Joan Myers Brown received her training from Essie Marie Dorsey as well as from Marion Cuyjet and Sydney King at the Sydney-Marion School. After the schism between the two women, Myers Brown remained with King, alongside peers Betsy Ann Dickerson, Barbara Harper, and Billy Wilson.

Though she initially turned to King for help opening the Philadelphia School of the Dance Arts, Myers Brown recruited Cuyjet to assist in teaching and managing. Myers Brown says:

[King] wasn’t interested in me having a school of my own, so I went to Miss Cuyjet. She opened her books to me and told me the things that I should do to have a school of my own. That was surprising because I wasn’t her student. Marion was the only other person I knew that had a dance school in the Black community. I [asked] her, “What do you do?”….she showed me how she kept her books. I knew some things about production from working in show business, so I just used what I knew and what I could gather from them and keep moving.

Cuyjet would eventually teach for Myers Brown for many years, as did her daughter.

Sources:

And Still They Rose: Joan Myers Brown, MoBBallet
And Still They Rose: The Legacy of Black Philadelphians in Ballet, MoBBallet

More about Joan Myers Brown

Joan Myers Brown was born on Christmas Day of 1931 to Nellie Lewis, a nuclear scientist, and Julius Myers, a chef and restaurateur. Myers Brown grew up in the Gray’s Ferry section of West Philadelphia, which was racially mixed. But with white flight, it slowly became an all-Black working-class neighborhood.

Brown was asked to join her school’s all-white ballet club. Her gym teacher, Mrs. Lingenfelter, served as the ballet instructor of this class and noticed potential in young Brown. Brown says, “I don’t think she was thinking of color; I think she was thinking of ability.” Though she was the only Black student in the group, this experience introduced Brown to the world of ballet. From here, she studied under Essie Marie Dorsey, at the Sydney-Marion School, and finally, with King following the two teachers’ split. 

Myers Brown became a student of Anthony Tudor and was asked to perform in Les Sylphides at the Philadelphia Academy of Music. Tudor candidly told Brown that if she was to perform professionally, she would not be able to do so in Philadelphia (she had already faced a racist review after performing in Les Sylphides).

At 20 years old, Myers Brown traveled to New York to study on scholarship at the Katherine Dunham School and to perform in a “Follies-style show” in New Jersey, a production in which she remained for two years. This show and working with choreographer Joe Noble opened the door to a whole new world for Myers Brown. Starting in 1955, she spent two years living and performing in Montreal, Canada with two other dancers. Together they were known as the Savar Dancers. It was Cab Calloway who brought Myers Brown back stateside with an offer to join his show. She performed with Pearl Bailey and Sammy Davis Jr. and worked with producer Larry Steele for seven years.

In these productions, Myers Brown was able to employ her skill in various techniques, performing elements of everything from Dunham to classical ballet en pointe.

Source:

And Still They Rose: Joan Myers Brown, MoBBallet

Compiled by Mad Crawford