About Us

Maher Benham founded Coyote Dancer in January, 1993.  The company gave its debut performance at the Festival de Musique, St. Barthelemy’s Island, French West Indies.  Since then, Coyote Dancers has performed at the 92nd Street Y, Dia Center for the Arts (now the Joyce Soho), Trinity Church, City Center Studios, and has presented successful New York seasons at the Marymount Manhattan Theatre and the Sylvia and Danny Kaye Playhouse.

The mission of Coyote Dancers is to honor the heritage and preserve the spirit of American modern dance.   Coyote Dancers has become known and acclaimed for its highly theatrical and spiritually inspiring works, including “Sipapu,” a dance for seventeen men of all ages, which honors and portrays the passing of wisdom and power from generation to generation.  Ms. Benham is noted for her signature solo, “Maher, It’s Donald,”  which Jennie Schulman of Back Stage called “one of the most profoundly moving solos seen in many a day….” 

Original Company members include Carlos Fittante, Artistic Director of BALAM Dance Theatre, Karen Kopf and Marc Weiss, and later, Tadej Brdnik, Erica Dankmeyer, Trebien Pollard and Blakeley White.

Distinguished guest artists who have appeared with Coyote Dancers include:

David Chase, Principal Dancer with the Martha Graham Dance Company

Ted Dalbotten, veteran dance musician and dance educator

Sharon Gannon, Founder of Jivamukti Yoga

Stuart Hodes, partner to Martha Graham in the 1950’s and Principal Dancer with

            the Martha Graham Dance Company

Rael Lamb, Soloist with Maurice Bejart

David Life, Founder of Jivamukti Yoga

Daniel Maloney, Principal Dancer with the Martha Graham Dance Company

Gerald Otte, Principal Dancer with the Nikolais Dance Theater

Maxine Sherman, Principal Dancer with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre and

            the Martha Graham Dance Company

Gus Solomons, Jr., Principal Dancer with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company

            and the Martha Graham Dance Company and Founder of Paradigm Dance

Dudley Williams, Principal Dancer with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and

            the Martha Graham Dance Company and Founder of Paradigm Dance

The American modern dance idiom was born here in the early 20th century by pioneering choreographers.  Coyote Dancers honors their lineage, and continues to offer unique and original dances which are meaningful and lasting, carrying that creative spirit into the 21st century.

“Strong, bold…totally attuned….”

- Jack Anderson, The New York Times

“Maher Benham...bursts onto a stage with an inner spotlight….deserved an encore.”

1. - Bert Weschler, Attitude
   

“Maher Benham’s work stems from Martha Graham’s influences.  The great lady…would have been proud of Benham.”

- Jennie Schulman, Backstage

Sipapu is a “…masterwork…which vividly renders a process of transcendence and spiritual renewal.  Benham so obviously has the imagination to shepherd them, so that Coyote Dancers should be garnering more and more attention in the coming months and years.”

- John Koroly, WRSU-FM, Brunswick, New Jersey

         

“Working with Maher Benham yields what dancers long for, an experience of movement that sweeps one up, moves liberated rather than invented, moves that vibrate between pinnacles , unpredictable yet inevitable, as rip tides must flow, air masses gather!  What a joy!”

1. -Stuart Hodes, Dancer
   

2008 © Coyote Dancers, Inc.

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