Priscilla Crommelin Ball, Executive Artistic Director
Kyana Goodyear, School Director
Priscilla Crommelin-McMullan, Youth Company Director
Meet our Artistic Staff and Faculty
ADMINISTRATION
Priscilla Crommelin Ball, Founder/Executive Artistic Director
Kyana Goodyear, Executive School Director
Priscilla Crommelin-McMullan, Artistic Advisor/Youth Company Director/Marketing Director
Faith Ladnier, Bookkeeper
Yvonne Paterson, Office Secretary
Kristin Allen, Costume Mistress
Priscilla Crommelin Ball
Founder & Executive Artistic Director
From a young age, Priscilla Crommelin Ball was given the opportunity to study dance in many of the finest ballet schools in the United States and Europe, most notably, the North Carolina School of the Arts, The Arts Educational School in Tring Park, England, Mary Day's in Washington D.C., Rosella Hightower's in Cannes, France. She began her professional career as a member of the Harkness Ballet of New York under the directorship of Brian MacDonald, Larry Rhodes, and Ben Harkarvy, respectively. Ms. Ball continued her career with Ballets Felix Blaska based in Grenoble, France. She was subsequently Principal Dancer of Maryland Ballet in Baltimore, Maryland, and Birmingham Ballet in Birmingham, Alabama and Ballets Classiques de Paris in Paris, France. During her prolific international performing career Priscilla danced the leading roles in many classical ballets most notably- "Giselle", "Les Sylphides", "Sleeping "Beauty", "The Nutcracker", "Spring Waters". She worked with many renowned choreographers, often under their personal tutelage,including: Alvin Ailey ("Feast of Ashes"), William Dollar ("Le Combat", Norman Walker ("Night Song"), Brian MacDonald (Time Out of Mind"),(Firebird"), Ben Harkarvy ("Madrigalesco") Todd Bollender ("Souvenirs"), Rudi Van Danzig ("Monument for a Dead Boy"), Elena Tchernichova ("Romeo and Juliet'), William Dollar's "Eaters of Darkness", Felix Blaska, Vicente Nebrada, Ben Stevenson, Ana Ricarda, John Taras, Vladimir Dokoudovsky, Gilbert Canova. Her favorite role was "Clorinda" in William Dollar's ("Le Combat"). During the "Paris Years" she was the principal teacher at L'Academie International de la Danse, later founding her own school in Paris, L'Academie de Danse du Stade Francais-Paris. After returning to Alabama in 1992, she taught in the Montgomery Ballet School at Huntingdon College. The Montgomery Ballet unanimously voted her School Director, Company Ballet Mistress, Associate Artistic Director (1995) Artistic Director (1996-2007) and Executive Director (2008-2012). Ms. Ball is thrilled to begin a new chapter in her career surrounded by so many fine friends, talented artists, and young rising stars and their families of the New, Alabama River Region Ballet School and Youth Company!
Kyana Goodyear
School Director and Ballet Teacher
Kyana Goodyear was named the School Director of the Alabama River Region Ballet in June 2013. Kyana, an Atlanta native, began her formal training with Bernadette Campbell of the Buford School of Ballet in Buford, GA. She was later accepted into the pre-professional division of the prestigious Atlanta Ballet, where she trained under various world class artists and teachers. Kyana began her professional career with the North Atlanta Dance Theater, under the direction of Michael Garrison, and later moved to Montgomery, AL to continue her career with the Montgomery Ballet. Kyana spent seven seasons as a member of the Montgomery Ballet Professional Company, where she achieved the level of Principal Dancer. She performed many principal roles including Princess Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, Odile in Swan Lake, Medora in Le Corsaire, Myrtha in Giselle, and the Sugar Plum Fairy in The Nutcracker. She has also performed the lead in La Vivandiere, and danced various roles in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Romeo and Juliet, Don Quixote, and Carmen. The role of “Artemis”, in Alpheos et Arethusa, was created for Kyana by international choreographer, Adria Ferrali. Kyana has performed in the Pietrasanta di Danza International Festival in Pietrasanta, Italy, and as a guest performer and teacher in many dance institutions throughout the United States. Kyana, a regionally renowned and highly experienced teacher, has served as the School Director of the Montgomery Ballet, and has more than seventeen years’ experience teaching all levels of Classical Ballet, Tap, and Jazz. Kyana was recently featured in RSVP magazines “the LIST”, which distinguishes her as one of the River Region’s “young leaders”.
Adria Ferrali
Director of Modern Dance
Adria Ferrali, International Coordinator and Director Modern Dance Department, is a native of Florence, Italy. She has spent eight years in New York City dancing and specializing in the Martha Graham Technique and gained an Advance Degree in Modern Dance. During her professional career, she was a member of the Martha Graham Dance Company, the Martha Graham Ensemble, and the Pearl Lang Dance Theatre. She toured the USA performing leading roles of the Graham repertoire notably, “Red Girl” in “Diversion of Angels”, “Mary” in “El Penitente” and the Lead dancer in “Acts of Light”. Recently she received permission from the Martha Graham Dance Company to dance the leading role in a revival of “Sketches from Chronicle” and “Primitive Mysteries”. Adria has worked in Amsterdam at the Dutch National Ballet as an assistant to Yuriko and a demonstrator of the Martha Graham Technique. In 2003 she was awarded the Nijinsky Prize as Best Dancer and Choreographer at the Kiev National Opera House in Ukraine. She was Guest Teacher and Choreographer at the Royal Danish Ballet in Copenhagen, Denmark for seven years and also at the School of La Scala Theater in Milan, Italy. She was invited as a member of the examining Board of La Scala in the year 2004. She has also worked as guest teacher at the “University College of Dance” in Stockholm, Sweden, at the Copenhagen Contemporary Dance School, and at Boston Conservatory in the USA as Regisseur. In 2012 she was a jury member at the “VII International Contest for Choreographers and Ballet Masters” in Novosibirsk, Russia and guest choreographer and jury member at the Kemerovo State University of Siberia. She was Chair in Contemporary Dance and Choreography at the Ballet Academy of Gӧteborg in Sweden from ’99 to 2005. She has extensively taught Master Classes and international workshops in Berlin, Cologne, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Ravenna, Cremona, Milan, Florence, and Rome. She was invited as Guest Choreographer and Teacher at Montgomery Ballet by Executive Director, Priscilla Crommelin Ball, in 2011 and again in 2012. She was Artistic Director and founder of the “Pietrasanta In Danza International Dance Festival 2010” in Italy. Adria’s choreographies were staged at the Royal Danish Theater in Copenhagen, at the Opera House of the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, at the National Opera House in Kiev, and at the Atlanta Theater, the Thalia Theatre and the Stora Teater in Gӧteborg, Sweden, at the Drama Theater of Kemerovo in Russia, at the Davis Theater, the Performing Arts Center of Montgomery, AL, USA, and also in Italy at the Festival La Versiliana, at Villa Strozzi in Florence, at the Teatro Dante Alighieri in Ravenna, at the Arena in Cremona, at the Teatro Greco in Rome, at the Teatro Comunale Pietrasanta, at the Pietrasanta in Concerto and at the Festival Estate Regina in Montecatini Terme.