Joy Vrooman Sayen

Joy Vrooman Sayen– a dancer, choreographer, dance teacher, and dance/movement therapist – has studied dance since childhood and has been a professional dancer since her graduation from Princeton University in 1976. She has taught at Connecticut College, Union College in NY, and Princeton Ballet School where she is currently on the faculty. Joy has also done extensive freelance teaching in three states including New Jersey where she resides.

As a dance/movement therapist Joy worked for eight years at Rock Brook School in Blawenburg, NJ with communication handicapped children and for three years at Princeton House with psychiatric and substance abuse patients. She has also worked with severely mentally disabled adults, emotionally disturbed adolescents and children, and multiply handicapped children and adults.

Joy has used narrative as the basis of some of her choreography, and she received a New Jersey State Council on the Arts Choreographer’s Fellowship for a proposal to explore and combine narrative and dance. Since 1986 Joy has participated as movement instructor in Susan Danoff’s annual week-long institute The Art of Storytelling in Princeton. With Storytelling Arts, Inc. Joy works in concert with professional storytellers to teach children and adults to feel the freedom and creativity of movement and understand how storytellers use movement to express emotion, action, and intention. Joy has an M.F.A. in Dance from Connecticut College and an M.S. in Dance Movement Therapy from Hunter College. She lives in Lawrenceville with her husband and son. All of them love stories.

Workshops and Residencies:

The Dance of Stories

Creative Movement

Choreography Workshop: Finding the Life of the Story

Dancing Your Own Story

How Stories “Move” Us / How We Can Move the Story

Telling a Story in Dance

The Story Comes Alive: Experiencing a Story Through Movement