Team Category: Instructors

Ravah began her dance career as a classical ballerina in Los Angeles, California. By the age of sixteen, she was working on television as a professional jazz dancer and singer, with ballet as her foundation. She regularly appeared on variety shows including The Carol Burnett Show, Sonny & Cher, The Osmonds, etc. She also performed on several television specials including, Ann Margaret, Goldie Hawn, Liza Minnelli, John Denver, etc. Highlights of Ravah’s career include partnering Mikhail Baryshnikov in two television specials and singing and dancing as a member of Tina Turner’s act, all over the world for several years. Choreographers Ravah worked for consistently included, Edward Villella (her first Broadway show) Ron Fields, Michael Peters, Lester Wilson and Joe Bennett, just to name a few. She also performed in several Broadway shows including Pal Joey (as lead dancer) and partnered the choreographer on a Chuck Mangione concert
tour. Ravah is currently the Associate Producer of two musicals coming to Broadway. She has also taught Luigi style jazz dance in Bergen County, NJ and in New York City. She currently lives in Fort Myers, Florida and continues to teach dance.

Melissa has a BFA from Lake Erie College and has been teaching drawing, colored pencil, and oil and acrylic painting at the Dunedin Fine Art Center since 1990. She served the Colored Pencil Society of America for 12 years as Ways and Means Director and President; she is now CPSA corporate relations director and holds CPSA (fifteen-year) and CPX (five year) signature memberships. She is also a Signature Member and board member of the Miniature Artists of America, a board member of the Professional Association of Visual Artists, a member of the Florida Artist Group, and a member and past board member of the Miniature Art Society of Florida. Her artwork has been featured in multiple books on colored pencil, and she wrote a step-by-step article for The Artist’s Magazine (October 2012). Her artwork has been used in packaging, advertising and promotional materials for several companies and her paintings and drawings are in numerous corporate and private collections, including the Pencil Museum in Keswick, England.