Director
Amy N. Tevlin, Artistic and Executive Director of Tevlin Ballet Company and Director of Tevlin Ballet School
Amy N. Tevlin is a one of kind master ballet teacher who brings to each class her vibrant personality, positive affirmations, creative imagery, spot on technique, humor, and a core belief that every dancer dances better when motivated through love rather than fear. Raising dancers' self-esteem and self-awareness is the cornerstone of her teaching methods. This year she can be found teaching for Tevlin Ballet School, Spotlight, guest teachng at the University of Arizona as well as Ballet Rincon, and setting a brand new ballet for Anderson Young Ballet Theatre.
Ms. Tevlin was born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio. There she rigorously trained in the Vaganova ballet technique and danced with Metropolitan Classical Ballet Company for six seasons before reaching the professional level and performing with various ballet companies throughout the Midwest.
Ms. Tevlin went on to major in history and dance at Butler University in Indianapolis, IN, where she performed extensively with the Butler Ballet and earned her B.A. During her final year at Butler, Ms. Tevlin attended Zhejiang University in China in order to immerse herself in the study of Chinese language, literature, and traditional Chinese dance. Following graduation, Ms. Tevlin served for four years on the faculty at the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati where she served as a collegiate and children's preparatory instructor of ballet, co-founded the CCM Youth Ballet, and acted as choreographer and ballet master before leaving to found and direct her own Ballet Esprit, a ballet company focused on providing experience to help transition high school and college aged dancers towards professional careers.
Ms. Tevlin is in demand as a master teacher around the country and has been a frequent guest teacher at Interlochen Center for the Arts, Michigan Classic Ballet Company, Memphis Classical Ballet, Ballet Arts in Jackson, TN, and Central Indiana Dance Ensemble. In 2003, she earned a J.D. from the University Of Cincinnati of Law. During law school, Ms. Tevlin was published in the Immigration and Nationality Law Review, won second place in the National Juvenile Law Moot Court Competition at Whittier Law School, and completed prestigious internships for the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals Mediation Services, United States Department of Justice, and Cincinnati City Council.
Realizing her true passion is life coaching, motivating, and teaching ballet for the betterment of young people, Mrs. Tevlin decided to put her legal career aside and returned to teaching. From 2006-2007 she completed a guest residence for the dance department at the prestigious St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire and then as served as Artistic Director for Ballet New England’s professional and junior company in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. There she restructured the affiliated school and together with her husband, Michael Tevlin, choreographed a new Nutcracker for Ballet New England’s 2007-2008 season. In 2009 she was honored to return to her roots in regional dance by teaching pointe for Regional Dance America’s Mid-States Festival.
For the past three summers, Mrs. Tevlin has directed THE TEVLIN PROJECT, a four week summer intensive intended for only 12 of ballet’s most elite young dancers. The idea was born after years of Ms. Tevlin sending very talented students to summer programs and having them come home feeling discouraged and complaining of not receiving much individualized instruction and attention. THE TEVLIN PROJECT changes that by focusing on solely the needs of 12 dancers and helping the dancers reach the five ballet goals they set for themselves. Ms. Tevlin is also designed a curriculum of real world, practical lectures to help dancers with the challenges they face such as: college or a company, how to audition, designing a great dance resume, putting together an audition variation and tape, making a photo portfolio, choosing a career after dance, and how to make money and survive while you make it dance. Ms. Tevlin feels that too often young dancers have to struggle to learn these skills on their own and to changes that for the dancers of THE TEVLIN PROJECT. Dancers have traveled from Missouri, Texas, South Carolina, Indiana, Illinois, and even from India for THE TEVLIN PROJECT!
In the fall of 2010, Mrs. Tevlin founded the professional and pre-professional divisions of Tevlin Ballet Company, along with an affiliated school. In 2010 Tevlin Ballet Company featured 13 professional dancers and over 30 school children for The Nutcracker. By the end of 2011, Tevlin Ballet had brought in over 1000 people to see Nutcracker who might not have otherwise had the opportunity. Free tickets were given to orphanages foster children and their families, patients and employees of drug rehab centers and their families, retirement homes, as well as ProKids. Mrs. Tevlin is a huge believer in using our gifts and art to uplift others.
Mrs. Tevlin's mentoring of her students never stops and she continues to monitor and advise them. Many have gone on to dance professionally in places such as: Dayton Ballet, Lexington Ballet, Louisville Ballet, Charleston Ballet Theatre, Kentucky Ballet Theater, Cincinnati Ballet, San Diego Ballet, Ballet Pensacola, Nashville Ballet, Island Moving Company, Ohio Dance Theatre, Columbia Classical Ballet, Milwaukee Ballet, and the hit Broadway shows: Memphis and Evita. A great valuer and advocate of education, Mrs. Tevlin's students have also attended prestigious high schools such as St. Paul's, North Carolina School of the Arts, and Interlochen Arts Academy. Her students have also gone to top universities such as University of Chicago, Harvard, Princeton, Tulane, Brown, George Washington University, and Duke. Her students have attended as dance majors Butler University, Goucher University, Arizona University, University of Utah, and the University of Cincinnati, to name a few. Three of her students have gone on to law school which pleases Mrs. Tevlin to no end: the world needs more dancing lawyers.Mrs. Tevlin is proud of the professional ballet dancers she has helped nurture but is equally proud of the students that have gone to become writers, doctors, lawyers, physical therapist, marketing directors, teachers, nurses, and arts administrators. So many have credited their success to the discipline and self- esteem that ballet and Mrs. Tevlin helped instill in them. This is what continues to motivate and drive Mrs. Tevlin everyday with each new generation of dancers she teaches.
