DAYSTAR :
CONTEMPORARY DANCE-DRAMA OF INDIAN AMERICA

MISSION OF THE DAYSTAR COMPANY:
to encourage and train Native American talent
in the performing arts, and to teach others
to approach respectfully,
the dance, music, and art of Native Americans.

(Photo Credit: Ann Hansen)

Daystar (Rosalie Jones) is the Founder and Artistic Director of DAYSTAR Dance Company. The Company, founded in 1980, was the FIRST DANCE COMPANY in the U.S. created with all-native performers and specializing in the portrayal of the personal and tribal stories of Indian America. The Company has toured throughout the United States and Canada, and in Germany, Bulgaria, and Turkey.

BIOGRAPHY AND ANCESTRY

Daystar (Rosalie Jones) was born on the Blackfeet Reservation in Montana and is of Pembina Chippewa ancestry on her mother's side.
She holds a Master's Degree in Dance from the University of Utah with postgraduate work at Juilliard School in New York City. She studied Korean, Hawaiian, East Indian and Flamenco dance, mine with Reid Gilbert,
and modern with Jose Limon and Hanya Holm.
Over many years, she has gained a knowledge of
the indigenous dance and cultural forms of the Plains,
the Northwest Coast, and Conchero Dance, among others.
As a teacher, she was responsible for the revitalization of Performing Arts at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico,
during the early 1990's when she was Chair of the Department.
In 1995, Daystar was awarded a two-year
National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Choreographer's Fellowship.

TEACHING

Over the past 30 years, Daystar and the Company has taught in a variety
of educational institutions, from elementary to university level,
and in cultural and community settings both native and non-native.
The teaching process of Daystar is both personal and tribal. Theatrical ideas - which encompass story, choreography and music - are developed for individual and group training in expressiveness, but with respectful attention being given
to the dictates of the tribal community and tradition.

Daystar lectures continuously in the university setting.
At University of California - Irvine,
State University of New York - Brockport College,
at American University in Bulgaria and Anadolu University, Turkey,
she has introduced such courses as
Native American Dance, Storytelling, and Mask and Myth.

 

CHOREOGRAPHY: "Tales of Napi Old Man" (Blackfeet), "Wolf: A Transformation" (Anishinabe), "The Woman Who fell From The Sky" (Six Nations), "Sacred Woman, Sacred Earth" (Lakota), "The Corn Mother" (Eastern Cherokee), "Legend of the Black Butterfly" (Maidu), "La Malinche: The Woman With Three Names" "Prayer of First Dancer" "Prayer of the First Dancer" "Native Bach: Homage to the Hoop Dancer"

SOME PERFORMANCE VENUES Museum of the American Indian, NYC UCLA and Stanford University, California Greer Garson Theater and Maria Benitez Cabaret, Santa Fe, NM Thomas Wolfe Auditorium, Asheville, NC Varna International Theater Festival, Bulgaria Yildiz Sarayi Palace Theater, Istanbul Carter Barron Amphitheater and Kennedy Center

 

DAYSTAR/Rosalie Jones
(Photo Credit: Philip Channing)

 

Daystar is currently teaching at:

Trent University
Indigenous Studies
Performance Studies
Peterborough, Ontario
Canada

Office:  705-748-1011 x7922

________

For more information, contact Daystar at:

1473-6 Stowell Dr.
Rochester, NY 14616
Ph: 705-748-1011 x7922 / Fax: 585-865-0447

Email: rosaliejones@trentu.ca

Home • Contact • Mailing List • News

Artistic Director • No Home But the Heart • Workshops & Residencies • Mythic Dance Cycles