applied to a 3-dimensional plane. Students will learn how to make almost any trick (such as a split/opp extension or an antispin vs extension) 3-dimensional.
Students will be challenged to be creative and find a way to make something they already know 3-dimensional. Each student will learn a short choreographed piece.
In this course the II (or double staff) relation will be introduced (where both hoops make a straight line and are generally folded subsequently to make flowers).
We will work our way up to quarter-timed 3-dimensional folds. Each student will learn a short choreographed piece.
Applying some knowledge acquired in courses prior to this one, students will learn how to navigate quad hoops on a 3-dimensional plane. This course puts quite a strain on the wrists and requires a bit of endurance.
We will begin with some wrist exercises and then will learn how to use the hoops in an ocho box grip. We will proceed into a double ocho box grip and explore this shape together.
From there each movement gains entrance to another, and by the end of the course students should have complete understanding of navigation. If time allows, each student will learn a short choreographed piece.
That Hoop Guy
Hoop Team
That Hoop Guy
Hoop Team
~ Michael Hayataka, That Hoop Guy ~ Mike has been hooping for over 10 years and in that time has fallen in love with hooping and teaching object manipulation skills. With his unique style and liquid flow, he’s now taking his over 8 years of teaching experience to the flow community. His analytical teaching style informs intuitive, hard-to-explain concepts through single technique-based breakdowns. With a successful international and domestic workshop portfolio, he has taught at over 60 flow and hoop events over the last 6 years. Just back from a tour with The Wandering Circus in Australia, Mike is ready to teach the stuff and things to all the hoopers.
***No prerequisites required, all kinds of prop-manipulators encouraged***
In this class we will learn how to do a super-duper clean, basic chest roll. The focus is not on how many different kinds or variations, but how to have a perfectly controlled chest roll that has contact from finger to finger.
Then, we will focus on variations. Mike has been doing chest rolls for about 6 years now, and it has been one of the most important moves in his practice. This move can truly show you that you are capable of anything, and that practice and dedication are worth it.
If you have ever thought that you cannot do a chest roll with a hoop, PLEASE COME TO THIS CLASS!!!
Mike has been obsessed with hoop balance for the last 3 years, and this class is an opportunity to share all he’s learned.
Designed to give beginners the basic exercises to practice, and to give experienced balancers new ideas, this balance class is great for all levels. Even if you don’t use hula hoops, hoop balance has no prerequisites, so please join us.
We will be learning techniques from the hand and finger-tip balances to the butterfly and face balance.
If you seek calmness mixed with constant concentration in your practice, come balance some hoops with us!
This class is a discussion- and exercise-based class designed for experienced teachers and novices.
Mike has over 7 years of hoop teaching experience and has taught at over 45 flow-related events. In this class, Mike will discuss his strategies for teaching as well as lead group exercises to explore how each individual person learns, and how to teach them.
We will also be discussing techniques for teaching to different class sizes, writing/planning out a class with realistic expectations, connecting with your students, time management, professionalism, and confidence issues. Let’s learn about learning!
— Bring Your Props —
Dancing and musicality have become an integral part of Flow Arts performance, personal style, and self-expression over the past couple of years.
Mike has managed, with no proper training, to learn how to move to music in interesting ways that onlookers seem to enjoy. In this workshop he will teach the basic concepts connected with the way that he expresses himself with his prop to music.
Beat dissection, tempo changes, timing, space, and energy will be explored through listening and dancing to many types of music. Come dance with Mike, and don’t worry, bring your prop too, please.
Dance Team
Rozbot
Dance Team
Rozbot
Dance Team
Manufactured on the Southside of Chicago, Rozbot has been practicing dance since he put shoes on, but he has performed professionally for 11 years now. He's dedicated himself to making FUN happen with his art, sharing his boogie all over the United States and even internationally. Although he is a jack of all dances, he is also a master of many. His typical movements consist of strong character, pinpoint isolations, and violent control.
Teaches you how to move with your prop. Focus on cycles of movements to match your prop manipulation with your dancing.
Learn how to utilize the full body grid and dance with it!
Teaches you how to move your feet! Focus on keeping a rhythm while moving your feet in different ways.
Matchstick Merryweather, “Matches”
Dance Team
Matchstick Merryweather, “Matches”
Dance Team
Matchstick Merryweather
Director of Tomfoolery
Producer, Whiskey City Burlesque
Known as the Dapper Napper of Burlesque, this narcoleptic showstopper manages to keep themselves busy. Matchstick Merryweather, or Matches, is a pure-bred sideshow wildfire who loves spending their time connecting the arts communities that surround them. Today, "Matches" performs, produces, and directs for Whiskey City Burlesque. They also sit on the Board of Directors for Central Illinois Ballet and occasionally perform with this professional company. Using their 20+ year background of theater, music, dance, flow arts, and overall "feminine mystique" (they are from the same city as Betty Friedan after all), they charm the pants off of audiences as much as possible. Matches enjoys infusing glitterblood into everyone they meet and hopes that others find as much joy, extreme self-acceptance, and ridiculous silliness as they do from the great art that is burlesque.
This is an all-levels burlesque class focused on the most important prop we have: our bodies!
The course will focus on intentional movement, taking time for musicality, and commanding attention.
Learn to add some peel to your appeal and some saunter to your swagger. Even if you do not intend to perform burlesque, this class is guaranteed to be crazy fun, body positive, and full of booty shaking.
Please wear clothing comfortable for dance. Heels are great fun to dance in but by no means required.
Demonstration of movement will be provided in a chair as well to accommodate various abilities.
If you need a chair or other assistance to make this class more accessible for you, please contact matchstickmerryweather@gmail.com before the start of class.
Have you ever wanted to take your skills to the stage, but you aren’t sure how to captivate the audience?
Stage presence is about more than just performing a skill with precision; it’s about connecting with the audience.
In this class we will cover the following themes:
1. Choosing a character for your act: Who are you, for this 5 minutes?
2. Research: Do you REALLY represent the part?
3. LOOK UP: Eye contact and facial expression
4. Be yourself, just not on stage: If you don’t feel weird, it probably looks boring.
5. Brand that booty!: How to take your overall “character persona” beyond the stage to build your brand as a performer
Squirrelly
Dance Team
Squirrelly
Dance Team
“Squirrelly” (Krysten) is bringing collaborative workshops and top-quality hugs all the way from Ontario, Canada. Squirrelly discovered flow arts after being awed by the Electric Forest Hoop Troupe auditions in 2015. Since then, she has become one of the ’hoop mamas’ in her area, inspiring muggles to spin things, and co-creating weekly flow arts and acro yoga jams (Tri City Flow). Her most recent endeavours include trying to #popularizepartnerpoi with Ryan, and setting corporate events (safely) on fire with her new troupe, Dragon Breath Entertainment. Her goal is to facilitate and inspire artistic collaborations whenever and wherever possible!
This workshop is essentially a collaborative art experiment using LEDs and long exposure.
We’ll play with layering patterns, silhouettes, and whatever glowing objects we have available to us!
Feel free to bring your camera if you’ve got one! (All media created will be put in a Google Drive for free sharing/use)
Poi Team
The baseline mechanics for spinning 2 poi in 1 hand. The different modes for spinning, how timing and direction work, and drills to build control.
Advanced tricks to take your 2P1H to the next level.
Ryan Dushwam
Poi Team
Ryan Dushwam
Poi Team
In 2012, Ryan discovered dance and flow arts. In 2015, at Campfire Retreat in Minnesota, he discovered how much they meant to him and decided to never ever stop. He began teaching, organizing spinjams and attending more retreats. All of this was in a concerted effort to facilitate all of Wisconsin's movement arts communities as best as he could. These works have lead him to his longtime goal of helping direct and organize Wisconsin flow arts events and retreats like Frostbite and Rock and Flow! To date, nothing makes him feel more fulfilled than teaching workshops and hosting flow jams.
First, we will learn an injury-prevention, poi-focused warm-up made with the help of a Physical Therapist. This warm-up will be done each day.
Then, we will practice plane control, walking, and “together-same” spinning. Using that spinning, we will learn reels, hip reels, shoulder reels and then chase the sun.
Each of the tricks in this class and the following will be followed up with variations involving walking, turning and chaine-turns.
By using tai-chi-type movements, we will break down 2-beat and 3-beat weaves before doing them with poi.
By learning it this way, students will be familiar with a number of ways of performing these weaves stylistically as well as with walking and turning.
Additionally, students will become familiar with “split-same” spinning, and we will revisit some of the reels from the previous class.
By the end of the class, students will have all of the components to do a 2x2x2x2 fountain.
The VTG, or Vulcan Tech Gospel, is a framework for understanding how two objects move through space.
We will specifically focus on practicing the four timing and direction combinations, how to transition between them and how to perform extensions. We will learn a sequence of transitions from each timing and direction while performing extensions and learn to do each while walking and turning.
Lastly, students will be left with the tools they need to build 40 flower patterns using timing and direction of the hands, timing and direction of the props combined with an understanding of inspin and antispin.
Soy Sauce & Seasoned Salt
Poi Team
Soy Sauce & Seasoned Salt
Poi Team
Krysten and Ryan met at Frostbite Flow Arts Camp in Wisconsin. Months later, they began talking online and proceeded to attend flow, fire and juggling events all over the US.
As they progressed further with their partner poi, they began hosting open partner poi skill-shares wherever they went. At Poi Parliament, Cory and Alicia Lund encouraged Ryan and Krysten to apply to the circuit, confident that they were ready to begin teaching.
Their ambition as teachers and performers is to #popularizepartnerpoi; to make it more accessible to all skill-levels and one day see it as commonplace as club passing.
Ryan’s 4 years of teaching experience consists of over 50 fire and flow festivals including PoiCon in Moscow, Russia.
Krysten taught horseback riding from ages 15-20. She is also a certified Hoop Love Coach of 2 years, with which she has taught over 100 classes at local community centers, juggling festivals, corporate events, campgrounds and more.
Students will learn how to do 3-beat “reel weaves,” 4-petal inspin flowers with a partner, 4-beat weaves at two points and 3-beat weaves in chest-to-chest orientation.
We will teach partner 4-beats first, because they are extremely accessible.
Juggling Team
Lee Mai
Juggle Team
Lee Mai
Juggle Team
Lee Mai went to his first flow festival "Flow Camp" in summer 2013. He enjoys club juggling and props in general and currently performs and workshops with Louisville-based company CirqueLouis for kids and adults. He likes the outdoors and stuff. He was the 2019 Cincinnati Juggling Festival face balance champion.
Learn juggling tricks involving balls, rings, clubs, spinning plates.
One-hour workshop will include suggestions for how to reproduce these tricks and teach them to groups of reasonably all ages and skill levels.
Introduction and simple teaching methods for intermediate props.
Try out stilts and discussion on methods for height progression.
Propfessor
Juggle Team
Propfessor
Juggle Team
“Propfessor” Eric Shibuya is a juggler and spinner as well as Professor of Strategic Studies at Marine Corps University. He’s been juggling nearly 35 years and has taught at various flow festivals and juggling conventions. He makes his own “Russian” juggling balls at propfessor.com and serves on the International Jugglers Association Board of Directors.
This will be a basic introduction to 3-ball juggling. No previous experience is necessary, and balls will be provided, though the student should feel free to bring their own.
It will cover the basic cascade and, time permitting, look at some basic tricks, as well as an introduction to 4-ball juggling.
Prerequisite: Solid 3-object cascade for 3-object tricks, solid 4-object fountain for 4-object tricks.
Workshop will explore some of the basic throw and catch variations, leading to student understanding not just of different tricks, but of how to put sequences together themselves.
Focus will be on balls, but all props welcome.
Club passing is one of the most entertaining and social forms of juggling.
This workshop will start from the ground up, teaching the student to develop accurate passing, how to catch a partner’s pass, and communication between jugglers.
This workshop will introduce the student to passing with both the left and right hand. While there are an infinite number of patterns and combinations of passing one can do simply with right-handed passing, learning to pass with both hands opens an entirely new dimension to passing and in many ways balances the juggler’s skill.
This class will work on the basic “3-count” or “waltz” pattern before moving onto other variations.
Basic how to grip, throw and catch your clubs, plus useful 2-club homework.
Throwing under the leg and behind the back. You will learn contact rolls and balance techniques as well.
Sticks Team
Fan 101 covering relations, transitions, grips, timing/direction, and vtg basics.
Digging deeper into transitions by learning and linking sequences that move through 3 or more relations.
Learn a multitude of S relation sequences. Knowing multiple sequences in a relation can provide an easily attainable transition point.
Learn beginner to intermediate tosses and traces to spice up your fan flow.
Gabriel Alexander Ford
Sticks Team
Gabriel Alexander Ford
Sticks Team
Gabriel began his love for the arts at the age of 5 while living the majority of his youth in California. Since then he has continued a path of progression for what has become his life’s ambition and fulfillment. He has an extended 23-year martial arts, weapons, theater, and dancing background in which he continues to develop his style by fusing his personal blend of martial arts, dance, and traditional forms. He has also performed and instructed at many music, art, and flow festivals throughout the U.S and internationally as well. He has been teaching nunchaku for the past 17 years as his specialty. His teaching experience over the years has since led him to craft new and approachable ways to learning that his students enjoy and find easy and engaging to follow. All the while maintaining a balance of informative instruction combined with positive energy and a high regard for the individual student. With his introduction into the flow arts several years ago with poi and double staff, Gabriel fuses the techniques learned from these props along with modern and traditional martial arts weaponry into his classes of Martial Flow. Gabriel currently hosts a monthly Cincinnati Flow Arts meet-up and skill share for all prop and movement artists, new and experienced, in which he continually encourages participants to attend and improve their personal growth and skill.
In this beginner class, participants will learn many basic techniques. We will first discuss a brief history regarding the story of nunchaku while also covering its present and future.
Continuing on, participants shall learn much of the terminology used in nunchaku.
We will then cover our fundamental basics such as grips, stances, weaves, spins, passes, and transitions, which will lead into combination building while developing coordination and timing.
*If you are fairly new or completely unfamiliar with nunchaku, then start with this class. Recommend for all newcomers*
Students shall now learn more intermediate techniques that will supplement the basics learned from the 101 class.
In this class participants shall be focusing on different patterns, timing, direction, hand-roll drills, digit-rolls, tosses, breaks, linking, and skill-drill focused exercises that help develop higher dexterity for creating personal style.
*Recommended for anyone with basic nunchaku understanding looking to build new patterns and combinations*
In this advanced class, participants will take all they have learned from the previous two classes and structure complex combinations which link together a series of grip changes, stance movement, body weaves, and toss patterns.
We shall then move into 2:1 grip patterns, toss-switch juggle drills, and contact nunchaku.
Krisstina from Ninja Pyrate
Sticks Team
Krisstina from Ninja Pyrate
Sticks Team
Krisstina Hawks is the cofounder of Ninja Pyrate, the Floasis Brooklyn, and the Floasis Atlanta. The art of practice has had a profound effect on her life. She is dedicated to her community and enjoys sharing the meditative benefits of building body awareness through movement.
In this beginner accessible class we will learn about pressure locks and their applications, and begin working on the Steve, a foundational move in the horizontal plane, progressing towards the Prayer Steve, with drills and variations to take home.
Loaner props available.
Learn a number of hand-to-foot transitions, using variations of entries from moves such as steves, angel rolls, and shoulder propellers. Discover pressure locks at your feet necessary for foot fishtails. kick-ups in two directions leading to waist wraps.
Loaner props available.
Learn the Matrix. This class focuses on the horizontal plane.
A series of stretches to warm the body will turn into the motions needed to execute the shoulder propellers and neck wraps.
Learn to drill from various entry points to fix your glitch points quicker. Why both directions are important.
Loaner props available.
Now that you have learned the components of the Matrix, learn how to transition into combos with other well-known moves like Duck Outs and Prayer Steves.
Learn transitions from shoulder propellers to foot locks. Begin work on seated versions.
Loaner props available.
In this full-body groundwork class, we will first learn a (beginner accessible) groundwork duckout called “The Mermaid.”
We will then work on a more intermediate “Matrix Sit-Up.” It’s ok if you don’t know the “Matrix” yet, you will definitely start to learn it.
Finally, we will discover how the two moves connect.
Logan Black
Sticks Team
Logan Black
Sticks Team
Southern Ohio-based professional performance artist and instructor, bringing the spirit of yoga to the flow arts, moving through space with smooth grace, Logan Black is an elder dragon (master fire breather) as well as a dragon staff manipulator who likes to get dirty doing groundwork. Be prepared to be swept off your feet because he is also an acro yogi who likes to combine flows.
Helping dragon hatchlings leave their shell and spread their wings.
Learn how to transition from standing to the ground with finesse.
In the last class you learned how to get to the ground; here is what you will learn when you get there!
Magpie
Sticks Team
Magpie
Sticks Team
Maggie “Magpie” Lasher has been a devoted movement artist her entire life. She began dancing at a very early age, ended up with a B.A., M.A., and M.F.A. in dance, and now is a dance professor and dance program coordinator in Houston, Texas. Wearing her dance hat, Magpie has taught dance professionally for over 20 years and has presented more than 50 fully produced choreographic performances ranging from single pieces to evening-length works. Magpie discovered the flow arts in 2002 when someone handed her the first pair of fluffy poi she had ever seen, and a lifelong love was forged. Although her flow journey began with poi, Magpie has delved into a variety of props and through many years of dedicated practice is now happy to call herself a buugengster. Since 2008, Magpie has been the founding and artistic director of Holding Space/Spacetribe, a contemporary dance and flow arts company, and Magpie and the company perform original choreographies in a variety of settings throughout the year. In fall 2018, Magpie offered what may be the first flow arts college class for credit, has featured buugeng and hoop choreographies in college dance program concerts, and has taught flow arts classes for dancers at the American College Dance Conference for multiple years. In addition to teaching a number of flow arts classes for the community, Magpie has taught and performed at Playthink, Flowstorm, SoFlow and Quasar, and has presented on the flow arts at the National Dance Education Organization annual conference.
A fantastic concept for buuginners and buugengsters alike, by honing in on this simple technique, one can unlock many levels of buugeng flow.
For the buuginner, this concept provides a solid building block for skill development, while for the seasoned buugengster, focusing on following the curve can lead to a myriad of new moves and discoveries.
This workshop will introduce the concept and then guide participants through the staggering amount of options that can come from following the curve.
A whole world of interesting buugeng moves are waiting to be discovered through the exploration of tip led movements.
After exploring curve led concepts in the previous class, participants will now discover many exciting variants by simply flipping the script and leading from the tip.
This class is ideal for buuginner to buugengster as a number of concepts that can lead to further exploration will be taught.
Now that we have learned a wide variety of buugeng skills, we will combine them into a movement combination utilizing all the concepts introduced in the previous workshops.
The resulting buugeng dance mediation will allow us to put buugeng movements into combination and drill our skills at the same time.
Matt Ruffner (Paw Print Props) & Dylan Rodriguez
Sticks Team
Matt Ruffner (Paw Print Props) & Dylan Rodriguez
Sticks Team
Matt is a dedicated flow artist from Ohio who focuses on nunchucks and single/double contact staff. Going on five years in flow arts, he’s instructed at a number of flow fests in the Midwest, and continues to explore and push the boundaries of what is possible with his props of choice.
Dylan Rodriguez began his Double Contact Staff practice in 2012 in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and joined Pyroscope Entertainment in 2013. He moved back home to Ohio in 2014, and continued to hone his craft in SOSC. Dylan is passionate about finding fresh concepts and sharing playful ideas.
We will start by pairing up anyone who doesn’t have a partner, and going over how both people should be standing to get started.
We will cover steals, partner folding, tosses, and other fun manipulations that two people can do in tandem, as well as some fun games to play with a partner.
Dylan or I will make a point to get with everyone at some point so that that can get the feel of the movements with somebody who is familiar with them.
Extra staves will be available for anyone needing them.
Learn the basics of staff juggling, starting with 1 staff and working up to 3. By the end of this class, everyone should be able to do some kind of cascade.
This is an all-levels class, but a juggling background helps.
Learn roll variant and assist as well as simple tosses to add to your 3 staff shoulder-pad cascade, whether to give yourself more time or to add flare you will leave this class with a larger trick base.
This class will be better if you have multi-staff experience, but some of these moves will also apply to single and double staff.
Learn how to do full contact rolls, halo turns, some cool contact toss combos, some 423’s and 531’s.