Get To Know Your Winter Workshop Instructors
Before the Winter Workshop & Party on February 10th, Let’s learn a little more about our guest instructors. We are thrilled to be hosting Ana Lisa Sutherland and Shelby Johnson to teach a day of workshops for our community. Keep reading to learn more about them.
Ana Lisa Sutherland is a whole lotta energy stuffed into a little package, and she brings it all to the floor! She began dancing early in life in California. There, she competed in Ballroom and Hip Hop before (accidentally) falling in love with Lindy Hop.
Since 2008 she’s traveled the country to compete and learn swing dancing from original legends and current-day champions. She holds multiple titles from top weekend events such as Lindyfest, Lindy Bout, Camp Jitterbug, Lindy Focus, and Lindy On The Rocks. Some of her favorite performance highlights include the Lincoln Center’s Midsummer Night Swing and local cabaret shows in her current city of Seattle.
Ana Lisa believes swing dancing is a cultural experience that allows its participants to connect with the roots of this African American historical dance, contribute back to it, and shine. There is truly a place for everyone within it. Thus, she loves pulling from historical sources and the greats that have come before, as well as incorporating newer forms of dance from her continued explorations in dance.
In the classroom she strives to inspire other dancers to be authentically themselves on the floor and encourage everyone to get a lil weird. She helps her students approach each dance and class as if anything could happen and helps them to unlock the unique conversation they can have with their partner and the music.
THINGS OF NOTE:
– varied dance career spanning many genres (Latin Ballroom, West Coast Swing etc)
– HellaBlack Dance Team Member
– Sister Kate Chorus Girl
– Frankie Manning Ambassador
– Currently studying Waacking and Voguing, much like lindy these connect her to her cultural
roots and expand her voice as a solo dancer
Shelby Johnson is a dance instructor, DJ and lecturer based in Columbus, Ohio. He’s been in the scene since 2011, but he grew up dancing to hip hop, R&B, Funk, Electronic, and, due to the local Latin scene, Salsa.
Growing up, he also experienced a wide array of Jazz music ranging from Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, George Benson, and David Benoit. So when he started dancing Lindy Hop in Orlando, Florida, he already had a knack for solo movement, musicality, and, fairly quickly, partnering.
Shelby has also leaned on his 6 years of Sports coaching education after attaining a Bachelors of Arts and Science in Athletic Coaching Education and later a Masters of Arts in Sports Leadership and Coaching. He has put this knowledge to work with 6 years of Athletics coaching experience ranging from All State high school athletes, Collegiate All Americans and an Olympic medalist. After graduation he turned his focus to general fitness as a personal trainer where he’s been training clients since 2012.
Over the years, Shelby has developed a wealth of knowledge not just of lindy hop and jazz dance steps, but connected the dots between the cultural customs and traditions of these and other dances to those of current Black dances and spaces. Shelby isn’t just a keeper of classic steps and choreographies, but also of stories of how these jazz dances came to be and how they evolved over time, along with the music and events that shaped them. In 2021 Shelby became a board member for Collective Voices for Change, an international organization founded to address the issues of racial inequalities and cultural appropriation in the Jazz dance community in Europe and around the world.