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During the university school year she travelled to the University of Windsor in 1970 to teach for Dr. Marliese Kimmerle, her friend from days at Bianca Rogge's studio. She also gave sessions at the St. Francis Xavier University's Department of Drama from 1970-73 while the theatre director Dennis Hayes was teaching there. It was here that her back injuries first started; she was incapacitated with three herniated discs.
... it is probably as a teacher that I remember her best, her willingness to travel anywhere in Ontario to bring dance; her warmth and energy when she taught; the attentiveness and concentration she got from the students; and the magic that happened as she helped the students find something inside that made the movements come alive. She had evolved her own approach to "technique" training with both a very thorough knowledge of the body and a marvelous feel for movement quality that turned technique sessions into dance sessions. The way she used rhythm was very unusual. She often played a drum herself, not relying on an accompanist for support. As a teacher myself I have found this very valuable. She gave the sense, perhaps in a more European than North American way, that you could be a dancer and a teacher and a musician, a conductor of many things, all at the same time. The intensity of Judy's teaching reflected the unity of her vision, her constant search to match body and mind, to link the idea with its physical expression, to forge the physical expression out of an idea. People who saw her dance often comment on the sculptural quality of the work. Perhaps this came from the very nature of the way she perceived the potential of movement to be eloquent, articulate and poetic. One former student recalls her classes as being unconventional, based in concept rather than on any codified physical outline. Her teaching was organic. She would sometimes use the barre, sometimes spend a whole class moving, and was unafraid to carry on with an exercise until the students got it. Another student recalled the concentrated feeling of letting the natural breathing patterns be incorporated in movement. Judy assimilated movement at a very deep level herself; her classes reflected this comprehension with a feeling that the teaching was worked through, digested and discerningly understood.
As a teacher she was wise beyond her years. She was welcomed by various universities and at a time when there were few places to study modern dance she offered an array of classes in her own studio. Reaching hundreds of students throughout her teaching career, she influenced a generation of young artists who infused their own work as dancers, choreographers and teachers with the wisdom that she imparted. (Next Page) ©2005, Dance Collection Danse | ||
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As well as her more permanent jobs, Judy was in demand across the country as a teacher. Always ready to jump on a bus or into her car, Judy was the peripatetic dance teacher of the late 60s and 1970s. She was closely involved with initiatives to promote dance in the education system through professional development. Her workshops, summer courses and master classes reached and inspired many teachers. From 1968 to 1970, she conducted contemporary dance workshops at the University of Montreal, St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, McMaster University in Hamilton, Ottawa's National Arts Centre, and the University of Ottawa. In the summer of 1969 Judy taught at York University, in the summers from 1971-1973 she taught at the University of Waterloo. Other summer teaching included the Hockley Valley School of Fine Arts in 1972 and 1973, at the Ottawa Dance Centre and at the University of Ottawa in 1974 and at the University of Alberta, Edmonton in 1975. 
With all this travelling. she still managed to teach technique, improvisation, composition and movement for theatre in her own Toronto studios from 1970-1981.
