Choreographer Jeremy Nedd explores viral dance at Lincoln Center

Although dancer and choreographer Jeremy Nedd’s heart belonged to classical ballet when he entered the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, the guidance and encouragement of his instructors opened up a whole new world for him.

- By NADINE MATTHEWS Special to the AmNews

“I didn’t have as much motivation or, I guess, passion, and they really helped rekindle that. I guess it was just having someone feel the confidence that you could go further in life with something that you enjoy. They really pushed us,” he recalled.

Nedd eventually grew to love modern dance, especially the Graham Technique, during high school and continued pursuing those forms of dance.

Nedd’s choreographic work, “from rock to rock ... aka how magnolia was taken for granite,” will make its New York premiere June 18 and 19 as part of Lincoln Center's Summer for the City series. The Brooklyn-born and raised Nedd describes himself as “a mover and a maker” who tends to be “on the quieter side.”

Nedd also attributes his admission to the highly competitive program at LaGuardia and the rigorous instruction he received at Ballet Tech, where he had trained since the age of 9. “It was truly a formidable feat to get into the school,” he recalled.

For the past nine years, the native New Yorker has been based in Basel, Switzerland, relocating there after working in Dresden, Germany, for a few years. “I had a dear friend who was working in Basel, and I was looking for someplace else to dance and experience other choreographers’ work within Europe,” he said. “It was really just a desire to see new choreographic styles and continue to learn.”