Phoenix Dance Theatre’s Sharon Watson tells us about the people who have guided and inspired her pioneering career.
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It resonates even now, although we met when I was 9, Nadine is absolutely the most inspirational woman I have ever come across. She was a P.E. teacher at my school, Harehills Middle School in Leeds, and hugely influential in putting dance on the curriculum. That was the beginning of my career. My peers and I were first generation inner-city black kids and she embedded in us an ambition to do something other than what was expected of us, something different. A substantial number of those dancers went on to make what would become known as Phoenix Dance Theatre.
Nadine founded the Northern School of Contemporary Dance in 1985, specifically for kids like me. The influence she has had on the dancers that have been through her school and under her leadership has been immensely powerful and life changing. It’s just amazing. She has a gift in understanding how to bring the best out of people.
