Tracy Kane
Director

Tracy Kane is thrilled to be joining the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts Half-Day Program as Principal / Director, a position that blends her background in educational leadership and the arts. Her most recent position was Director of Academics and Intervention for grades 6-12 at Torrington Public Schools. Tracy’s previous leadership roles in public schools have focused on the arts including her positions as Director of Arts for Hartford Public Schools and Supervisor of the Fine and Performing Arts in East Hartford. More┍
Before stepping into administration, she spent a decade as a theatre and English teacher at Farmington High School and three years as a theatre teacher at Hartford Magnet Trinity College Academy. In addition to her public education roles, Tracy also has worked as an artist-educator and administrator for three professional theatres across the country: Hartford Stage, Honolulu Theatre for Youth, and American Place Theatre in New York City. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Drama from Vassar College, an MA in Educational Theatre from New York University, and a Sixth-Year in Educational Leadership from Central Connecticut State University. Less┍

Lynn Hoffman
Academic Advisor
Lynn Hoffman has a B.Mus. cum laude in Music Theory and Composition from the University of Hartford/Hartt School and an MFA in Writing from Spalding University with a double-major in Dramatic Writing and Writing for Children & Young Adults. She also has a Masters in Education from the University of St. Joseph with areas of concentration in Reading and Language Arts. Lynn studied Dramatic Writing with Kira Obolensky, Charlie Schulman, Sam Zalutsky, and Gabriel Jason Dean at Spalding U. Prior to that, she studied playwriting with Arthur Feinsod and Tony Hall at Trinity College (CT); with Kathleen Cahill at Wesleyan University; and with Jeffrey Sweet for a week-long summer playwriting intensive at Manhattanville College.  More┍
Lynn is the recipient of a 2020 CT Artist’s Fellowship Award in Playwriting from the Connecticut Office of the Arts. Her plays have had readings at Trinity College and at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts’ “Page to Stage New Play Readings.” Three Mothers (full-length) was selected for the 2020 Depot New Play Readings. The same play advanced to the 2nd Round in the 2019 Orlando Shakes Festival. It also was submitted to the 2019 Kennedy Center Summer Playwriting Intensive for which Lynn was selected. Mortal Allies (full-length) advanced to the final round at The Depot. The Sidewalk Living Room (full-length for young adults) was a Semi-Finalist for the 2017 Biennial Write Now Playwriting Competition for Young Audiences; it also was a Semi-Finalist in the American Alliance for Theater and Education’s Unpublished Playwriting Reading Competition. Lynn’s collection of poetry, Like Fire Catching Wind, was nominated for a CT Center for the Book Award. Her poem, “True Story,” was aired on NPR. Her poem, Mother to Son in Iraq, won 1st place in the CT Writing Project/UCONN Annual Writing Competition. She has studied poetry with Steve Straight, Rennie McQuilken, Doug Anderson, Edwina Trentham, and a week-long poetry intensive with Kimiko Hahn.
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Aaron Laudermith
Design and Theater Production Dept. Head

Aaron Laudermith has been designing for theater since 2002. He received a MFA in Scenic Design and Production Technology from The University of South Dakota. He has worked with regional theaters in Maine, Vermont, Chicago, Nebraska, South Dakota and Connecticut as a designer, scenic and properties artist, and fabricator. For over 8 years he was the Technical Director for Northwestern University Theater working with Tony award winning designers and directors. More recently he has worked with Chicago Scenic Studios, PRG, and Chicago Flyhouse as a Technical Designer. The projects have varied from creating the construction drawings for PFF Studios to designing a conveyor system for a play area at the San Antonio Children’s Hospital.

Alexa Melonopoulos Fleury
Dance Department Head

Alexa Melonopoulos Fleury began her dance training with Estelle Jones. She earned her BA in Dance from Hofstra University and holds an MA in Dance in Higher Education and Administration from New York University. She has had the opportunity to perform with choreographers Eleo Pomare, Remi Charlip, Rosalind Newman, Robin Becker, Stormy Brandenberger, Lance Westergard, Lili Weiss, John Mead and Ching Wen Yeh. More┍
Alexa has been affiliated with a number of groups including Washington Square Repertory Dance Company, Sonia Plumb Dance Company, Works /Laura Glenn Dance and Miss Porter’s School. She is currently the Dance Department Chair at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts in Hartford and member of the Judy Dworin Performance Project. Less┍

Natasha Miles
Visual Arts Dept. Head
Natasha D. Miles is an accomplished painter, printmaker and book designer. She studied Visual Arts at Dreyfoos School of the Arts in West Palm Beach, Florida and then graduated from the University of Hartford’s Art School earning a BFA in Painting and Printmaking. Her multimedia works of art have been exhibited at local, national and world-renowned museums such as Galleria d’arte Nocchia in Cortona Italy, Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut and the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach. In addition to participating in gallery exhibitions, she has been an advocate, exhibitor, volunteer coordinator and Assistant to the Director for Open Studio Hartford since 2003.  More┍
She offers enriching arts educational hands-on workshops for children and adults of all ages by introducing innovative visual arts techniques learned from around the world, across multiple disciplines, media and techniques. Since 2002, Natasha has been an arts educator and mentor at CREC’s Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts in Hartford, Connecticut where she currently serves as Department Head for Visual Arts.   Less┍

Kristen Palmer
Theater Department Head

KRISTEN PALMER is a playwright and director and has taught theater and writing for over 25 years. Her plays have been produced in New York City, Los Angeles, Seattle, and elsewhere and are published by Broadway Play Publishing, Original Works, and Stage Partners. She is an alumna of the Women’s Project Lab, Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab and has been a William Inge Playwright in Residence, a Dakin Fellow at the Sewanee Playwright’s Conference, a Jerome Fellow at the Playwrights Center in Minneapolis and a Dramatist Guild Fellow. She is a New Georges associate artist, and spent her 20s making theater as a company member of Printer’s Devil Theatre in Seattle.More┍ She holds an MA from NYU’s Gallatin School where she worked with the Creative Arts Team and an MFA from Hunter College where she studied with Tina Howe and Mark Bly and won both the Zarkower and Goldberg Prizes. She has created theater and directed projects with youth in schools, prisons and community programs around the country and served as Artistic Director of Oddfellows Playhouse Youth Theater, Middletown, CT from 2013-2018. Most recently she taught and directed at Central Connecticut State University.Less┍

Danae Beckford
Design and Theater Production

Alexia Bobrowski is an alum of the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts. As a Junior in high school, she became a Jazz and Contemporary Trainee at Joffrey Ballet School. She holds a BFA in Contemporary Dance Performance with a Creative Entrepreneurship Minor from Boston Conservatory at Berklee. The Dean of the Dance division named her The Dance Pedagogy Scholar of 2020-2021. Formerly, she was a dance company member with the IMMIX Dance Project and Dimensional Dance. Alexia has performed works by Mark Morris, José Limon, Paul Taylor, Catherine Coury, Bradley Shelver, Daniel Pelzig, among many other internationally recognized choreographers. Alexia Bobrowski teaches a wide range of dance classes in Hartford Public Schools as well as technique classes at Studio22. Along with dance, she has gained skills as a Business Analyst for Connecticut Children’s Medical Center and Community Project Coordinator for DANCENOW NYC.

Greg Boucher is a graduate from the University of Massachusetts Lowell with a degree in Music and Sound Recording Technology. He has worked various live sound, and events/production as a freelance engineer. He worked at WWLP TV22 as a production assistant, video editor, sound engineer, and web author.  Presently, Greg works at the Academy supporting productions, theater events, IT support, and as an artist instructor. At the Academy, Greg has taught songwriting, recording production, and sound design and has served as the sound designer for its musicals and other stage productions. 

Lily Fryburg is an actor, writer, improviser, and educator. She holds a BA in Theater and Music from Muhlenberg College and studied physical theater at the Accademia dell'Arte in Italy, as well as improv at Upright Citizens Brigade and Groundlings. Lily has appeared in a variety of plays and short films in NYC, including dramatic and comedic new works, Shakespearean plays, sketch comedy, musicals, cabaret, and puppetry. Lily creates her own comedic digital shorts and web series, and performs on the improv house team, Oops! All Cuties, at Sea Tea Comedy Theater in Hartford. She teaches and coaches teen and adult actors of all levels throughout Connecticut.

www.lilyfryburg.com

Jeanne Giroir
Dance

Dance

Thomas attended Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas on a dance scholarship and received his BFA in Dance.He then joined the Hartford Ballet and danced there for nine years doing many principal roles including Romeo in Michael Uthoff's Romeo and Juliet, the Prince in Nutcracker and the title role in Tom Dula, as well as dancing in pieces by choreographers such as Antony Tudor, George Balanchine, Dennis Nahat, Lar Lubovitch, Anna Sokolow and Kurt Jooss. After retiring from dance, he pursued a career in photography, specializing in Dance Photography. He has worked with many dance companies and schools in the New England area, as well as being ask ed to photograph Mikhail Baryshnikov's one man show in 2004.  More┍
He has also done work for corporations and educational institutions. In addition to his photography work, he teaches ballet in the Greater Hartford area at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts, as well as several dance studios. He is married to his former dance partner, Jeanne Tears Giroir and they have two children, Christopher, a software engineer in California and Megan, a dance teacher in Bremerton Washington. Less┍

Calvin Linderman
Music

Calvin Linderman is a composer, music producer, and music educator based in Connecticut. Calvin has written and produced music for brands and institutions such as Amazon, Merrell, Yale, IMDB, Nespresso, Volvo, and many more. Calvin's music has also been featured on multiple film projects and TV shows, including releases by Sony Pictures and most recently on episodes of the Discovery Channel's Shark Week. He has worked as an audio editor for many media projects with hundreds of credits, and music has been used for years as the soundtrack to Studio71's podcast, Something Scary, which has tens of millions of streams across its hundreds of episodes. Calvin started his career as a touring musician for hip-hop and pop acts, most notably with LA-based artist, Rakeem Miles. More┍  Currently, he runs his own production studio and performs in several groups in the local CT music scene. Calvin teaches modern music and orchestra at the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts as a member of the Music Department faculty and has directed several productions, including the development and production of Academy Pops Less┍

Mike Nowicki
Theater

Michael Nowicki is a theater artist, educator and stage director. He holds a BFA in Acting from the Experimental Theatre Wing at the TISCH School of the Arts at New York University. In addition, he studied commedia at the Dell’Arte International School of Physical Theatre in California with Carlo Mazzone-Clemente. He has workshopped with a variety of groups ranging from Chicago's Second City Theatre to Anne Bogart's Saratoga International Theatre Institute. Mike’s numerous professional credits include 5 mainstage productions and over 15 staged readings at Hartford Stage, where he worked directly with 2 Pulitzer Prize winning playwrights. He is also an Artistic Associate at Capital Classics Theatre Company, home of the Greater Hartford Shakespeare Festival, where he has been performing title roles and directing outdoor Shakespeare for the last 2 decades.   More┍
As an educator, he served on many Connecticut faculties including the University of Hartford, the School of the Hartford Ballet, Hartford Stage Company and the Hartford Conservatory, where he served as Dean of Musical Theater during his 8-year affiliation with the college. He was also the Artistic Director of the Theater Program at Simsbury High School for 10 years. For the last 27 years, his teaching base has been the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts, where he currently serves as Core Faculty in Theater for their high school and as Director of the Arts for their middle school. He received the inaugural Artist/Instructor of the Year award from the school in 2003 and a CREC Shining Star award in 2015. Mike's work has allowed him to travel the world, with stops including Iceland, Cape Verde and Russia, where he spent 3 weeks as a guest artist at the Diaghilev School of the Arts. He frequently directs productions and leads technique workshops for high schools, colleges and professional theater companies across the country. Mike was awarded a National Artist Teacher Fellowship in 2014, to develop and direct an original piece of immersive theater about the history of Hartford, set in the Colt Firearms Factory's abandoned spaces. During the pandemic, Mike used his ample free time to complete online courses on Shakespeare (through Harvard University) and Social Emotional Learning (through Yale University). Less┍

Christine Perry
Dance

Christine Perry graduated Magna Cum Laude from the Hartt School at the University of Hartford with a BFA in Dance Performance in the Spring of 2009. During this time she also had the privilege to train at the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance on scholarship. She has danced with dancEnlight as a dancer and company teacher and with Judy Dworin Performance Projects. Christine Perry has taught in various schools around Connecticut including Limelite Dance Center, Eastern Connecticut Ballet, Premier Dance School, Miss Porter’s School and Yale. She is currently on faculty at Dance Express of Tolland. She is a co-artistic director and dancer with IMMIX dance project, a contemporary dance company centered around collaborating with local artists to create new and unique work.  More┍
Along with dance she is a professional stage and production manager and has done extensive technical theater work in locations including the Baryshinikov Arts Center in New York City, St. Joseph College, the Garde Arts Center, Charter Oak Cultural Center, Foxwoods and the Wadsworth Atheneum.   Less┍

Hannah Simms is a director and teacher based in Hartford, CT. She is a graduate of the Dell'Arte School of Physical Theatre, the National Theater Institute at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, and the Ada Comstock Program at Smith College. She has worked in education for HartBeat Ensemble since 2005, and was program director for their Youth Play Institute. Directing credits include: Pegao and Frog Hollow State of Mind (HartBeat Ensemble), To Kill a Mockingbird (Central Connecticut State University) Guenevere (Ivoryton Playhouse), Eurydice, (PVPA Charter High School), Julius Cesar and Romeo & Juliet (Hampshire Shakespeare) and The City That Cried Wolf (Assistant Director, 59E59). She also teaches stilt-walking at Children's Circus of Middletown. More about her work can be found at hannahjenckessimms.com.

Christine Simoes is a choreographer and teacher in the Greater Hartford area. She has her certificate in Dance Pedagogy from the Hartford Conservatory and is an alumnus of the CREC Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts Dance Department. Christine has trained to compete professionally in American Style Latin Ballroom dance and taught Ballroom dance for Fred Astaire Dance studio in West Hartford and Arthur Murray Dance Studio in New Britain. She has choreographed and taught Jazz, Ballet and Ballroom Dance to children and adults for the past twenty-four years in schools throughout Connecticut and Massachusetts. More┍
She is currently on faculty at the Academy as an Artist Instructor in the Musical Theater Department where she choreographs and teaches Dance. Christine has been teaching at the Academy for the past 19 years and was named Artist Instructor of the Year for the 2013-14 school year. She has had the pleasure of choreographing many spring and Black Box Musicals at the Academy (Chicago, Dessa Rose, Cabaret, Urinetown, Caroline or Change, Ragtime, Carousel, Sweet Charity, In the Heights, King of Hearts and Once On This Island ). This spring she will be choreographing Little Shop of Horrors for CT Repertory Theater at UCONN. Christine has also choreographed Carrie the Musical for Central Connecticut State University, Assistant Directed The Good Person of Setzuan and Urinetown at Loomis Chaffee School and taught/ choreographed for many summer workshops throughout Connecticut. Most recently Christine has choreographed Merry Wives of Windsor, Pericles, Prince of Tyre for Capital Classics and Love’s Labour’s Lost which earned her a Best Choreographer nomination for the 2017 Broadway World Connecticut Awards. Less┍