Every stu­dent, regard­less of his/​her goals, should receive the best pos­si­ble train­ing. The fac­ulty and staff take pride in mak­ing sure all stu­dents receive per­son­al­ized train­ing and indi­vid­ual atten­tion. No two artists are alike. Therefore, it is very impor­tant for each stu­dent to know how to approach his or her craft in a safe and thought­ful manner.

Our stu­dents are taught the value of fine arts so they may become a life-​long sup­porter of the arts regard­less of the paths they may choose.

The fol­low­ing is a list of pre­vi­ous fac­ulty and staff, many of whom will be back in 2012.

Daniel Adams | Carson Alexander | Carla Anderson | Kelly Bales | Michael Baxter | Michelle Brandt | Travis Brendle | Buckner Cooke | Paul Davis | Lisa del Rosario | Rona Ebert | Taylor Edwards | Kasey Eggleston | Michael Fariss | David Gallagher | Kirk German | John Howrey | Monique Huff | Stacey Huston | Heather Huggins | Erik James | Larry Lehew | Robin Lewis | Jill Leberknight | Katie McDowell | Dr. Michael McKelvey | Ginger Morris | Aaron Moten | Alan Shorter | Dustin Struhall | Scott Thompson | David Valdes

Carson Alexander

Counselor, Acting Teacher, Residential Director
Carson Alexander (BFA in Acting, Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University) loves TAP CAMP! He grad­u­ated from St. Stephen’s where he stud­ied act­ing through­out high school and was active on the Helm stage. Carson is a New York City res­i­dent, where he starred in a one-​man show Off-​Broadway. Theatre has been his pas­sion since he was 13 and he hopes to make it his life work.

Carla Anderson

Guest Artist
Carla Anderson (Professional Dancer; BFA in Dance, Conservatory of Music, Univeristy of Missouri, Kansas City) has stud­ied dance for 20 years. She has worked as a dancer for Crystal Cruises, mul­ti­ple the­atre com­pa­nies across the coun­try, Oakland Ballet, Anaheim Ballet, and Albany Berkshire Ballet. She has also danced in numer­ous films, music videos and indus­tri­als. She cur­rently teaches dance and works as a chore­o­g­ra­pher and guest art­sist on the West Coast.

Kelly Bales

Director/​Choreographer, Junior Camp
Kelly Bales served as Director/​Choreographer for TAP Junior for the past 5 years and Choreographer for TAP Senior in 2009. She has taught for Austin Musical Theatre and Footworks Academy. Kelly has worked as assis­tant direc­tor and chore­o­g­ra­pher for a num­ber of mid­dle and high schools and most recently for Summer Stock Austin. Kelly was an orig­i­nal mem­ber of Austin Musical Theatre’s Junior and Senior Companies and par­tic­i­pated in over a dozen pro­fes­sional shows with Austin Musical Theatre at the Paramount Theatre. Kelly also played the role of Irene in Crazy For You at Zilker Hillside Theatre and occa­sion­ally per­formed with The Small Stars, an Austin rock band.

Michael Baxter

Choreographer/​Dance Instructor
Michael is a pro­fes­sional actor, singer, dancer, teacher and chore­o­g­ra­pher (AEA Member). He cur­rently resides in New York City after hav­ing received his BFA with Departmental Honors in Musical Theatre from The Conservatory of Theatre Arts at Webster University. Selected per­for­mance cred­its include – NYC Theatre: The Cradle Will Rock (Theatre Ten Ten). Regional: The Drowsy Chaperone & Guys and Dolls (STAGES St. Louis); Guys and Dolls (Riverside Theatre in Florida) 42^nd Street, The Producers & My One and Only (St. Louis MUNY); Kiss Me Kate (The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis); She Loves Me & Godspell (Hope Summer Repertory Theatre). Other selected per­for­mances cred­its include: Oklahoma! (Will Parker), Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris (Lead Performer), Angels in America: Millenium Approaches (Prior Walter) & Cabaret (Emcee). Recent chore­o­graphic cred­its include: The Producers & My Fair Lady (Arrow Rock Lyceum Theatre), Man of La Mancha (Insight Theatre Company).

Michelle Brandt

Movement Teacher, Counselor, Dance Captain
Michelle Brandt is a grad­u­ate of St. Edward’s University. Her per­for­mance cred­its at St. Edward’s include City of Angels, The Stronger, and On the Town. She also served as the chore­o­g­ra­pher for the main­stage pro­duc­tion of Peer Gynt. Michelle is a found­ing com­pany mem­ber of DA! Theatre Collective, a move­ment based act­ing com­pany in Austin. As a DA! mem­ber, she has assisted sev­eral work­shops teach­ing the Droznin System of phys­i­cal actor train­ing at T.E.T.A and in local mid­dle schools. Michelle has spent over ten years study­ing and train­ing in clas­si­cal bal­let, the Cecchetti Method, tap, jazz, lyri­cal dance, mod­ern dance, act­ing, and voice in the greater Austin area. She cur­rently resides in New York City.

Travis Brendle

TAP Production Stage Manager
Travis lives in New York City, where he works as a pro­fes­sional Stage Manger (AEA). He is work­ing on the revival of Carrie at MCC Theatre in NYC. He will be work­ing as Stage Manager on One For My Baby in NYC this sum­mer. Travis is a grad­u­ate of the University of Cincinnati College-​Conservatory of Music (CCM) with a BFA in Theater Design and Production with an empha­sis in Stage Management. Having stage man­aged musi­cal the­atre, opera, and drama, some favorite cred­its include HAIR, Two Gentlemen of Verona: The Musical and Assassins at CCM, Thoroughly Modern Millie and Oklahoma with SummerStock Austin, and the regional pre­mieres of Becky’s New Car and The Marvelous Wonderettes at the Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati. He also spent three months in Las Vegas as the stage man­age­ment intern for The Beatles LOVE by Cirque du Soleil in 2009. He is a grad­u­ate of the St. Stephen’s Theatre Focus Program and loves com­ing back to TAP as often as possible.(Camper in ’04, Councilor in ’06, and Production Manager in ‘07/’08). He is a proud mem­ber of the Actor’s Equity Association.

Buckner Cooke

Head of Filmmaking, Senior Camp
Buckner is a grad­u­ate of the University of North Texas. Buckner has been work­ing pro­fes­sion­ally for over ten years. His work in the music indus­try has been broad­cast both national and inter­na­tion­ally on MTV and he served as the Music Video Judge at the 1999 SXSW Film Festival. In 1999 he co-​founded Red Frame Productions, a full ser­vice pro­duc­tion com­pany in Austin Texas. Since that time, Buckner has worked as a Producer, Director, Director of Photography, and Sound Mixer for sev­eral diverse types of film and video projects. Over the course of the last sev­eral years Buckner’s work has been screened at film fes­ti­vals includ­ing SXSW and Slamdance as well as being broad­cast nation­ally on PBS and ABC. Buckner has been the head of Filmmaking for Texas Arts Project since its incep­tion in 2003.

Paul Davis

Technical Design, Senior Camp
Paul is an active set designer in and around Austin. He has also worked as a scenic artist for the Dallas Theatre Center, Portland Stage, and Connecticut Repertory Theatre; and as Scene and Costume Designer for Finborough Theatre in London, England. In 2004, Davis was nom­i­nated for his work on The Importance of Being Earnest, as well as a B. Iden Payne Award for The Drawer Boy. His stu­dents have placed among the top in the state at the Texas Thespian Convention for set, cos­tume and mask design. Many have also qual­i­fied for National Competition is Set and Lighting Desgin.

Lisa del Rosario

Co-​Head of Dance/​TBallet & Modern Teacher & Choreographer, Senior Camp
Lisa began her dance stud­ies at the Margo Marshall School of Ballet and the Cleveland San Jose School of Ballet. She con­tin­ued her train­ing as a pres­i­den­tial schol­ar­ship stu­dent at the University of Texas at Austin where she received her B.F.A. in Dance. She also stud­ied clas­si­cal piano and vio­lin for many years and in her later years Pilates, Yoga, Tai Chi, Vipassana Meditation, Taoist Meditation, and the Feldenkrais Method of move­ment edu­ca­tion. Lisa danced pro­fes­sion­ally in the Philippines with The Philippine National Folk Dance Company, Bayanihan. She cur­rently dances locally with Moving Voices Dance, Sharir/​Bustamante Danceworks, Sheep Army/​Elsewhere Dance Theatre, Subclavian Groove Dance Company, Yellow Tape Construction Co., and other inde­pen­dent chore­o­g­ra­phers. Lisa has taught and chore­o­graphed at the UT Informal Classes, the Dougherty Arts School, the McCallum High School Fine Arts Academy, and the Creative Movement and Pre-​Ballet divi­sions of the Ballet Austin Academy. She is thrilled to be in her third sea­son teach­ing for the Texas Arts Project at St. Stephen’s Episcopal School. Lisa is also under­go­ing train­ing in New York City to become a Guild Certified Practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method.

Rona Ebert

Tap Teacher/​Tap Choreographer, Senior Camp
Rona began study­ing bal­let and tap at the age of 8, in many schools across the coun­try as she trav­eled with her mil­i­tary fam­ily. Arriving in Austin at age twelve, she began pro­fes­sional bal­let train­ing with Eugene Slavin and Alexandra Nadal (Slavin-​Nadal School of Ballet). Under their direc­tion, she danced with Austin Civic Ballet (now Ballet Austin) for eight years. After grad­u­at­ing from U. T. with a B.F.A. empha­siz­ing graphic design, she joined Austin On Tap, a nation­ally tour­ing com­pany based in Austin. Ms. Ebert trav­eled the with the com­pany for five years and in 1990, joined Tapestry Dance Company, fol­lowed by Estampa Y Española, a local Flamenco com­pany. A seri­ous injury put a stop to her career for two years. Upon recov­er­ing in 1996, Ms. Ebert began work­ing with Scott Thompson and Richard Byron, direc­tors of Austin Musical Theatre She was graphic designer for the com­pany until 2002, and has danced in their pro­duc­tions of Peter Pan, West Side Story, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Music Man and Celebrate Austin Musical Theatre, The Wizard of Oz as well as numer­ous Gala pro­duc­tions. In addi­tion to her pro­fes­sional career as a graphic designer, Ms. Ebert has taught tap and bal­let for over 20 years at var­i­ous loca­tions includ­ing Austin Civic Ballet, The YMCA, the Slavin Nadal School of Ballet, and Austin Musical Theatre.

Taylor Edwards

Musical Theatre TA, Counselor, Vocal Assistant, Dance Captain
Taylor Edwards is a junior at Texas State University where she is pur­su­ing her BFA in Musical Theatre under the direc­tion of Kaitlin Hopkins. Texas State cred­its include Madeleine True in Lippa’s The Wild Party, Ermengarde in Lippa’s A Little Princess, and Vivian in Oklahoma!, as well as Reader in The D’Amboise Project, A Workshop under the direc­tion of Chris D’Amboise. Other cred­its include Nikki in Sweet Charity and Usherette in The Producers with Summer Stock Austin.

Kasey Eggleston

Guest Artist, Dance
Kasey Eggleston is an English Teacher at Dripping Springs High School. She has danced in numer­ous pro­fes­sional musi­cal the­atre pro­duc­tions with Austin Musical Theatre, Austin Playhouse, Zachary Scott Theatre and more.

Michael Fariss

Counselor
Michael Fariss is in his third year study­ing Acting at Webster University in St. Louis. He per­formed with Summer Stock Austin for five sea­sons. His final role was the Dentist in Little Shop of Horrors.

David Gallagher

Residential Director, Acting Instructor
David Gallagher grad­u­ated from St. Edward’s uni­ver­sity in Austin, TX. He received his bach­e­lors in Theatre Arts and a minor in busi­ness and music. Currently he lives in New York City and has been for the past two years. He is a mem­ber of Actors Equity Association, which is the union for pro­fes­sional actors. Some of his New York cred­its include, “Othello” pro­duced by Wandering Bark Theatre com­pany, “Estreies Verdes” with Full Stop Theatre Collective, and last year he had the won­der­ful oppor­tu­nity to intern with the great Acting Company. He has been the Residential Director/​Acting Coach for Texas Arts Project for the past 4 years.

Kirk German

Residential Director, Senior Camp
Kirk German has worked in the arts and edu­ca­tion for over ten years in three states. At Middlebury College in Vermont, where he grad­u­ated with hon­ors with a degree in the­atre, lit­er­a­ture, and art his­tory, he worked exten­sively as a play­wright, direc­tor, actor, and stage manger. He also worked as an RA, a fea­ture writer for the cam­pus news­pa­per arts sec­tion, and as a DJ for the local radio sta­tion. During the sum­mers, he taught exten­sively for a vari­ety of the­atre camps and arts edu­ca­tion enrich­ment pro­grams, includ­ing a two-​month stint as an RA and instruc­tor for the Exploration Summer Program in Wellesley, Massachusetts. After grad­u­at­ing, he worked for a year as an assis­tant dean and res­i­dence hall direc­tor at Middlebury College while also writ­ing and direct­ing for Middleground Children’s Theatre Company. Since return­ing to his home­town of Austin, Kirk has per­formed with sev­eral com­pa­nies includ­ing Austin Lyric Opera, TexArts, Austin Playhouse, Different Stages, Naughty Austin, and Theatre at the J, for which he received the B. Iden Payne “Best Ensemble” award along with four other actors. He has directed sev­eral children’s shows, includ­ing James and the Giant Peach for the Austin Scottish Rite Children’s Theatre and You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown for kid­s­Act­ing. During the day, Kirk has hap­pily worked for the past five years as a teacher of English and the­atre at Huntington-​Surrey High School in Hyde Park.

John Howrey

Musical Director/​Musical Theatre Instructor, Senior Camp
Adjunct fac­ulty at Massachusetts College of Art and Design and Curry College. Currently pur­su­ing his MFA in the Dynamic Media Institute at MassArt. Theatre cred­its include Bat Boy (Metro Stage Company, BroadwayWorld Boston Award), Sunfish (Stoneham Theatre), Oklahoma, Footloose, Les Miserables, 42^nd Street, Thoroughly Modern Millie, Once Upon a Mattress (Stoneham Theatre’s Young Company), The Rocky Horror Show (Suffolk University), Pageant, Personals (Naughty Austin Productions), The Rocky Horror Show, The Santaland Diaries, (ZACH Theatre), You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown (Austin Musical Theatre), Merrily We Roll Along and Passion (Austin Circle of Theaters). John has taught for Stoneham Theatre, Austin Musical Theatre, Austin School of Music, ZACH Theatre and more. John is a graphic designer. His Map of Musical Theatre History can be found in Strange Maps by Frank Jacobs or at chonny​.com.

Monique Huff

Guest Artist
Monique Huff is a Junior B.F.A Musical Theatre major at Ithaca College. Ithaca cred­its include Kit in Top Girls and Miriam in A Thousand Years, a work­shop. Her other cred­its include play­ing Logainne Schwartzandbrubenierre in The 25^th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee at the Hangar Theatre.

Stacey Huston

Jazz Choreographer, Senior Camp
Stacey is happy to be involved with TAP as often as pos­si­ble. After grad­u­at­ing from UT with a Business degree, she attended The University of California at Irvine and grad­u­ated Cum Laude with a degree in Dance, Theater and open-​by-​audition-​only Choreography pro­gram. At UC Irvine and an away-​program in NYC, she stud­ied dance, voice and act­ing under such renowned greats as Susan Stroman, Uta Hagen, Donald McKayle and Harry Garland to name only a few. Stacey has been involved in part­ner danc­ing in one way or another for over 13 years. She tested out and is cer­ti­fied through American Style Gold lev­els and com­peted heav­ily in International Latin for 3 years. Her rank­ings include top six place­ments in Rising Star events in many national com­pe­ti­tions like California, Nevada, Washington, Virginia, and Florida. Upon com­ple­tion of her com­pet­ing career in 1996, she was ranked 7^th in the U.S. and 13^th in the World in Rising Star Latin and Jive styles. Her vast expe­ri­ence includes Feature Films, Television appear­ances, Commercials, Special Gala events, and stage pro­duc­tions. Her most recent work has been 5 years with stage show pro­duc­tions in the­aters and hotels in California, New York, Philadelphia, and finally over­seas on cruise ships. She has quite lit­er­ally been around the world and back.

Heather Huggins

Head of Dance/​Jazz Teacher/​Acting Teacher, Senior Camp
Heather has taught at Baylor University, Ballet Austin’s Musical Theatre Division, Musical Theatre Institute at St. Stephens Episcopal School, Footworks Dance Center, Zilker Academy, Performers’ Workshop, Young Actors’ Shakespeare Project, Kids’ College and DanceWorks. Regionally she has per­formed with Austin Musical Theatre, Broadway Texas!, Hyde Park Theatre, Vortex Repertory Theatre, Sharir + Bustamante Danceworks, Silver Star Productions, Waco Musical Theatre, Inc., Zachary Scott Theatre Center and Zilker Theatre Productions. Her recent per­for­mance cred­its include Rhonda in You’re No One’s Nothing Special, Frenchie in Cabaret, Kathleen in Chopper and Lilianna in Windblown, con­ceived by Kimmie Rhodes and directed by Joe Sears. Heather is a grad­u­ate of the University of Texas at Austin Department of Theatre and Dance, where she was a mem­ber of Dance Repertory Theatre under the direc­tion of Yakov Sharir, Lyn Elam and Jeffery Bullock. Heather received her MFA at the Boris Schukin Insititue at the Vakhtangov Theatre, a stu­dio of the Moscow Art Theatre (MXAT) in Moscow, Russia. She now spends most of her time as the Founder and Producing Artistic Director of DA! Theatre Collective.

Erik James

Musical Director, TAP Jr
Erik James is a clas­si­cally trained pianist and com­poser liv­ing in New York City. Frequently play­ing and Music Directing cabaret and the­atre, New York knows him as a ver­sa­tile pianist, singer, and enter­tainer. Erik also makes a liv­ing by com­pos­ing and pro­duc­ing music for TV and Film. His cred­its include the College Baseball World Series theme song, “Omaha” for ESPN, as well as many orches­tral, pop and rock library pack­ages for ESPN, Spike TV, and Inside Edition. Erik has col­lab­o­rated with such musi­cians as Frank Black (of the Pixies), Stephanie J. Block (“Wicked”, “Pirate Queen”), Mario Cantone (“Sex and the City”), and Mark Mulcahy.

Larry Lehew

Technical Director/​Designer
After spend­ing some time at Yale School of Drama, Larry moved back to Texas build a high school the­atre pro­gram in San Antonio. He served as the Master Electrician at the UT Performing Arts Center for sev­eral years. He holds a BA in Arts Administration from St. Edward’s University, where he worked on many shows. Larry has worked as a Lighting Designer, Set Designer, Technical Director and Robotic Lighting Consultant for the­atre com­pa­nies, edu­ca­tional insti­tu­tions and light­ing orga­ni­za­tions around the country.

Robin Lewis

Guest Artist
Robin Lewis is a vet­eran of sev­eral Broadway stage pro­duc­tions includ­ing Disney’s Beauty & the Beast (dance cap­tain), A Christmas Carol at Madison Square Garden (dance cap­tain) and Fosse (includ­ing the film ver­sion) with Ben Vereen and Ann Reinking. Additional cred­its include the Off-​Broadway pro­duc­tion of The Green Heart as well as the first national Broadway tour­ing pro­duc­tion of Mel Brooks’ The Producers star­ring Jason Alexander and Martin Short. Lewis has taught for the University of Texas, Saint Edward’s University and has been a guest lec­turer for American Ballet Theatre Summer Intensives, Ballet Austin, the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, Oklahoma University, Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts, Camp Broadway in NYC, US Performing Arts Camp and oth­ers nation­wide. He has also been a guest teacher for, and holds mem­ber­ship with, the Musical Theater Educators Alliance and the Texas Educational Theatre Association among oth­ers. He is also a mem­ber of Actor’s Equity.

Jill Leberknight

Guest Artist
An actor in var­ied pro­fes­sional set­tings for over 20 years and enthu­si­as­tic teacher of the­atre, Ms. Leberknight has taught for some of the top per­form­ing arts orga­ni­za­tions in Austin and on the East Coast where she grew up. She believes in a strong edu­ca­tional foun­da­tion based on learn­ing tech­nique and strives to help stu­dents build their “trav­el­ing suit­case of per­form­ing tools.” She holds a BA from Penn State University and an MFA from the University of Texas at Austin.

Katie McDowell

Film TA, Counselor
Katie McDowell is major­ing in Radio/​Television/​Film at the University of Texas, Austin. She has directed, writ­ten, pro­duced and filmed sev­eral short films over the past five years that have run the fes­ti­val cir­cuit, includ­ing WorldFest, Berkeley Film Festival, and the Toronto International Film Festival. She has worked intern­ships in Toronto, Canada (CTV) and Austin, Texas. She recently fin­ished shoot­ing her first fea­ture film with fel­low TAP camp alum, Andrew Edison. They won the Audience Award for Best Feature at Slamdance Festival 2011. This will be her sev­enth year with TAP camp and she can’t wait for TAP 2011.

Dr. Michael McKelvey

Musical Theatre & Voice Instructor; Senior Camp
Dr. McKelvey is the Head of Private Voice/​Associate Professor at Point Park University. He served as coör­di­na­tor of Music at St. Edward’s University for 6 years and received his Doctorate of Musical Arts from the University of Texas. Performance cred­its include work with Austin Lyric Opera, The State/​Live Oak Theatre, Austin Musical Theatre, Austin Shakespeare Festival, and Mary Moody Northern Theatre, Dallas Opera, Shreveport Opera, Theatre Three, Deep Ellum Opera Theatre, New Texas Music Festival. He has been a musi­cal and vocal direc­tor for Austin Musical Theatre, The State Theatre Company, and Austin Playhouse. This past year Dr Michael Mckelvey won Austin Critic’s Table award for best musi­cal direc­tion and received his third B. Iden Payne nom­i­na­tion. He has served on the fac­ul­ties of Concordia University, St. Stephen’s School, Broadway Texas/​AMT Academy, The Zilker Academy @ Footworks and Mountain View College. He also runs a pri­vate vocal stu­dio in north Austin, opened a new the­atre pro­duc­tion com­pany in Austin, where he has won a num­ber of awards for Best Director and Best Musical Director.

Ginger Morris

TAP Artistic Director
Ginger grad­u­ated with a BFA in Theatre and a minor in Speech Communications from the University of Texas – Austin in 1998. While in col­lege, Ginger worked as Assistant Stage Manager and Academy Director for Austin Musical Theatre where she pro­duced the Annual All-​Youth Summer Musical for three years and gar­nered two B. Iden Payne Awards for “Best Play for Youth.” She also had the oppor­tu­nity to direct pro­duc­tions with St. Edward’s University, Zilker Theatre Productions, Austin Scottish Rite Children’s Theatre and Second Youth Family Theatre. Ginger directs and chore­o­graphs for mid­dle schools and high schools in Central Texas includ­ing Dripping Springs, Leander and Austin school dis­tricts. She is co-​founder of Summer Stock Austin, where she has directed Footloose, West Side Story, Thoroughly Modern Millie, Little Shop of Horrors and The Producers with high school and col­lege stu­dents. She is very excited to be trav­el­ling to New York this sum­mer to Assistant Direct the new musi­cal, One For My Baby.

Aaron Moten

Residential Staff/​Acting Instructor
Aaron Moten cur­rently resides in New York City, where he works as an actor. He was recently cast in the Broadway revival of Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire. He stud­ied dance, voice and act­ing in Austin for ten years. Aaron has per­formed pro­fes­sion­ally, to fan­tas­tic reviews, as Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd, Emcee in Cabaret, and Jimmy in Thoroughly Modern Millie. While study­ing Acting at The Juilliard School, Aaron played King Henry V in Henry V, Semyon Medvedenko in The Seagull, George in A Raisin In the Sun and many other notable roles.

Alan Shorter

Vocal Coach and Musical Theatre Director, TAPAdvanced
Alan Shorter received his BA in Acting/​Directing from Indiana University and his MFA in Theatre Arts with a Directing Concentration from Minnesota State University. Mr. Shorter worked as an Instructor, Music Director, Artistic Associate, Stage Director and Composer for The Children’s Theatre Company & School in Minneapolis. He served as Director of Music Theatre for Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota, Graduate Assistant in the Department of Theatre and Dance for Minnesota State University and Musical Theatre BFA Program Coördinator/​Assistant Professor for The University of Wisconsin-​Stevens Point. Mr. Shorter has worked pro­fes­sion­ally as a Stage Director, Choreographer, Actor, Musical Director and Composer for col­lege depart­ments, orga­ni­za­tions and the­atre com­pa­nies across the coun­try. He is asso­ci­ated with The Kennedy Center/​American College Theatre Festival, The American Composers Forum, The American Federation of Musicians, The Theatre Communications Group and The Educational Theatre Association. Mr. Shorter is cur­rently an Assistant Professor/​Performance Faculty for Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, TX.

Dustin Struhall

Musical Director/​Accompanist
Dustin grad­u­ated from Westminster Choir College of Rider University in Princeton, NJ in 2007 and high­tailed it back to Austin soon after. Since return­ing, his music edu­ca­tion con­tin­ues with work as an accom­pa­nist, vocal coach and music direc­tor. As a music direc­tor, he reg­u­larly col­lab­o­rates with Stuart Moulton on his many musi­cal adven­tures. Other artists include Joe Hartman on vari­a­tions of his char­ac­ter “Cathy Dresden”, with Ginger Morris in the sum­mers as music direc­tor for the Texas Arts Project. Other cred­its as a music direc­tor include Anything Goes at McCallum High School Fine Arts Academy, and Songs from the boX with Cathie Sheridan. As a key­boardist, Rockin’ Christmas Party (ZACH), Little Shop of Horrors (NJ), Wizard of Oz (Broadway Texas), Guys & Dolls (Broadway Texas Academy), Into the Woods (VLA, ZTP), Sweeney Todd (Westminster Actor’s Company), and The Will Roger’s Follies (ZTP).

Scott Thompson

Guest Director/​Choreographer
Scott has over 20 years teach­ing expe­ri­ence. Though cur­rently resid­ing and teach­ing in New York City, he has worked nation­wide at uni­ver­si­ties, con­ser­va­to­ries, dance acad­e­mies, and sum­mer camps. Scott has guest lec­tured at NYU, California State College at Fullerton, Birmingham University, University of Arizona and the College of the Desert in Palm Springs, California. Scott Thompson has won numer­ous awards for direct­ing and chore­o­graph­ing some of Broadway’s bright­est tal­ents in over 100 pro­duc­tions nation­wide. Scott directed Tony Award win­ner Betty Buckley in her first GYPSY, coun­try music leg­end Larry Gatlin in THE MUSIC MAN and Tony Award win­ner Cady Huffman in DAMN YANKEES. For the Library of Congress, he chore­o­graphed an all-​star Gershwin Gala fea­tur­ing four-​time Tony Award win­ner Audra McDonald, record­ing star Dawn Upshaw and Tony Award nom­i­nees Lara Teeter, David Garrison and Wanda Richert. For Princess Cruise Lines, Scott Created, Directed and Choreographed a multi-​million dol­lar pro­duc­tion show BROADWAY BALLROOM, which pre­miered on Princess Cruises new star ocean liner the Ruby Princess. Scott co-​wrote and will direct/​choreograph One For My Baby, a new musi­cal in NYC.

David Valdes

Head of Acting, Senior Camp & Director, TAPAdvanced
David is cur­rently the Director of Theatre at St. Paul’s School. He was the Director of Theatre for the Theatre Focus pro­gram at St. Stephen’s Episcopal School for 8 years. Prior to com­ing to St. Stephen’s, he was Theatre Department Chair and Arts Facilitator (fif­teen years) at one of the top ten nation­ally ranked per­form­ing arts high schools in America. David was awarded “arts edu­ca­tor of the year” from the Milwaukee Magazine in 1998. He has directed many award win­ning plays and musi­cals in Milwaukee and many of his for­mer stu­dents have gone on to study at the some of the top pre-​professional act­ing pro­grams in the coun­try. He was hired by St. Stephen’s in 2000, to design and develop a cur­ricu­lum, which is the Theatre Focus pro­gram. His goal as a the­atre edu­ca­tor is to make it clear to stu­dent actors that the class­room is an exten­sion of the stage and that the stage must always be a class­room. His goal is to guide actors through a “process” rather than a “prod­uct” ori­ented cur­ricu­lum. David has his under­grad­u­ate degree from the University of Wisconsin and has MFA grad­u­ate train­ing from Boston University and Minnesota State University.