Meet our Greene Fellows

About Candice Michelle Franklin

From website Candice Michelle Franklin

“Miss Candice”™ Michelle Franklin, born in St. Louis, MO, and raised in the world of live jazz music and jazz dance, is a New York–based professional dancer, choreographer, and music producer who strives to embody the living continuum of jazz tradition through music innovation, scholarship, and live performance. She is the Artistic Producing Director of JAZZ AIN’T DEAD®, her signature live urban jazz music and dance production, and the Artistic Director of Cumbe RISE Community Dance Company, a performance group and Dunham-Informed Jazz workshop series produced by Cumbe Center for African and Diaspora Dance. 

Franklin holds a B.A. in Dance from the University of Kansas and received her conservatory training at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center. Committed to deepening her fluency in jazz and jazz-adjacent forms, she has traveled internationally to study, perform, and honor the global reach of the form. Her training includes the DVIDA rhythm syllabus at the Ballroom Dance Teachers College of New Mexico and Afro-Brazilian Zouk with world-renowned dance artists Carlos and Fernanda. As a Frankie Manning Scholar and legacy dancer for the Al Minns’ Next Generation Project, she twice attended Swing's legendary Camp Hollywood in Los Angeles and Sweden’s renowned Herräng Dance Camp as well as Seattle’s Camp Jitterbug, all on full fellowship, studying under Denise Minns-Harris, acclaimed Lindy Hop duo Marie N’diaye and Felix Berghäll, and legendary jazz dancer and film choreographer Chester Whitmore. Moreover, she has participated in the Gus Giordano Teacher Training Program (High School Track) in Chicago and continues her lineage work as an ongoing IDTC certification candidate in the technique, methodologies, and theories of Katherine Dunham (Institute for Dunham Technique Certification).

As a performer and music producer, she has collaborated extensively with Chris Rob, Philip Hamilton, Axel Tosca and  Lafayette Harris, Jr. as well as Steve “Styles” Rodriguez, Rajdulari Barnes, and Onaje Allen Gumbs. She has also performed sets with Alphonso Horne, Michelle Coltrane, Lonnie Plaxico, Winard Harper, Eyal Vilner, Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards, Calvin Booker, Bakari Wilder, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, and the house band of the Cotton Club.

A 2024 NYSCA grant recipient, Franklin’s choreography has been presented by Lincoln Center’s Summer for the City, The Whitney Museum, Cumbe, The African Burial Ground, Jazzmobile, Harlem One Stop, Yale University, Joyce SoHo, Mid-Atlantic Jazz Festival, Harlem Arts Festival, Jackie Robinson Park, The NYC Multi-Cultural Festival, Harlem Summerstage, BAMcafé Live, NYC Department of Education DECC, Webster Hall, and MTV/Viacom. Her work has also been featured at major casino venues, including Turning Stone, Foxwoods, Mohegan Sun, Borgata, and Caesar’s. She has choreographed for recording artists Courtney Elle, Art Auré, Bollywood sensation SHAKTI, and Grammy Award–winning artist Macy Gray.

As an educator, Franklin teaches extensively for the Departments of Education in New York and New Jersey, and she’s served as an instructor for DEL Dance Educators Lab, the National Jazz Museum in Harlem, YAFFA Arts, Ailey Extension, and The Joyce. During the summers, Franklin holds summer intensive faculty positions for Complexions, Latinoamericabaila, and Connecticut Ballet. Additionally, she has presented her scholarship and practice at leading jazz conferences, including Uprooted/Broadway Dance Center, Beantown Lindy Hop Camp, New York Lindy Exchange, and The Legacy Jazz Conference in León, Guanajuato, Mexico.  Recently, her teaching has been featured in Urban Stomp, a 2025–2026 interactive installation at the Museum of the City of New York, and for the world-famous Apollo Theater’s Apollo LiveWire Archives under the direction of Dr. Derrick León Washington. 

Franklin currently serves on faculty at Sarah Lawrence College, Kean University, and the Joffrey Ballet School, where she is also a member of the audition tour team. She holds an MBA in Music Business from Berklee College of Music/SNHU, is a member of Delta Mu Delta, is a founding member of iDANZ Inc., and is a proud union member of SAG-AFTRA. She continues to produce, choreograph, and teach throughout the U.S. and abroad, advancing the future of jazz with power, innovation, passion, and joy of dance.

About the Greene Fellowship

The Greene Fellowship is a special two-year fellowship which provides full tuition remission and a teaching stipend to visionary artists who will lead the future of dance and cultural expression. Applicants must have 6-10 years of professional experience in the dance field post-undergraduate studies and some demonstrated prior experience teaching dance.

Miss Candice™ Answers Your Questions

What brought you to apply to the MFA in Dance at Sarah Lawrence?

I've been teaching Jazz at Sarah Lawrence for the past two years and have been performing professionally forever but never got the chance to get an MFA for myself.  When the opportunity came around, I took a leap and went for it!

You are just beginning your first year in the MFA Dance program, tell us about your experience so far.

It's a lot of work, but I'm around a ton of talented students with brilliant creative minds and professional practitioners in dance that inspire me every day. I've also made friends in the music department!

How do you think your experience as a student will inform your dance practice?

At Sarah Lawrence, I'm working on dance every day, putting up my own work, learning lighting design, doing tech jobs, learning new styles of dance, collaborating with musicians, and learning functional anatomy that I can use in teaching my own classes. All of these things, I'll definitely be using in the real world. Some things I've learned, I've already started putting into practice now!

What advice would you give to someone who is thinking about pursuing an MFA in dance?

Always be ready to dance and never take off your creative hat!