Sean McLeod is an Executive Producer, Award Winning Businessman, and American Director and Choreographer whose work spans more than 30 years and 3 continents. He works in New York City, across the US, and internationally in the West Indies, the Caribbean, Europe, and Africa. Sean is founder of Reaching for Higher Ground Consulting, President of the New York Institute of Dance & Education, and President and Artistic Director of the Kaleidoscope Dance Theatre.
Raised in the household of a New York Human Rights Commissioner and founding President of a local NAACP chapter, Sean McLeod’s path to engage social change was activated at a young age. Starting on stage at 11 as the only professional Black child actor in the famed New York State “MGR” Theater, Sean also practiced Chinese and Japanese martial arts, gymnastics, swimming and diving. Understanding future challenges as a Black man, his parents required him to become multidisciplinary in the arts and business. Using these skills for 31 years, McLeod fought to gain sustainable support for Black people, women, and People of Color, through Social Practice work that challenges the foundation of American acceptance for ill constructs affecting women’s rights, inclusion of Black people, people of color, LGBTQIA+, and the poor.
Sean delivers multi-disciplinary work as a choreographer, dancer, playwright, director, and executive producer of dance, film, tv, and the stage via acting and direction. He also employs music as a composer, singer, songwriter, and player. McLeod was raised in Urban dance and neighborhood culture, studied at SUNY Purchase, has completed multiple Limon Teacher Certifications, and studied Classical ballet with greats like Gayle Young, Mette Spaniardi, Rosanna Seravalli, Bettijane Sills, and Maestro Corvino. Mentors like Kazuko Hirabayashi, Juilliard’s Elizabeth Keen and Dr. Berryman Johnson of Howard Univ, challenged him to embrace the void of Black dance technique creation in our industry and create a dance technique of innovation for classical ballet and unifying intersection for Modern Dance vocabularies. Sean studied African origins of dance and drumming with tours to South Africa, the Caribbean and with masters like Assane Kante, Elie Kihonia, Etse Nyadedzor, and fell in love with Latin polyrhythms, world culture, and luminaries like Carmen de Lavallade showed him he was worthy. This inspired creation, including the New York Dance Festival, Harriet Tubman Freedom Music Festival, Community of Color World Culture Celebration, Moving Past Racism Series, the MLK: Conference for Men, and more.