DANCE GRENADA
LEADERSHIP TEAM 2022
THE DANCE GRENADA CORE TEAM ARE ALSO WORKING PROFESSIONALS WHO HAVE COME TOGETHER TO MAKE THIS FESTIVAL COME TO LIFE!
SHOLA K. ROBERTS
FOUNDER/ EXEC. DIRECTOR
DANCE GRENADA
Shola K. Roberts is an international performing professional dancer, dance educator, choreographer and fitness instructor based in Brooklyn, New York.
In 2019, Shola was selected as one of the eight candidates to pursue her Doctoral degree in Dance Education at Columbia University.
Shola attended Howard University and earned her BFA in Dance and Caribbean Studies. She was apart of the last graduating class that studied under the tutelage of the late Dr. Sherrill Berryman Johnson. She currently serves as the Dance Educator and Arts Liason for MS 354- School of Integrated Learning in the Crown Heights region of Brooklyn.
Shola, is a proud Grenadian American
SULE ADAMS
Project Manager
A native of New Orleans, LA, Sulé-Joel Adams enjoys a career that personifies artistic versatility. He has worked in roles including dancer, educator, producer, choreographer, and arts administrator. He is a graduate from the State University of New York College where he earned his B.S. in Interdisciplinary Studies with a focus on Community Arts Management and M.A. in Arts Administration from NYIT. As a dancer, Sulé has worked with Ronald K. Brown/Evidence, Francine E. Ott/The Walk, Soweto Street Beat, N’Kafu Traditional African Dance Company and other widely renowned companies and artists touring regionally and internationally. In addition to performing, he has created and continues to produce HomeGrown events and the Beautiful Dreamer initiatives, in which both celebrate artists’ contributions to the cultural heritage of their communities through performances, exhibitions, talks and workshops.
Ignited by his passion for the arts, Sulé’s mission is to always advocate and assist in building communities through arts education. In 2018, Hudson Warehouse Theater Company presented him with the Richard Harden Award for excellence in theater arts education and outreach. “Dance is always a work through spirit.” Living and working by that motto, Sulé continues to share and pave a way for dreamers and their dreams as the Founder & Executive Producer of Whole Heart Productions.
MELISSA NOEL
COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR
Melissa Noel is an award-winning international journalist, host and media entrepreneur. She has built a distinguished career in television news and digital media with work that centers on reporting issues impacting the global Black diaspora and developing and managing strategic content partnerships.
Melissa is the founder and managing director of Mel&N Media Group, a strategic
communications and brand development firm connecting diaspora brands to the global market.
An accomplished international correspondent, Melissa is a contributing news and politics editor at ESSENCE Magazine. As an experienced travel reporter and Caribbean expert, she is also a contributor to National Geographic Travel and Trip Savvy.com.
Melissa is the creator of Destination Diaspora®, a docuseries and storytelling platform that highlights the impact of the African Diaspora in travel, culture, and lifestyle. She is a Pulitzer Center grantee and an Ethel Payne Reporting Fellow for foreign correspondence in Africa. A successful media entrepreneur, she was named one of the Top 50 Caribbean American Entrepreneurs two years in a row by the Carib Biz Network in 2020 and 2021.
A proud Guyanese American with over a decade of reporting and production experience, Melissa
has made a proven impact at the intersections of media, entrepreneurship, and social impact.
CECELIA GRIFFITH
LEAD FESTIVAL ARTIST
Her love for dance began dance at age six, when she enrolled with the Grenada School of Dance where her skills in modern dance and Grenadian folk dance were developed under Mrs. Cheryl Barnabe- Bishop. At the Grenada School of Dance, Cecilia toured regionally and internationally including CARIFESTA 1992 in Trinidad and Tobago and, as part of a small cast that toured the east coast of the U.S. along with the National Folk Group in 1998. She later joined the Choremi School of Dance where she spent two years developing new skills in Ballet and Jazz.
In 2004, she attended the UWI, Mona where she pursued a B.A in Humanities and Education with a dance major, a joint program with the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts (EMCVPA) and Graduated with first class honours.
Upon her return to Grenada in 2007, she returned to the St. Josephs Convent as a Biology and Visual Art teacher, and in 2010 introduced dance in the lower school curriculum as well the CXC CSEC Theatre Arts program to the upper school. In 2014, she attended the Teachers College at TAMCC and is now holds an Associate’s Degree in Secondary Education (Science) from the JBTE, UWI Cave Hill.
In October 2007, Cecilia opened Conception Dance Theatre and has worked conscientiously not only to develop herself, but also her students by creating opportunities for them to grow technically, artistically and in their personal development through performances, workshops, the inclusion of international tutors and providing teaching opportunities to its members.
QARRIANNE BLAYR
LEAD FESTIVAL ARTIST LIASON
Qarrianne Blayr is from Fayetteville, North Carolina. She earned her BFA degree at Howard University, under the tutelage of Dr. Sherrill Berryman-Johnson, Pat Thomas, Sandra Fortune-Green, Katherine Smith, Akua Kouyate and Assane Konte, and studied traditional Jamaican dance at the University of West Indies - Mona.
Ms. Blayr joined the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company’s professional group in 2012 after having performed for two seasons in DCDC2, the company’s pre-professional ensemble.
She is most inspired by the study of spirituality, human nature, and Traditional/ social dances of people of African lineage, and uses these ideas to guide her creative process. She has choreographed works for DCDC, DCDC2, musical productions at The University of Dayton and Central State University, and the traditional Kazakh dance ensemble Kazyna Dance Company. She has also performed around the world including Kazakhstan, Russia and China.
Ms. Blayr remains a performing artist with the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company and was named Associate Artistic Director in 2019.
