JOEL HALL DANCERS & CENTER
FOUNDED: 1974
Founded to showcase and celebrate the artistry of Black and Brown LGBTQIA+ performers, Joel Hall Dancers & Center stands as the embodiment of Joel’s life-long passion for creating, performing, and teaching dance artistry and technique. While holding the highest standards of excellence, Joel Hall Dancers & Center is a welcoming and accepting home for all artists. Defiantly and unapologetically diverse, accessible, and inclusive since 1974, Joel Hall Dancers & Center lives at the leading edge of the anti-racism, LGBTQIA+ Pride, and DEAI movements, actively pursuing opportunities to dismantle oppressive systems, amplify oppressed voices and cultivate a better world for all. The Joel Hall Dancers creation and performance of professional dance and the world-class instruction of The Center enrich lives, enhance our collective culture, and improves the world around us.
COMPANY LEADERSHIP
PC: Photo of Joel Hall by Rachel Neville Studios
Joel Hall,
Founder & Artistic Director Emeritus
A native of Chicago’s Cabrini Green neighborhood, Joel Hall established and cofounded the Chicago City Theatre Company in 1974. This unique performing arts organization includes the professional company known as the Joel Hall Dancers, and training facility, The Center. Hall was the artistic director and primary choreographer for his dance company and chief instructor for the training studio. He has mentored dancers who direct theJoel Hall Dancers, Joel Hall Dancers II, the Joel Hall Dancers Youth Company, and numerous other dance organizations in Chicago.
During the past 48 years, Hall has achieved an international reputation for his Dance Company and acclaim as a choreographer whose work— in his own unique style known as Urban Jazz— is based in jazz and expresses a rich vocabulary embracing classical, modern, and street dance idioms. Mr. Hall also served as Mayor Harold Washington’s International ambassador for the arts. “Jazz dance at its best,” says Dance Magazine.
PC: Photo of William Gill by Rachel Neville Studios
William Gill,
Interim Artistic Director
William Gill (he/him) is a Chicago native who has taught and danced professionally throughout the US and internationally for the past 25 years. Will has worked with such noted dance legends as Donald Byrd, Alonzo King, Donald McKayle, and Milton Myers, (just to name a few), all while dancing for the acclaimed Dallas Black Dance Theatre for 9 seasons. One of many highlights with Dallas Black was when Will performed the legendary solo “Ostrich” at the Austrian Dance Festival, choreographed by the renowned Asadata Dafora. Since his return to Chicago, will has been teaching and choreographing at the Joel Hall Dancers & Center, Chicago Multicultural Dance Center, Deeply Rooted Dance Theater, Praize Productions, as well as Roosevelt University, where he was on Staff as a professor of dance in the Chicago College of Performing Arts.
Will is also the resident choreographer for the highly acclaimed and internationally known visual artist Nick Cave. He had the pleasure of working with Nick on his successful exhibit “Heard” when it toured across the United States, including New York's Grand Central Station, Australia, and Hong Kong. Will began his artistic career as a company member with Joel Hall Dancers & Center and now serves as its artistic director. “It is such an honor and privilege to continue the legacy and work of Joel Hall while implementing new and fresh ideas through my voice.”
Joseph Pindelski,
Interim Executive Director
Joseph Pindelski (he/him) joined Joel Hall Dancers & Center in September 2021 as its managing director, taking on key leadership duties for the company’s organizational and financial health. He has previously worked with Pivot Arts, The Den Theater, and Goodman Theatre here in Chicago, The American Pops Orchestra in Washington, DC, and with the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, MA. Joseph holds an MFA in dramaturgy from the Moscow Art Theatre and Harvard University’s American Repertory Theater Institute for Advanced Theater Training. A native of Chicagoland, Joseph began his career as a performer after studying at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC.