Creative Team
Lauren Putty White
Found
er, Artistic Director, Choreographer
Hailing from Baltimore, Maryland, Lauren Putty White is a Philadelphia based dancer, choreographer, educator and dance writer. She has an MFA in dance from Montclair State University and a BFA in Modern Dance Performance from University of the Arts. Having performed internationally with the world-renowned Parsons dance company and PHILADANCO, Lauren has also choreographed for Ballet X , Grace Dance Theatre, Bryn Mawr College and Drexel University. She has been an adjunct professor at University of the Arts, Stockton University and Temple University and most recently has taught dance at the public high school level for the School District of Philadelphia. Aside from also teaching at private studios throughout the region , White has also done guest artist residencies at Mercy High School, Carver Center for Arts and Technology in Baltimore, MD, and has taught on faculty at AileyCamp Baltimore. White co-founded Putty Dance Project, with her jazz musician husband, producing socially conscious critically acclaimed works. They have presented at the Kimmel Center, the K Dance Yes Invitational, American Dance Guild Festival, Baltimore Dance Invitational, and virtually in the Boston Contemporary Dance Festival and San Francisco’s Virtual Pathways. Currently, White is a featured dancer with the world-renowned Sun Ra Arkestra and recently performed with them at Summerstage 2021 in New York City and BRIC Jazz Festival. She now teaches master workshops in her newly developed methodology Physical Listening for Free Form Body Motifs, which specializes in translating Free Jazz music into movement through improvisation. As an emerging dance writer, her featured article can be found in the Spring 2021 issue of Black Dance Magazine and she is the newest member of the writing platform thINKingDANCE in Philadelphia.
Brent White
Founder, Executive Director, Composer
Brent White is a lifelong Philadelphian and jazz enthusiast. Mr. White understands Philadelphia’s rich cultural community; its leaders, history, musicians, connectors, and politics. He holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Widener University, a Master’s Degree in Jazz Studies from the University of the Arts, and a certificate in non-profit management from LaSalle University. He has toured nationwide and internationally as a freelance trombonist to the world’s largest Jazz festivals, yet possesses the local field experience, and relationships with many of Philadelphia’s non-profits with a career focus that can be summarized in one word—Jazz.
Previously, White has worked as the Education Program Manager at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, designing and implementing outreach education programming for Philadelphia students. Currently, he serves as the Assistant Teaching Professor of Music and Coordinator of Arts and Culture Hub at the Dornsife Center at Drexel University. He has taught jazz in the Philadelphia Prison System, the Philadelphia Clef Club of Jazz and Performing Arts, in the Camden New Jersey City School system, and as Director of Jazz Orchestra at Drexel University. Residencies included the Juilliard School of Music outreach Department (Bay Area Tour), where he provided jazz workshops in juvenile detention centers, children’s hospitals, and schools in the San Francisco Bay area.
As a trombonist, White has toured with the likes of John Legend (Indonesia), Kindred Family Soul (South Africa), and the Sun Ra Arkestra (Europe). He has been welcomed to the stage by Lady Alma, and has recorded in-studio for Patti Labelle. White is no stranger to the Philadelphia and New York jazz scenes where currently, he performs with Orrin Evans’ Captain Black Big Band, Josh Lawrence and Color Theory, and the Fresh Cut Orchestra, among other ensembles.
White is an associate minister at Mt. Zion Baptist Church of Holmesburg and most recently, he composed and recorded his album Broken Toy dedicated to children who suffer trauma caused by losing a parent to incarceration.
This project is supported in part with funding from Small But Mighty Arts
Graphic Design & Website Updates/Edits by Sammi Pfeiffer
Photography by Ola Baldych
