Founded in 1958, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT) is the largest modern dance company in the United States. Based in New York City, the company was founded by Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Alvin Ailey (1931-1989), a noted choreographer and dancer. The Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation, which includes AAADT and Ailey II, the Ailey School, Ailey Extension, AileyCamp, and other operations, is housed in the 87,000 square-foot Joan Weill Center for Dance, one of the largest buildings dedicated exclusively to dance in the United States. AAADT is recognized as a vital American cultural ambassador, and has performed for diverse audiences in more than seventy countries around the world.

History

In 1958, Alvin Ailey and a group of young Black modern dancers performed as "Alvin Ailey and Company" at the 92nd Street Y in New York. Ailey was the company's director, choreographer, and principal dancer. The company started as an ensemble of seven dancers, including Nat Horne, Minnie Marshall, Ella Thompson Moore, and Dorene Richardson, "the only dancer who performed in Alvin Ailey’s two concerts (1958 and 1960) at the 92nd Street Y." In addition to Ailey, the original company worked with guest choreographers in addition to Ailey. For the company's first performance, Ailey's Ariette Oubliee, Blues Suite, and Cinco Latinos were featured. In 1960, the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater, later to be renamed the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT), presented the premiere of Revelations at Kaufmann Concert Hall in New York. Rehearsals for Revelations were held in the basement of Clark Center for the Performing Arts, which would later serve as the official residence for the company. In 1962, Ailey recast his all-black dance company into a multi-racial group, and the modernized company completed its first international tour to Australia and southeast Asia. The tour of the Lavallade-Ailey American Dance Company, named for Ailey's partnership with Carmen de Lavallade, started in Sydney, Australia, and ended in Seoul, South Korea. In 1964, the company of five women and five men toured as the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater. The dancers included Loretta Abbot, Takako Asakawa, Hope Clarke, Joan Peters, and Lucinda Ransom, Alvin Ailey, Bill Luther, Hector Mercado, James Truitte, and Dudley Williams, performed in Paris and London. In 1965, Judith Jamison joined the company and would later serve as the company's first artistic director after Alvin Ailey's death in 1989. In 1969, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater performed at Broadway's Billy Rose Theater. In 1970, the Ailey company and school relocated to 229 East 59th Street in Manhattan, a renovated church building. In April of that year, a financial crisis caused Ailey to issue a statement that the dissolution of the company might take place. The crisis abated, however, and in 1971 AAADT made its first performance at the New York City Center. In 1974, AAADT had their State Theater at Lincoln Center debut. The program featured Ailey's “Feast of Ashes,” Talley Beatty's “The Road of the Phoebe Snow,” John Butler's “Portrait of Billie” revival, the premiere of John Jones's “Nocturne,” and Joyce Trisler's “Journey.” In 1977, the company performed at President Jimmy Carter’s inauguration gala. In 1988, AAADT hosted its 30th-anniversary season gala at the City Center. The company and school are located at 45th Street and Broadway, and move the following year into a 36,000 square-foot space at 211 West 61st Street in Manhattan. In 1989, Alvin Ailey died from AIDS-related complications. Judith Jamison, who rejoined AAADT in 1989, replaced Ailey as the artistic director of AAADT. The company was struggling with mounting debts, and the number of company dancers was reduced. In 2000, AAADT launched the silent phase of a five year, sixty-six million dollar capital campaign for a new building that would double its size and an endowment for financial stability. In 2002, AAADT broke ground on its new building site on West 55th Street. In 2004, the United States Postal Service issued a first class postage stamp honoring Alvin Ailey as part of the American Choreographers stamp series, and the Oprah Winfrey Foundation pledged one million dollars to endow a student scholarship at the Ailey School. In 2005, the Ailey organization, including the main company, Ailey II, and the Ailey School, moved into its new West 55th Street home, the Joan Weill Center for Dance, the former WNET-TV studios where AAADT first appeared on television in the early 1960s. In 2008, Glorya Kaufman donated six million dollars to AAADT's educational programs, including support for AileyCamp programs, the Ailey School, and Ailey's BFA program with Fordham University. The fifth floor lobby in the Weill Center for Dance is named in Kaufman's honor. Also in 2008, the United States Congress passed a resolution officially designating the company a "vital American Cultural Ambassador to the World." In 2011, the United States Senate passed a resolution recognizing the artistic and cultural contributions of AAADT and the 50th Anniversary of the first performance of the Ailey classic Revelations. That same year, Robert Battle, artistic director (2011-2023), established a New Directions Choreography Lab to nurture emerging artists. In 2014, AAADT kicks off a fifty million dollar capital campaign, "Campaign for Ailey's Future," to support artistic, educational, and building expansion projects, and to honor outgoing board chair Joan Weill. Sandy Weill, Joan Weill's husband, provided a lead gift of sixteen million dollars to the campaign. In 2021, AAADT received a twenty million dollar gift from MacKenzie Scott to support its "Dancing Forward" initiatives. In 2024, the Whitney Museum unveiled "Edges of Ailey," the first major museum exhibition to survey the artistry of Alvin Ailey and AAADT. In November 2024, AAADT announced that Alicia Graf Mack, a former Alvin Ailey company member and the dean and director of the dance division at Juilliard, will take over as AAADT artistic director on July 1, 2025.

Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation

The Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation is the largest modern and contemporary dance organization in the United States and consists of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Ailey II, The Ailey School, Ailey Camp, Ailey Extension, and Ailey Arts In Education and Community Programs.

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater

Performances and tours

The Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, a prominent dance company and global arts institution, has performed for audiences around the world. The following is a sample of significant AAADT performances, residencies, and tours:

Repertory and choreographers

Alvin Ailey created seventy-nine dances for the company that bears his name. He maintained that the company was not solely a repository for his choreography, and sought the contributions from other choreographers. Today, AAADT has a repertory of nearly three hundred works by more than one hundred choreographers, including: The company keeps Alvin Ailey's works, including Revelations (1960), Night Creature (1974) and Cry (1971), in continuous performance. Memoria was one of Alvin Ailey's balletic pieces, with long lines and a clear technical style different from his usual jazz character style of swirling patters, strong, driving arm movements, huge jumps, and thrusting steps. This dance was later adopted into the repertory of the Royal Danish Ballet. Cry is a three-part, 17-minute solo created for Judith Jamison. It was meant to pay homage to "all Black women everywhere, especially our mothers" and can be seen as a journey from degradation to pride, defiance, and survival.

Ailey II

In 1974, Ailey created the Alvin Ailey Repertory Ensemble (later renamed Ailey II). In 1980, the second company and the Ailey School relocated to four new studios in a building on Broadway.

The Ailey School

The Ailey School was established in 1969, the same year the company moved to the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The Ailey School is an accredited institutional member of the National Association of Schools of Dance (NASD). The school is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education as an institution of higher education and is eligible to participate in Title IV programs. In 1998, the Ailey School and Fordham College at Lincoln Center (FCLC), Fordham University launched a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degree program. The program is recognized as one of the preeminent BFA dance programs in the country.

AileyCamp

In 1989, Kansas City Friends of Alvin Ailey is founded and develops into the national AileyCamp program. By 2016, AileyCamp expanded to ten cities: Atlanta, GA; Baltimore, MD; Berkeley/ Oakland, CA; Chicago, IL; Kansas City, KS; Kansas City, MO; Miami, FL; New York, NY; Newark, NJ; and Seattle/Tacoma, WA. In 2023, AileyCamp Atlanta launches a partnership as part of Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens’ Year of the Youth initiative.

The Ailey Extension

The Ailey Extension was created in 2005. Ailey Extension offers instruction in more than 25 different dance and fitness techniques, including Ballet, Hip-Hop, Horton, House, Jazz, Masala Bhangra, Samba, West African, and Zumba.

Joan Weill Center for Dance

Since 2005, the Ailey organization has been headquartered at the Joan Weill Center for Dance, which was originally designed as a 77,000 square-foot building. The Weill Center features state-of-the-art dance studios, a performance space with a seating capacity of 275 people, classrooms, a costume shop, physical therapy facilities, faculty and student lounges, and administrative offices. In the late 1990s, following their Russia, France and Cuba tours and South Africa residency, AAADT's leadership determined that it needed a larger space for rehearsals, school performances, production materials, and offices. The board of trustees established a campaign steering committee to identify potential major donors. Joan Weill, who served fourteen years as chairwoman of the Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation, and her husband, Sandy Weill, co-chaired the building capital campaign, and donated a total of eighteen million dollars to the effort.

The Elaine Wynn and Family Education Wing

In 2017, AAADT unveiled The Elaine Wynn and Family Education Wing, a 10,000-square-foot expansion to the Weill Center. Elaine Wynn is a major donor to AAADT. The Wynn Wing adds three floors to Weill Center and features four additional dance studios, two new flexible classrooms, and administrative offices.

Leadership

Artistic director

Associate artistic director and rehearsal director

Ailey II

Ailey School

Board of trustees

The following is a partial list of trustees who have played a major role in AAADT's history.

Executive director

Dancers

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater

Ailey II

Former dancers

A partial list of former Alvin Ailey dancers.

Awards and Honors