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Isabelle Kay Dance Bio
Isabelle found tango by accident in 1998, when a disabling event prevented her dancing modern and African dance. Tango not only allowed her to start moving again, but eventually became a vehicle for collecting and synthesizing her life-long training in dance. Isabelle started dancing as a child in Barbados, the West Indies, instructed in the rigorous ballet syllabus of the Royal Academy of Dance, and also dancing spontaneously to the indigenous rhythms of the steel drum. She continued her ballet training with the National Ballet School in Washington D.C., and Ballet Rambert in London, with additional training in mime, flamenco, and jazz at the Metropolitan Ballet in Bethesda, Maryland. At Reed College in Portland, Oregon, she discovered African dance, and in graduate school in Houston first performed with a modern dance ensemble.
With modern dance now her focus, Isabelle continued performing and training in various genres of modern dance, including Graham Technique at Santa Monica, Palomar and MiraCosta Colleges, Limon technique with Jean Isaacs at UC San Diego, post-modern with Kim Epifano, and contact improvisation with Lower Left in San Diego.
Isabelle’s tango training started in San Diego with Ive Simard and Todd Martin at El Mundo del Tango, followed by numerous world-renowned tango dancers, including Fernanda Ghi and Guillermo Merlo, Jorge Nel, Sergio Cortazzo, Pablo Veron, Fabian Salas, Graciela Gonzales, and Cecilia Gonzales. Performances have included Celebrate Dance Festival, Bravo San Diego, the Del Mar Fair, San Diego Magazine’s Celebration of Who’s Who, the Jewish Film Festival, the San Diego Klezmer Festival, and for numerous corporate and private functions.
Dance training
Tango
- Ive Simard, El Mundo del Tango
- Norberto Paz (“El Pulpo”) and Luiza
- Fernanda Ghi and Guillermo Merlo
- Jorge Nel
- Sergio Cortazzo
- Pablo Veron
- Fabian Salas
Ballet
- UCSD, 1990-91
- Portland Ballet School, Portland, Oregon (age 18)
- Metropolitan Academy of Ballet,(ages 14-17)
- Ballet Rambert, London, England (age 15)
- National Ballet School, Washington, D.C. (ages 10-13)
- Royal Academy of Dance training, Barbados, West Indies (ages 6-9)
Modern
- Tonnie Samartano (Isaacs, Macaleb & Dancers summer workshop; UCSD; Academy of Moving Arts)
- Terry Wilson (UCSD)
- Jean Isaacs (San Diego Dance Theatre Summer Workshop; Three’s Company; UCSD)
- Allison Dieterle (San Diego Dance Theatre Summer Workshop)
- Choreography, summer workshop, UCSD
- Graham Technique (MiraCosta College, Palomar College)
- Bella Lewitsky (summer at Idyllwild, California)
- Santa Monica College
- University of Houston
Post Modern
- Kim Epifano (San Diego Dance Theatre Summer Workshop)
- Lower Left
African, Afro-cuban
- Reed College, Portland, Oregon
- Charmaine (Encinitas Dance Academy; UCSD)
Other training
Yoga:
- UCSD (Arturo Galvez) (1990-2000)
Qi Gong
San Dieguito Adult School
Pilates
- Portland Ballet School, Portland, Oregon
- Del Mar Workout
Alexander Technique
- Three’s Company & Dancers, San Diego, Calif.
- Portland Ballet School
- Center for Alexander Technique, Encinitas
Feldenkreis
Sharon Moyano
African Drumming
- Paolo, Encinitas
-
Jazz
- UCSD
- Metropolitan Academy of Ballet
Flamenco
- Metropolitan Academy of Ballet
- Mime
- Metropolitan Academy of Ballet
Florentino Guizar Dance Resume
Tango Teaching Experience
UCSD Recreation Program, Instructor, 2003 to present
Beginning, Intermediate and Advanced classes, special subject workshops, Tango Intensive, Tango Bootcamp, and 3 day Tango Festival (organizer and instructor).
TangoConcepts, 2003 to present
Public performances at UCSD, San Diego State, San Diego City College, Mesa High School, San Diego County Fair, Lemon Grove County Library, and Bravo San Diego!,
Private shows at gala fundraising events, and local restaurants such as Tango Grille, Puerto La Boca, and Pampas Argentine Grill as well as, private parties, weddings, and corporate events including Christmas parties.
Whirl Ballroom & Synergy Dance Zone, presently
(Previously at Pattie Well’s Dancetime Studio, International Dance Center, The Dance Place) Beginning, Intermediate and Advanced Tango classes, Tango Intensive workshops, and Introduction to Tango classes.
Biography
Florentino has been dancing since age 6 when he did his first public performance. He started learning Mexican folk dancing at the age of eight, spent a summer at the Ballet Foklorico in Mexico City learning to dance, and actively performed for 16 years. He co-directed a high school Mexican dance group and later, was co-director and head instructor of Harvard's Ballet Folklorico de Aztlan.
Besides folk dancing, Florentino dances socially and loves to watch, learn, and dance bossa nova, danzon, boleros, cumbias, salsas, rancheras, Tex-mex, and meringue. Growing up in the US, he danced to rock & roll and disco. Later, while traveling, he learned to dance axe and samba in Brazil. Florentino has danced with the locals in Switzerland, Rio De Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Sydney, Singapore, Mexico City, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico, Tahiti and, of course, rural Michoacan, Mexico which, like many other parts of Mexico, has its own unique form of Tarascan Indian based social and religious dances.
Florentino started dancing Tango in 1998 with private lessons from Alberto Paz and Valorie Hart and quickly fell in love with the magic of Tango taking 3-4 classes a week, dancing practically every night for a year and traveling up to 90 minutes dances and classes. He has taken dozens of workshops and private lessons with visiting Argentine Tango Masters, travelled to Argentina for a month of dancing, classes, including a week tango with the older Tango Master and the rising stars of Tango. He is an avid Tango social dancer, teaches group and private lessons.
In 2003, Florentino started teaching with Isabelle Kay for UCSD's Recreation Program, where they developed and refined an approach to teaching Tango based on Isabelle's extensive formal dance training and his varied social dancing and teaching experience.
In San Diego, has stuied with Ive Simmard, Linda Garwood, Susan Lake, Mike Markov and Marizabel Arango and Todd Martin among others. He has also taken workshops from best dancers and teachers in Argentine Tango.
He has travelled to Argentina, explored Tango first as a tourist and then as a dedicated dancer, spending a month in Buenos Aires and Rosario learning from the grand masters as well as the young rising starts of tango in both cities.