Dance

Downloadable Schedule Here: 107 PAS schedule wo ECE .pdf

For more information, contact Artistic Director of Dance, roberta mathes at rmathes@bergenpac.org OR bpaceducation@gmail.com

DRESS CODE

Proper dance attire and neatness are required for all dance classes. All dancers must have their hair secured back and away from their faces. Jewelry is NOT permitted. Appropriate and properly fitted footwear must be worn for each class.

All dress code items can be purchased at bergenPAC’s Performing Arts School. 

Our Pre-Professional classes offers the dancer (between 13-18 years)  an individualized curriculum. Student take a minimum required number of classes in classical ballet, Horton, modern jazz (mathes technique),  enriched by other dance electives – tap, hip-hop, voice or musical theater. Proper technique and dance training are emphasized to develop strong, well-rounded dancers. Annual evaluations are done. Masterclasses and workshops are offered. 

Our pre-professional dancers will be a part of the Dance Ensemble and have opportunities to perform in NYC and throughout the community. 

Earn College Credit! 

Learn more about the Dual Enrollment  Program at Bergen Community College. There are currently six classes where high school juniors and seniors can receive college credit from Bergen Community College: The Performing Arts School Show Chorus, Advanced Jazz Dance, Teen Acting Technique, Summer Musical, Private Voice Lessons, and Private Piano Lessons. These college credits are transferable to many colleges in the state of New Jersey! 

Summer Dance Intensives (Ages 7-17)

We offer 2-week dance intensives led by Artistic Director of Dance, roberta mathes.  All classes are taught by our stellar faculty and NYC guest artists. Each session culminates with an in-studio presentation. 

2025 Dates TBD

Summer Open Dance Classes (All Ages)

Single and drop-in classes are available which are great for the college or adult student. Child and preteen dancers are required to sign up for the 6-week session. These classes vary in level, beginner through advanced, children through adults. Keep your skills sharp and continue learning over the summer break!

2025 Dates TBD

For more information, contact Artistic Director of Dance, roberta mathes rmathes@bergenpac.org

 Acro is a performance art form that combines balance, strength, agility, motor coordination and tumbling exercises with the artistry of dance and the athleticism of gymnastics. In this class dancers will work on backbends, somersaults, and fundamental balancing needed in walkovers, handstands, and cartwheels. As students master these pre-requisite skills, they safely progress to more advanced work such as scorpions, aerials, handsprings, and layouts. Then they seamlessly integrate it into choreography. Throughout the class, students are challenged on an individual basis and learn to work together creating group tricks and variations. 

*Ballet required for Acro

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• Pre-Ballet

This one-hour class introduces students to the absolute fundamentals. They do floor stretching, barre work, rhythmical exercises and learn dance ettiquette, ballet positions, coordination and spacial awareness. 

• Child Ballet

These classes are progressive in structure, introducing the discipline of classical dance. Students learn basic positions, the use of turnout, and the importance of proper posture. Children develop coordination and footwork skills through barre work and center exercises. They continue to learn ballet terminology and begin to put steps together.  

• Pre-Teen/Teen Ballet

Teachers build from the child ballet syllabus and strengthen the exercises at the barre to increase students’ physical strength and ability. At this level instructors attempt to improve flexibility in crucial muscle groups, strengthen dancers’ lines, and work on expression and basic performing skills. 

• Intermediate/Advanced Ballet

As students continue their education in classical dance, the focus is on technique, perfecting lines, refining their movement, and gaining more control and mobility at the barre and in the center. Exercises are more demanding, and footwork is more complicated. Performing skills are also emphasized. 

• Pointe 

Students learn the fundamentals of pointe work. Dancers must have at least three years of proper ballet training and take a minimum of three classes a week. Pointe is demanding on the body and especially on the feet; sore feet and blisters often occur. At the beginning level, we make sure pointe shoe fits properly and show students the correct way to tie them. Correct ballet technique, alignment, and balance along with proper turnout and strength in the legs are required in order to avoid injury. The mastering of basic pointe gives the dancer proper use of the floor and allows for freedom in complicated steps. “En pointe” students will learn short excerpts of classical repertory. 

This class emphasizes urban and street movement, popping and locking, along with jazz isolations, new style reggae, body waving and break dancing techniques all done to the beats of popular and Hip-Hop music.  

All jazz warm-ups embody a strong ballet and modern foundation, based on the “mathes technique” with an emphasis on correct posture, torso exercises, footwork, leg extensions, floor stretching, sit-ups, and pushups. Dancers repeat progressions across the floor (grand battements, turns, leaps) and learn to put the steps together in different sequences all done to popular and contemporary music. At the end of each class, students will learn a combination varying in style from week to week. 

In more advanced classes, Roberta continues the “mathes technique” training system. Abdominal (core) strength and endurance are emphasized through body alignment including a series of contractions and releases, isolations, and floor work. At this level students gain more muscular control while increasing flexibility, improving extensions, learning how to sustain movement with more ease, linking one step with another and forming artistic expression. Progressions are more challenging, and choreography is more diversified including Latin, lyrical, soulful, upbeat, or theatrical jazz, working on one style for several weeks. 

All Pre-Professional classes: it is mandatory to take two ballet classes per week. 

These classes are done barefoot and emphasize balance and control, weight shifting and use of gravity. Our contemporary class draws on a more aggressive way of moving and builds strong, athletic dancers. 

Modern will explore numerous contemporary techniques, including Graham, a modern dance method devised by the esteemed Martha Graham, Cunningham, and other modern styles. 

Horton, the training system of the Alvin Ailey School in NYC, is a grounded and structured modern dance technique allowing dancers to strengthen their lateral muscle groups.  

Afro Modern will focus on combining traditional African dance stylings and modern strength and movement techniques.  

*All Pre-Professional classes: it is mandatory to take two ballet classes per week. 

There are different techniques and a range of styles that cover the basics of tap dancing: soft shoe, hoofing, and Broadway tap. We cover the fundamental use of musical patterns with footwork (heal toe) and the shifting of weight. These classes are progressive in difficulty, beginning with simple relaxed footwork, across the floor exercises and then in more advanced classes students develop separation of sound, use of swing rhythms and more challenging rhythmical patterns done a capella or to music. 

 [Artistic Director, Dance]

Born and trained in NYC, Mathes received a BA in dance from Adelphi University and has a distinguished career in the performing arts, both in front of the audience as a performer and behind the scenes as a choreographer and coordinator. Her litany of achievements includes: feature films, Beat Street, Fatal Attraction, television programs, The Guiding Light, Law and Order, and award-winning music videos, Higher Love (Steve Winwood), Heard it Through the Grapevine (Marvin Gaye). She has also performed in shows, Sweet Charity and Kismet, an off-off-Broadway in play, Invisible Child, in major industrials for IBM and Chrysler, in special events including the Liberty Bicentennial and Broadway’s opening of the Disney’s film Hercules. Her strength as a dancer and choreographer is her versatility in style. One of Roberta's outstanding credits was as assistant choreographer in Brian de Palma’s film, Carlito’s Way. She has choreographed the opening segment of bergenPAC’s annual galas, featuring such notables as Tony Bennett, Chaka Khan, Stephanie Mills, Paul Anka and their very first musical, FAME. For thirteen years Roberta co-directed dance plus…a whole lot more, a dance school in Englewood, NJ. She especially loved teaching and choreographing for American Ballet Theatre’s Summer Intensive in NYC and was fortunate enough to be a part of their Make a Ballet Program where her work was presented at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center. Roberta guest teaches internationally- Israel, Italy, Canada, Norway, Venezuela, and Brazil. Currently, she is the Artistic Director at the PAS @ bergenPAC and remains on the faculty of Steps on Broadway, NYC. Roberta feels that her best achievements lie in teaching dance as mentioned in a feature article in the February 2000 issue of Dance Teacher Magazine. Roberta loves watching her students grow into expressive and successful dancers. Along with Broadway stages: Carousel, Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, Wicked, Mamma Mia, Spring Awakening, Les Miserables, Sound of Music, Footloose, and major dance companies, her students have been on SYTYCD, The American Music Awards, competed in the prestigious Youth Grand Prix, performed in the NY Jazz Choreography Project, Dance Collage, a 9/11 Tribute in NYC, and can be seen on television in commercials and music videos. Roberta's dynamic personality, along with her own style and “technique” forms a whole and responsive learning experience. She loves giving the gift of dance and sharing her passion with the next generations of dancers! www.robertamathes.com! 

[Dance]

Danelle Herran comes to NYC via San Francisco, California with an extensive background in gymnastics. She began the sport at age 3 and was competing on the DC USA Gymnastics Team at age 6. Making the switch from gymnastics to dance at age 16, Herran went on full scholarship at DSG under the direction of Ann Marie Garvin and Ann Barrett. Her combined training of gymnastics and dance has landed her in numerous workshops and shows including the Las Vegas spectacular, Cirque du Soleil! She has also performed with JKing Dance Company, Dance it Forward and Dancemaniacs. She has had the pleasure of assisting Joyce King (Contemporary) and the renowned, Chuck Kelly (Acrobatics). Danelle is also an advocate for missing children and has choreographed and performed to raise funds for the Xiana Fairchild Recovery Center and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.Danelle brings a love for gymnastics and dance to her teaching, creating a fun and positive learning environment for all ages and levels - including pre-school, special needs, and recreational classes as well as competitive teams.  www.DanelleHerran.com

 [Dance]

Yucari Kobayashi, hailing from Tokyo, Japan, has been dancing since the age of three. After training at Kazuko Fukazawa Ballet and H Dance Company, she began teaching, choreographing, and performing as a soloist among an elite group of dancers from Alvin Ailey including Obediah Wright. Yucari came to NYC and trained under Patricia Dokoudovsky’s tutelage at The New York Conservatory of Dance. Her NYC performing credits include the bergenPAC’s annual gala, opening for such notables as Tony Bennett, Paul Anka, Chaka Khan, and Stephanie Mills, the 2003 ELAN Awards, Dancers Responding To Aids at Symphony Space and St. Marks Church, as well as the International Chopin and Friends Festival. This dancing dynamo has been featured in several dance companies: Jete, Stankovic Ballet Company, Faune Dance Troupe, Dzul Dance. In addition to Steps on Broadway, she has taught at The New York Conservatory of Dance, Lumiere Ballet, dance plus…a whole more of Englewood, Dance Emotions and Central Park Dance in Westchester, NY and continues to choreograph for the NJ Association of Verismo Opera. Currently, Yucari teaches ballet and jazz at beyond dance @ bergenPAC in Englewood, NJ, and taught jazz at Buddy Balou’s and Elaine Kudo’s Theatre Arts Dance Academy (TADA) in Upper Montclair, NJ. Yucari continues to work closely with Roberta Mathes and has assisted her at The School at Steps and at American Ballet Theatre Summer Intensive.

[Dance]

Esther Lee, from Leonia, NJ, started her dance training at age 8 at beyondDANCE (The Performing Arts School) at bergenPAC. Esther is a graduate of The Ailey/Fordham University BFA program, under the direction of Melanie Person, (Co-Director of The Ailey School), and recently received her Masters Degree in Childhood Education. She has been under the tutelage of "roberta mathes" for many years and worked with teachers and choreographers such as Yucari Koboyashi, Miro Magloire, Lakey Evans-Peña, and Gabriel Lamb. Esther has also attended summer intensives at The Ailey School as a scholarship student. She participated in Fordham University’s Spring Anthem commercial, performed an excerpt from the world renowned 'Revelations' at The 2019 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, and most recently danced in song artist Aggelikki's new music video, Samba Griega. In addition to dance, Esther is classically trained in opera and attended Manhattan School of Music Pre-College for Voice. Esther has her sights on Broadway and she can not wait to share her gift to audiences worldwide!

[Dance]

Alice Murphy received her training at the School of American Ballet, attending summer programs at Pennsylvania Ballet, the Chautauqua Institute, and the Saratoga Performing Arts Center. She has performed with the New York City Ballet, the Royal Ballet, and the Bolshoi Ballet. Ms. Murphy continued dancing at Goucher College, working with guest artists from around the world.

She was a founding member of Ballet Ambassadors, an arts and education outreach dance company that gave children and teen in schools, afterschool programs and homeless shelters the opportunity to share the stage with professional dancers in adaptation of ballet classics.

Ms. Murphy has been teaching and coaching students for over 15 years including at the Sarasota Ballet School and Joffrey Ballet and sits on the advisory board of the School of American Ballet.

[Dance]

Brittany Shannon was born and raised in Bergen County, NJ. She graduated from Teaneck High School in 2006 and received a BA in Finance from Hofstra University in 2010. She obtained a Master’s of Health Administration Degree from Capella University in 2022. Her dance training started at the age of five in Teaneck, NJ at Five Star Dance Center and continued to mature in Englewood, NJ at Dance Plus... A Whole Lot More studying the genres of Ballet, Tap, Jazz, and Hip Hop. There she was also accepted into their award-winning competitive dance team which focused on the genre of Hip Hop. While attending Teaneck High School, Brittany studied dance as an elective course for four years and was a part of the Teaneck Terpsichoreans, where she was not only a dancer but a student choreographer as well. In 2006 she was chosen to be a part of THREAD, a performing arts group that traveled to Ghana for a cultural exchange. At Hofstra University she was a dancer and the Vice president of Imani Dance Ensemble for three years. As an educator, she taught at Showtime Dance in Wayne NJ, and served as an assistant choreographer and then house choreographer for the Teaneck Terpsichoreans from 2011-2022. Additionally, she held a teaching position at Dance Art Creative Center in Teaneck, NJ for eight years. Brittany has drawn on all of her experiences to become the dancer and educator she is today. Her goal is to guide and encourage her students by teaching the values of discipline, self-confidence, and perseverance that are key to not only dance but all aspects of life.

[Dance]

Alayna Raye Simpson, raised in Teaneck, New Jersey, has been dancing since childhood. After studying at local dance studios including dance plus…a whole lot more where she met and studied with “roberta mathes” during her senior year of high school, Alayna pursued her passion seriously and attended Hofstra University for Dance. Post-college, she honed her skills in the Independent Study Program at the Alvin Ailey Dance School, focusing on Ballet, Modern (Horton/Graham), Jazz, and African dance.

During her time at The Ailey Program, Bloc Talent, one of NYC’s top dance agencies, saw Alayna dance in a Hip Hop class and sought her out. Since signing with Bloc, Alayna has performed with renowned artists such as Shakira, Yandel, Sia, Pharrell, The Dream, Ne-Yo, OMI, Mase, and Sean Paul, among others. Along with touring extensively, Alayna has appeared in numerous music videos, and performed in various TV/Award Shows, such as the AMA’s.

While working professionally, Alayna Simpson has also taught Modern, Jazz and Hip Hop at numerous studios across the tri-state area. Alayna considers her career a blessing as it allows her to pursue her passion for the arts and inspire others along the way.

​[Dance]

Mateo Wright born in Harlem New York, Mateo Wright is a Hip Hop choreographer with 7 years of experience, winning best theme on JenniferLopez’s television show, World of Dance. He has performed multiple times at the renowned Apollo Theater with the top 5 winners of American Idol including Wé Ani (McDonald), who came in 3rd highest vote, 2nd place on The Voice! Along with being on faculty at Harlem School of the Arts, he has his very own Hip Hop company named Chimera Concept. Mateo is ready to bring the NYC vibe and energy to bergenPAC!!!