Sayer Mansfield has spent the past decade working as a full-time company dancer with Compagnie Marie Chouinard (Montreal, QC) and Pilobolus Dance Theater (New York, NY). Sayer holds a BFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. She received her classical training from The Royal Academy of Dance, Boston Ballet, and Joffrey Ballet and continued her contemporary training abroad at Trinity Laban in London, UK, and The Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance in Austria. Sayer has been an adjunct faculty member and guest artist and choreographer at Jacob’s Pillow, Phillips Academy Andover and Roger Williams University. She is a 400hr RYT™ yoga teacher and has been teaching yoga, dance, and embodiment practices for over 14 years. Sayer works as a mentor and coach offering embodiment counsel and support on an individual basis. Through a lineage of incredible teachers, a lifelong devotion to studentship, and personal experience, Sayer has created a unique voice and vision in her approach to the embodiment of self-inquiry, healing, resilience, expansion, and artistic freedom. She now works independently and in collaboration as a performer, choreographer and teacher. Sayer has presented her work in New York City, Montreal, and The Berkshires.
Archives: Team Members
Team Members
Maggie McRae
Maggie McRae began traditional dancing when she was 12 years old at Sierra Swing Dance Camp and Centrum’s Festival of American Fiddle Tunes. She was one of the organizers of the Brevard College Contra dance in 2010 and 2011. She began calling contra dancing in 2018 under the mentorship of Jon Greene. Maggie is on both the Lenox and Sheffield Contra Dance committees. Maggie has called in Poughkeepsie, NY, Lenox, MA, and Cornwall, VT among other dances. She also has a growing repertoire of family dances and has taught community dance/contra dance at Berkshire Pulse in Housatonic, MA, and at the Oldtone Roots Music Festival. Maggie also has a working knowledge of a variety of Scandinavian dances, a passion that began while she was living in Norway, which she has continued to nurture.
Sydney McManus
Sydney McManus, originally from London, Ontario, is a multidisciplinary queer artist based in Tiohti:áke (Montreal), Quebec. Carrying a passion for dance and visual arts since childhood, they studied at OCAD University from 2014 to 2016 while working independently performing with TOES for Dance, Frog in Hand and Alysa Pires Dance Projects, to name a few. They worked with RUBBERBAND Contemporary Dance Company from 2016-2021 as a fulltime dancer, collaborator, and educator where they were involved in four creations, a film project, and international tours. Their work for the company continues as an assistant and educator of the RUBBERBAND Method created by Victor Quijada. Currently, Syd has returned to school to further their studies in design with hopes of integrating their performance practice with visual art. Alongside Jean Bui, they are the co-creator of the performance collective jean & syd, which was part of the La Serre – arts vivants Delegate Production program from 2020-2023. The collective premiered their first full length work “1, 2, maybe 3” as part of the Wildside Festival in March 2022 with La Chapelle Scènes Contemporaines and the Centaur Theatre. The project was then expanded into a publication in the form of an artbook and released in October 2022. Syd spent the summer of 2022 working as an assistant for visual artist and designer Andrew Lewis where they assisted a site intervention and mural project. They continue to expand their movement practice through teaching and collaboration. They see each project as an opportunity to play, to collect and to let go.
Maria Mendoza
Born in beautiful Colombia, Maria Mendoza is the daughter of two hardworking immigrants. Proud of her background and committed to supporting the Latino community, she aspires to become a bilingual clinical psychologist and is currently pursuing her education. She is passionate about mental health advocacy and hopes to make therapy more accessible to Spanish-speaking communities. Along with her dedication to psychology, she has a deep love for the arts and design, which have been an integral part of her life. Whether through painting, fashion, or creative expression, she finds joy in exploring different artistic mediums. She believes that both psychology and art have the power to heal and connect people, inspiring her to integrate creativity into her future work.
Bettina Montano
Bettina holds a BFA in Dance, Cum Laude, from Temple University.
In Philadelphia, she performed professionally with Philadelphia’s Sybil Dance Company, Artistic Director Eva Gholson, and Dance Conduit, Artistic Director Ann Vachon, for the reconstruction of Doris Humphrey’s “Dawn in New York.”
In the Berkshires, Bettina performed with choreographer Dawn Lane, Artistic Director Community Access to the Arts, as an independent choreographer and as a member of choreographer/film maker Laurie McLeod’s Victory Girl Productions with whom she performed extensively throughout the Berkshires, New York, and abroad.
Bettina’s dance training began with her mother Christa Montano, a student of renowned dancers Mary Wigman, Herald Kreuzberg, Martha Graham, José Limón and Louis Horst. Her early training continued under the direction of Truda Kashman, Martha Graham technique with Debra Zall, with various teaching artists at the Murray Louis and Alwin Nicolais Dance Lab and later with Educators/Choreographers Eva Gholson, Ann Vachon, Hellmut Gottschild and Marilyn Middleton Sylla. Bettina’s passionate belief in accessible dance education led her to teaching and inspired the creation of The Flowering Child Performing Arts Program in 1995 — which ultimately evolved into Berkshire Pulse in 2005. Bettina has been teaching classes in modern dance for students of all ages and levels throughout her 27-year directorship of the organization.
Christa Montano
Christa began her dance studies in Germany with Suzanne Kabitz, former assistant of Rudolf Von Laban. She continued her studies in Germany with Modern Dance innovators Mary Wigman and Herald Kreuzberg, and in the USA with Martha Graham at the Martha Graham Center for Contemporary Dance in New York City, as well as with other renowned choreographers/educators such as José Limón, Alwin Nicolais, Murray Louis, and Louis Horst. In 1962, Christa established a Modern Dance Department in a private high school in Windsor, CT. For many years, she taught Modern dance for students of the now Oxford Kingswood High School, as well as Creative Dance for children and adults throughout Hartford, CT, and NY. After retiring from teaching during her late 70s and 80s, Christa enjoyed taking classes at Berkshire Pulse. She continued dancing every day into her 90s, inspired by her own practice and a lifelong appreciation for nature, poetry, and music.
Crane Morehouse
Crane Morehouse is a certified Kundalini Yoga Teacher. She did her training outside of Boston in 2008 and excelled in the training. She began teaching on a regular weekly basis in 2010. She taught at a studio in Great Barrington for 11 years and at Kripalu Yoga Center. She has also done workshops abroad. During the pandemic, she continued teaching on Zoom. Crane is a very enthusiastic teacher, devoted to this form of yoga that creates deep peace and happiness.
Erin Naylor
Erin has been an avid dancer since she could walk. Throughout her youth she studied ballet, Modern, and Jazz as well as Hip Hop and Afro-Caribbean, being one of the first graduates of the Flower Child Performing Arts Program that became Berkshire Pulse. As a young adult she began teaching gymnastics and ballet to children at Berkshire South Regional Community Center and Berkshire Country Day School. In 2013 and 2014 Erin studied and completed Ashaya Yoga Teacher Training with Todd Norian, and in 2017 she completed Zumba Teacher Training. Erin enjoys helping people become better versions of themselves through all kinds of movement!
Shannon Nulf
Shannon Nulf (she/her) is a movement artist and arts administrator whose work reflects her commitment to human connection and community building. She is a graduate of the University of Michigan with a BFA in Dance and minors in Movement Science and Performing Arts Management. At U-M, she worked with artists Urban Bush Women, Rosie Herrera, and Joel Valentin-Martinez, U-M Faculty Missy Beck and Charli Brissey, and MFA candidates Fabiola Torralba, Sydney Schiff, Kelly Hirina, Jen Peters, and Melissa Brading. After graduating in 2021, Shannon worked as a Community Engagement Intern for the 2021 Summer Festival at Jacob’s Pillow and then as Community Engagement Fellow until September 2022. She has performed and presented work at multiple venues in the Berkshires, including Jacob’s Pillow, The Foundry, and Chesterwood. She currently teaches Ballet, Modern, and Contemporary at Berkshire Pulse, having studied dance education and pedagogy at U-M.
Raymon “Red Ink” Padro
Raymon “Red Ink” Padro is an accomplished Hip Hop dancer hailing from Hartford, CT. His dance journey began in 2009 at the age of 8 when he joined the Kalligraphy dance crew. After learning about Litefeet in 2018 through YouTube, he had fully immersed himself in the art by 2021. Since 2022, he’s been a dynamic member of the Brooklyn Nets’ Team Hype and has also joined Bombsquad, an critically acclaimed Litefeet team. Passionate about the dance style, Raymon is dedicated to sharing his knowledge and experience with aspiring dancers, aiming to share the Litefeet community with the present and future generations.
Click here to see Raymon teaching Litefeet at Studio 860!