Dance

As a dance major at Cornish, you’ll combine rigorous training with creative freedom. Develop the healthy and sustainable practices you’ll need to be a working dancer. Immerse yourself in a curriculum centered on technique, collaboration, improvisation, screendance, choreography, and performance. Learn from faculty members who have mastered multiple forms of dance and pioneered their own. Join a community of collaborators and innovators shaping the Seattle dance world, and beyond.

BFA in Dance

What Will You Learn
as A Dance Major at Cornish?

The dance program at Cornish prepares you to perform, choreograph, direct and teach dance. You’ll know your history and you’ll develop the skills to speak and write about dance.

Spend an average of 6 to 8 hours each day in the studio, with a minimum of 13 hours of technique classes per week. Perform both choreographed and improvisational works. The department offers additional elective technique classes each semester.

Refine your technique in contemporary dance styles, jazz, modern, and ballet. Learn the fundamentals of technical production and design. Choreograph and create performance pieces for both real-world and digital spaces.

Image Credits:

Header Image – Photo by Joseph Lambert. “Echoes”, choreographed by Rauf “RubberLegz” Yasit from Spring 2024 Cornish Dance Theater. Pictured: Daezhane Day, Iverson Harding, Gabriela Ross, Madison Steele.

Bottom Image – Photo by Joseph Lambert. “Bacchanale for Syvilla Fort”, choreographed by Black Collectivity from Spring 2024 Cornish Dance Theater. Pictured: Natalie Johnson and Gavino Lucero.

Recent Cornish News & Blog Posts

Press releases

Cornish Dance Capstone Concert - celebrating emerging movement artists in the PNW

A black and white photo of dancers on a stage.

Lenora St. Blog

Exploring the Creative Legacy of Merce Cunningham

Front Page

Cornish Alum Laura Rodriguez Featured in Dance Magazine

Lenora St. Blog

All of the projects, late nights, last-minute rehearsals, collaborations, risk-taking ideas, heated arguments in critique, and final products, those moments that represent your college career — those moments are greatness.Margaret Phyllis Johnson & Theresa Lynn Alexander (DA ’17)

Explore Your Major

See BFA Degree Requirements and Model Program

BFA in Dance

Accelerated Degree Program

Professional Dancers’ Program

Performance

Choreography

Health & Wellbeing

New Moves

Cornish Dance Theater (CDT)

Visiting Artists

I just really loved dancing a ton. There was no shortage of technique classes and that’s what I craved.Jim Kent (DA ‘05)

Student Work

Senior Solos

Playlists cultivated by the Cornish Dance Department.

Student Choreography

To explore other performances and student art from across the College click below.

Student Work

Visiting Artists

Watch Mini-doc featuring Visiting Artist, Stephanie Zaletel (and other college-wide docs)

Mini-Docs

We walk out of Cornish with the gift of life experience from our teachers, armed with the courage to rise to any challenge, to jump in with both feet, and to accept change as it comes.Jolene Winner-Ziemer (DA ’12)