The Capitol Ballet: 1988 Restoration Dancers

Sandra Fortune-Green

Sandra Fortune-Green is one of the most renowned alumni of the Capitol Ballet Company. After enrolling in the Jones-Haywood School of Dance, Fortune-Green eventually became a principal dancer for the Capitol Ballet Company.

As a professional dancer, Fortune-Green was a featured soloist with The Washington Ballet and the Capitol Ballet Company, performing in the classics, such as Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, Le Corsaire and Don Quixote, and in contemporary works by George Balanchine, Louis Johnson, George Faison, Choo-San Goh, Billy Wilson, Walter Raines, Sylvester Campbell, and Norman Walker.

Sources:

6 september 1968 & capitol ballet company, Marya Annette McQuirter, dc1968 project
Sandra Fortune Green, MoBBallet.org
Capitol Ballet Guild, Incorporated, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
Sandra Fortune-Green, Artistic Director, Jones-Haywood Dance School

April Berry

In the Kennedy Center Concert Hall in April 1987, there was a gala benefit, “A Salute to Doris W. Jones: A Lady With a Vision,” honoring the cofounder and artistic director of the Capitol Ballet, Washington’s unique multiracial classical troupe. The event was intended to start the ball rolling toward resumption of the company, possibly by the next fall. Louis Johnson, assisted by Keith Lee, produced and directed the entire gala. April Berry, a member of the Capitol Ballet, performed at this gala.

Sources:

April Berry, MoBBallet
Tribute For The Troupe, The Washington Post

Tammy Hurt

Tammy Hurt, a native Washingtonian, started her dance training at the Jones-Haywood School of Ballet and later became a member of the Capitol Ballet Company under the direction of Doris Jones and Claire Haywood. After an extensive dance career with some of the greatest choreographers of the times such as Louis Johnson, Kevin Jeff, George Faison, Hinton Battle, and Mike Malone, to name a few, Ms. Hurt decided to devote her life to teaching. She spent ten years as the Director of the Jones-Haywood School of Ballet. There, she directed and choreographed The Nut-Kracker and Black Heritage for youth dancers. Ms. Hurt has taught ballet at Howard University and choreographed for the Duke Ellington School.

Source:

Tammy Hurt, Joy Of Motion

Nathaniel Orr

Nathaniel Orr was raised in York, Pennsylvania and started dancing professionally in 1976. Though Orr was athletic as a child, he did not consider professional dance until attending South Eastern University (formerly Westchester State University).

After moving to New York to pursue this career, Orr was accepted into the Dance Theatre of Harlem school and The Ailey School and attended the former, eventually dancing with the main company. Following an injury and recovering, he served as a rehearsal director for the Walter Nix Company. He has also been a member of the Andre Eglepsky Ballet Company, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Rockville Ballet, Washington Ballet, and the Capitol Ballet.

He choreographed Undeniably Bach for the Capitol Ballet in 1988 and served as ballet master for the company the same year.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
The Capitol Ballet, Renewing the Promise, The Washington Post
The Dance: Rockville Performs, The New York Times
World of Dance According to Nathaniel Orr, American Eagle

Sabine LaBonne

Sabine LaBonne was part of the new, 12-member incarnation of the Capitol Ballet Company in 1988. LaBonne also danced with the Joffrey II Dancers in July 1981.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
Photograph, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival
THE JOFFREY II DANCERS, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival

Otis Daye

Born ca. 1955 in Oxford, North Carolina to Mrs. Catherine Turrentine and Mr. Daye, Otis Daye moved to Durham when he was seven years old and attended Northern High School (in Durham, North Carolina).

Daye told The Herald-Sun in 1979, “Ever since I can remember, I wanted to dance…. I would go into the woods and leap….” He trained at North Carolina School of the Arts on scholarship, the Dance Theatre of Harlem school, School of American Ballet, and the American Dance Center.

A member of the Iranian National Ballet Company from 1977 to 1978, Daye then joined Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in 1979 and said about Ailey, “Alvin is like my father….He’s very sensitive, and he knows how to bring things out of you that you didn’t know you had.”

After dancing as “Delilah Razzmatazzmova” in Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo in 1985, he also performed with the Capitol Ballet in Nathaniel Orr’s Undeniably Bach in May 1988.

As a guest artist, Daye appeared with the Charlotte Youth Ballet in The Sleeping Beauty in 1990 with Harry Bryde African American Dance Theatre in 1993.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
Iranian National Ballet Company, Wikipedia
Kysionia Daye, IMDb
The Trocks, The Pittsburgh Press
Ailey’s In Durham–Durham’s In Ailey Too, The Durham Sun
Dancers Back On Familiar Ground, The Charlotte Observer
Trockadero Dancers at El Camino, The Los Angeles Times
It’s Homecoming For Two Dancers, The Herald-Sun
Can Charlotte Support Dance, Or Will We Sit This One Out?, The Charlotte Observer
Tribute puts Lewis’s works center stage, The Atlanta Constitution

Kimberly Dillard

Kimberly Dillard was part of the new, 12-member incarnation of the Capitol Ballet Company in 1988.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
Sylvester Campbell, Alonzo King Lines Ballet

Don Bellamy

Don Bellamy studied dance at Duke Ellington School of the Performing Arts. Bellamy was part of the 12-member incarnation of the Capitol Ballet Company in 1988. He started his career as a corps dancer with the company in Washington, D.C. under the direction of Doris Jones and Billy Wilson.

After this, he joined Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater under the artistic direction of Alvin Ailey. Bellamy has been part of such prestigious groups as Dance Theatre of Harlem, Complexions, Lar Lubovitch, Donald Byrd The Group, Elisa Monte, and was part of a collaboration between Dance Theatre of Harlem and New York City Ballet. Bellamy was part of many Broadway productions including The Red Shoes, The Lion King, Porgy and Bess, and The Phantom of the Opera. He has worked with many artists including Michael Jackson, Aretha Franklin, and Celine Dion. Bellamy teaches ballet, Horton, modern, and contemporary dance at The Rock. He is a ballet master and coach at the Las Vegas Contemporary Dance Theatre.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
Staff, The Contemporary West Dance Theatre
“Memoria”: Don Bellamy & Dana Hash, National Museum of African American History and Culture

Treanna Reid-Alexander

At the restoration of the Capitol Ballet Company at the University of the District of Columbia in 1988, Treanna Reid-Alexander, a veteran of the old Capitol Ballet Company, performed (alongside Robyn Nash and Rodney Green) Doris Jones’ wonderfully flavorsome and inventive tap number Bach Vibrations, created in 1973 and a Capitol classic ever since.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post

Robyn Nash

At the restoration of the Capitol Ballet Company at the University of the District of Columbia in 1988, for old times’ sake, so to speak, Robyn Nash, a veteran of the old Capitol Ballet Company, performed (alongside Treanna Reid-Alexander and Rodney Green) in Doris Jones‘ wonderfully flavorsome and inventive tap number Bach Vibrations, created in 1973 and a Capitol classic ever since. During her dance career in the 1960s and 1970s, Robyn shared a stage with Debbie Allen, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and Dance Theatre of Harlem.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
Robyn Bandele Nash, 66, Vineyard Gazette

Rodney Green

At the restoration of the Capitol Ballet Company at the University of the District of Columbia in 1988, Rodney Green, a veteran of the old Capitol Ballet Company, performed (alongside Treanna Reid-Alexander and Robyn Nash) in Doris Jones‘ wonderfully flavorsome and inventive tap number Bach Vibrations, created in 1973 and a Capitol classic ever since.

Green performed in various performances with the Capitol Ballet, including Taps for Old Times, Les Deux, Hinty, Three Black Cries, Flair For Movement, and Asha I.

Sources:

Capitol Ballet Capital Night, The Washington Post
Capitol Ballet Guild, Incorporated, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library

Kevin Brown

Kevin Brown, a member of the Capitol Ballet, performed at the gala benefit “A Salute to Doris W. Jones: A Lady With a Vision,” which was produced in honor of Artistic Director Doris Jones at the Kennedy Center in April 1987. Brown also performed with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater along with fellow Capitol Ballet company members April Berry and Nathaniel Orr in March 1981 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Brown and Berry performed the central pas de deux in Ailey’s Revelations.

Brown is also an executive producer of the original drama series Flesh and Bone.

Sources:

Tribute For The Troupe, The Washington Post
Arts Around Ann Arbor, Pulp
Kevin Brown, Getty Images
Trust, Or How I Met My Husband, Ballet to The People
World-Renowned Dancers Attached To Starz Original Ballet Drama Series In Development, “Flesh And Bone”, PR Newswire

Alisha Naidu

Iulia Stanciu

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