My guest today is Matthew Rushing. Not only has Matthew been an outstanding dancer with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater since 1992, he has also choreographed three pieces for the company and became the Rehearsal Director and Guest Dancer in 2010. Matthew was 12 years old when he first saw the Ailey company perform and remembers being transformed; he saw his life danced in front of him and fell in love with the idea of the company! The clarity that followed was not that he simply wanted to be a professional dancer, but that he specifically wanted to dance in this company! 5 years later, at age 17, Matthew manifested his dream. Matthew has a huge heart for young people in the arts, so along with all the classes he teaches, he co-founded the ASAP Mentoring Program, pairing Ailey students with Ailey professionals. As part of the 60th anniversary of the company, a video was made of Matthew dancing “I Wanna Be Ready” (a male solo section from the dance “Revelations”). Matthew danced this piece in Alvin Ailey’s childhood church, in Rogers, Texas, which was both exhilarating and humbling for Matthew. It’s breathtakingly beautiful and Matthew says he couldn’t have asked for a better opportunity to thank Mr. Ailey, who changed his life and gave him wings to fly. Check out the links below for the Alvin Ailey website, where you will find photos, interviews and video footage of Matthew’s magnificent work with the company. There are also YouTube links of excerpts of Matthew’s choreography, and a link to Matthew giving an innovative keynote speech to the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts graduating class of 2015. Do yourself a favor and watch it, watch all the YouTube footage of Mathew dancing - he is exquisite and will uplift, inspire and maybe even move you to tears!!! Enjoy the podcast! Links: Alvin Ailey web site YouTube videos: “I Wanna Be Ready” Keynote speech at Frank Sinatra High School of the Arts Uptown (2009) Harlem Renaissance Odetta (2014) tribute to Odetta Holmes Alvin Ailey: The Making of Matthew Rushing's ODETTA: Part 1   Part 2    Part 3 New York City Dance Alliance Matthew 28 Collaborative Performance--Gracefarms.org

NYIBC Gala: A Song For You, solo performance