Croí Glan Integrated Dance is Ireland’s leading Integrated Dance Company and was co-founded in December 2006 by Rhona Coughlan  and Tara Brandel. Linda Fearon joined the company as Co-Artistic Director, working alongside Tara, in 2019. The company is based in Cork and produces innovative, engaging, high calibre productions and delivers associated participatory activities with dancers with and without disabilities to highlight the value of diverse bodies in creating performance. Croi Glan was nominated Best Performance Ensemble Dublin Fringe 2012 and 2016. The company has toured throughout Ireland, and internationally including to the UK, Egypt and the USA. The company’s most recent works are Tilt, an aerial dance theatre show, centred around a very versatile pole that flies, falls, and circles as a metaphor for instability and chance in an unstable world; and Armour Off! performed by Linda Fearon, and created in collaboration with performance artist and choreographer Caroline Bowditch, and Composer Niall O’Carroll; a film of Armour Off, produced by Invisible Thread won the award for Best Documentary Short at the Catalyst International Film Festival earlier this year.

Tara Brandel: Co-Artistic Director

Tara is a Contemporary dancer and choreographer originally from West Cork, Ireland She trained at the Laban Center in London, and has been choreographing extensively since 1990. She performed Gawky and Awkward at San Francisco International Arts Festival 2015; created Square One for D-CAF 2017 in Cairo, Egypt; her dance film CAR was Director’s Choice at the CDIFF in Toronto 2017; and she performed in Jess Curtis/Gravity’s Intercontinental Collaborations #7 in San Francisco 2018. Most recently Tara has toured Cappaghglass, a one woman show about  migration,to Cork Midsummer Festival, D-CAF Cairo Egypt, Echo Echo Derry, San Francisco FRESH Festival, and Ponderosa, Germany. She is co-Artistic Director of Croí Glan. Tara holds a Masters in Interdisciplinary Performance from UCDavis, where she was awarded the Della Davidson Award 2019, the Mondavi Fellowship, and the Women’s Research Center Fellowship for her new show Circus.. Circus has toured to San  Francisco International Arts Festival, Seattle International Dance Festival, Cork Midsummer Festival and Dublin Fringe Festival and will be at FRESH San Francisco and CSUEB in 2020.

Linda Fearon: Co-Artistic Director

Linda Fearon has worked with Croí Glan since 2014. She is also a dancer with Luminous Soul Dance Project with whom she has performed across Belfast at the Paralympic Flame Ceremony, Bounce! Festival; Surmount Parliament Building and further afield. Linda has trained with various dancers and choreographers including Marc Brew, Caroline Bowditch, Claire Cunningham, Sheena Kelly, Kimberley Harvey and Janice Parker and has danced with companies including Candoco Dance, Blue Eyed Soul, Maiden Voyage Dance, Echo Echo Dance and Pony Dance. In 2012 Linda joined Kids in Control/Blue Chevy physical theatre company and she is a Creative Assistant with Kids in Control, working and performing with a number of all ability youth groups throughout Belfast. Linda is a certified Disability Equality Trainer.

Leighton Morrison, Performer

Leighton trained at Arts Educational school, London. After graduating he travelled to Israel to work with Bat-Dor Company where he remained as a soloist for two years. Leighton has performed with companies including English National Opera, Rotterdam Dance Group, Wayne Sleeps Ballet Company, and Vienna Festival Ballet. He subsequently became a member of the English National Ballet where he stayed for three seasons performing in all the major classics. He then joined the hit musical Cats as lead dancer Mistoffelees, followed by Anything Goes and the UK and World tour of Saturday Night Fever. Among various TV and film appearances Leighton has worked with directors including Oliver Stone. In Ireland he has worked with Ballet Ireland, Cois Ceim, Cork City Ballet, Irish Modern Dance,& Chrysalis. Leighton taught for Corrib Dance Academy, Shannon Dance Academy and has his own school ‘Morrison School of Dance’ in Tuam, Swinford and Ballina. he has also choreographer and rehearsal director for Youth Ballet West Leighton is a qualified Zumba & Zumba Kids Instructor, Fitness and Studio Instructor with a Diploma in Nutrition.

Angharad Matthews, Costume Design

Angharad Matthews is a multi-disciplinary Performance Maker, Performer and Costume Designer from Wales, working within the field of theatre, dance, film, and circus. She completed her degree in Theatre Design at the Royal Welsh Collage of Music and Drama in 2005. Since then she has worked extensively throughout Wales and Europe with a variety of companies including National Theatre Wales, National Dance Company Wales, NoFitState Circus, Gothenburg Opera, Volcano, Frantic Assembly, Croì Glan, Gwyn Emberton Dance, Company of Sirens, Uluak Theatro and English Theatre Berlin. Angharad now resides in Berlin where she completed her MA in Devised Theatre and Performance Practices at Arthaus Berlin.

Ray Harman, Music.

Ray Harman Has worked as a composer for Film, TV , Animation and Theatre forover 20 Years. His work has been nominated for and won several awards including 2 IFTA’S (Irish Film and TV awards) and best original score for Liam Gavin’s horror, A Dark Song (Monster fest, Australia). Recent Theatre and Dance work include WrongHeaded WRONGHEADED, Bastard Amber, The Country Girls, Last Orders at the Dockside.  Recent TV & Film work includes the acclaimed series Blood, The Young Offenders, Taken Down, The Farthest, Shooting the Mafia, Inspector GeorgeGently & Love/Hate. He plays guitar with Irish band Something Happens.

SJ Shiels, Lighting

SJ began designing lighting in Dublin Youth Theatre, completing a BA in Drama and Theatre Studies 2006 (Trinity), and the Rough Magic Seeds3 programme 2006-2008. From 2010–2017, she was co-artistic director of WillFredd Theatre. Recent lighting designs include A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings (Collapsing Horse), Much Ado About Nothing, Hecuba (Rough Magic),Woman Undone (Brokentalkers), A Different Wolf (Junk Ensemble), Sure Look It, Fuck It (This Is Pop Baby), This Beautiful Village, Jimmy’s Hall, The Remains of Maise Duggan, Town is Dead (Abbey Theatre), Dublin Oldschool (Project Arts Centre), PALS (Winner Irish Times Theatre Award Best Lighting 2015), The Boys of Foley Street, Laundry, World’s End Lane, Basin (ANU Productions). Set and Lighting Designs include, BEES!, Jockey, CARE, Farm, Follow (WillFredd Theatre),How to Keep an Alien (Sonya Kelly/Rough Magic), It Folds (Junk Ensemble/ Brokentalkers, Winner Irish Times Theatre Award Best Lighting 2015).