Why Dance Matters

People often say ‘dance is for everyone’, but few people walk the walk like Irma Becker. In Miami, she leads the Inspire Theatre Project at Area Stage Conservatory. Inspire is an inclusive programme for neurodiverse ballet students – but it doesn’t water down the rigorous RAD ballet syllabus. Irma ran both a professional dance school and a special needs dance company in Mexico before moving to Mia...

Sonia Brown is an award-winning RAD teacher in Berkshire, UK. The RAD’s Silver Swans programme, aimed at people aged 55 and over, struck a chord with her. Her mother was Sonia’s first student, and the classes have grown into a warm and inclusive community of dancers: they even threw her a surprise hen party when she got married. And in 2025 Sonia won the People’s Choice Award at the One Dance UK A...

Jack Murphy is the acclaimed choreographer and movement director of Bridgerton. Initially an actor, he became a movement director (training in part at the RAD), helping actors find a physicality to connect them with their characters. Jack was involved in the BBC’s iconic 1995 Pride and Prejudice: in a full-circle moment, he’s worked on Netflix’s new version, starring Emma Corrin. But his work is s...

Christopher Wheeldon is a very special guest for the 100th episode of Why Dance Matters. He’s a ballet great – creator of marvels like After the Rain and Tryst, and full length enchantments like Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and The Winter’s Tale. He’s big on Broadway and in the West End, with shows like An American in Paris and MJ the Musical. He’s also president of Benesh International, dedic...

The RAD has an impressive global reach – in over 80 countries across the world, thousands of teachers are progressing even more thousands of students the curves and lines that make up classical ballet technique. And looking after all those teachers are a wonderful flock of RAD National Directors, including our guest Amanda Teo, RAD National Director in Singapore. Amanda trained in RAD ballet befor...

Alicia Graf Mack is only the fourth ever director of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. It’s a company with a huge significance for dance history – and especially for Black America. Alicia danced with them from 2005-14, and was mentored by Ailey’s own star dancer, Judith Jamison. Previously a principal ballerina at Dance Theatre of Harlem, more recently she was Dean & Director of Dance at...

The wonderful Scottish dancer Serena McCall is currently appearing in Matthew Bourne’s The Car Man. It’s a tale of torrid sex and violence, set in a small US town. Serena herself always looks cucumber cool. She was head girl at her school outside Stirling in Scotland, and her socials showcase her poise and chic. She has also performed in some of the UK’s biggest dance shows, like Kate Prince’s Mes...

The human body is a walking repository of human experience, its joys and terrors, surprises and exhilarations. Someone who knows how to tap into that embodied experience is Alexandra Beller – an American dancer, choreographer and somatic educator, whose new book explores how movement and our lived relationship to it can widen our capacity for self-trust and curiosity. Alexandra danced for several...

No one moves like Charles “Lil Buck” Riley. The dancer, renowned for Memphis jookin’, has a breathtakingly fluid style which has led to collaborations in ballet, music, fashion and more. His latest project is part of the opening season at Oxford’s new arts centre: he is a Schwarzman Centre Cultural Fellow, and collaborating with ZooNation on 1776, a new piece marking 250 years of American independ...

Isabelle Brouwers is an eloquent advocate for ballet and the way it can speak to young people, audiences and wider communities. She retired from English National Ballet earlier this year to become Artistic Director of Yorkshire Ballet Seminars, which offer opportunities to talented young dancers (the rollcall of past participants is impressive). Isabelle’s links with the RAD run deep: she took a S...

As the RAD releases its new Musical Theatre syllabus, Dr Nathan James (the RAD’s Deputy Artistic Director – Education) describes what makes it distinctive. From falling under the spell of the tap-happy musical 42nd Street in childhood, to performing in the show as an adult performer, he tells us about discovering his calling as teacher, his research into MGM musicals, the rigou...

In a candid interview, the Australian-based dancer, actor and musician Dena Kaplan describes the unexpected places dance may take you. Dena was born in South Africa and moved to Australia. A talented young dancer, at 16 she was cast in The Lion King: an experience far less supportive than it should have been. After training in New York she returned to Australia in the hit tv series Dance Academy,...

Sir Peter Wright  is living proof that doing what you love will sustain you. The ballet producer and artistic director turns 100 in November, but has been involved in recent revivals of his cherished productions of Giselle, The Nutcracker and Swan Lake for the Royal Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet. In this special episode of Why Dance Matters, we listen in as Sir Peter ...

Serendipity is what happens when the universe smiles on you: a happy chance, a creative coincidence. It is also the name of the remarkable Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage. Led by the unstoppable Pawlet Brookes, it shifts the lens through which we see dance, putting art and artists from the African and African Caribbean diaspora at the heart of the conversation. Pawlet’s career em...

Jordan James Bridge is a sharp mover and thinker and an ambitious talent. Having danced for Company Wayne McGregor, his own choreography has made a splash on screen and in the Ballet Nights series of dance gigs. It all began for Jordan at school near Wigan, in the north of England, where he first discovered dance – where he returned last summer because the dance studio at Fred Longworth High Schoo...

Our guest today is the choreographer Sonia Sabri – dance changed her life, and now she uses it to change others. Sonia grew up in Wolverhampton, UK, in a traditional Indian family. Unusually her parents supported her dancing: her dad hoped she might conquer Bollywood, but instead, she devoted herself to kathak, which helped her withstand disapproval and bullying. Alongside her international career...

Dr. Mark Broomfield is a dance scholar and artist, and the author of Black Queer Dance: Gay Men and the Politics of Passing for Almost Straight. Born in London, he has spent much of his career in New York, currently as Associate Professor of English and the Founder and Director of Performance as Social Change at SUNY Geneseo. He says his work is about “moving minds, moving bodies and moving souls”...

We meet Elizabeth Honer – the RAD’s first female chief executive in its 106 year history – marking her first year in post. Elizabeth’s career in public service has included leadership roles in the UK’s Treasury and Foreign Office. But ballet has long been a passion, and Elizabeth first encountered the RAD when taking exams as a child. She returned to dance as a Silver Swan, the life-changing progr...

Our first guest of 2026 is the choreographer of the Wicked movies: the defying gravity force field that is Christopher Scott. In two phenomenal films, based on the hit stage musical, Christopher brings the land of Oz to stomping, whirling life – continuing his collaboration with director John M Chu (including In the Heights and the web series Legion of Extraordinary Dancers). How does Christopher...

Jamiel Devernay-Laurence has a dance brain, but also a business brain. Founder, artistic director and enthusiastic compere of the ever-growing series of Ballet Nights events, he has also created the production house Fundamentally Dance. Having danced with Scottish Ballet, Jamiel then parlayed his energy into Ballet Nights, taking its programmes of dance into big London venues like C...

Here’s an unusual compliment: “Evie has amazing eyes that can emote both compassion and complete psychotic behaviour.” This is a director describing Evie Templeton, who at 16 stars in the hit Netflix series Wednesday. Evie brings her compassionate/psychotic presence to Agnes DeMille – stalker and ally of Wednesday Addams in the comic and macabre series. The character, name...

Few classical singers embrace movement as vividly as the star countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo. He explores all the possibilities of a performing career, from opera to cabaret. His captivating high tones specialise in both early and modern operas: famously, in the testing title role of Philip Glass’ Akhnaten. Recent audacious projects include playing Maria Callas, and a solo Marriage o...

To be artistic director of one of the world’s great ballet companies is a daunting task. But Tamara Rojo is accustomed to pressure: as Royal Ballet, artistic director of English National Ballet, and now of San Francisco Ballet (SFB), America’s oldest classical company. Tamara has the gift of making each programmes an event; the highlight of her first season at SFB was Mere Mortals, a ballet for th...

Today we enter the world of Strictly Come Dancing. The show is a phenomenon of British television, and our guest is the longest serving professional dancer on the series – the sparky Venezuelan-American dancer Karen Hauer. Karen spoke to us just before she learned her partner for the 2025 series would be the Team GB sprinter Harry Aikines-Aryeetey (aka Nitro from Gladiators) – but Karen tells us h...

Maddie Jamieson is one of the UK’s leading experts in dance team. As a former competitive dancer, and now a choreographer, coach and judge, she’s the perfect guide to a discipline which sits between sport and art (the International Cheer Union was recently recognised by the IOC, possibly paving the way for inclusion in a future Olympic Games). What is the difference between dance team and cheerlea...