Company Members

Cori Terry, Wellspring’s Artistic Director, was born in Brooklyn and attended the State University of New York at Stony Brook before moving to New York City to complete her dance training.  In 1974, she joined the Erick Hawkins Dance Company, performing and teaching throughout the US and Europe.  She moved to Kalamazoo as Artist-in-Residence at Western Michigan University in 1980 and founded Wellspring in 1981.  In 1983 and again in 1991, Ms. Terry received a Creative Artist Grant for choreography from the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs, and in 1987, she received Kalamazoo’s Community Medal of Arts.  She completed a BA in dance from WMU in 1989 and on occasion teaches master classes there as well as throughout Michigan and the Midwest.  To date, she has choreographed more than 60 major works for Wellspring.  Ms. Terry is a certified advanced Rolfer®, in practice since 1996.

Michael Miller, Wellspring’s Artistic Associate, has been teaching, choreographing, and performing with Wellspring since 1991.  He began his movement studies as a competitive gymnast in Royal Oak and went on to explore music and dance at Western Michigan University.  He taught Modern and Jazz Dance technique at WMU from 1992-2000.  In 1995, he received an Irving S. Gilmore Foundation Emerging Artists Grant to study with the Joe Goode Performance Group in San Francisco, and in 2000, he received the grant again to study with Jan Erkert at Columbia College in Chicago.  Since 2001, he has been working with choreographer Wendy Rodgers in the San Francisco Bay Area on a four year site-specific work studying the architecture of Julia Morgan.  Michael most recently choreographed and performed with slam poetry duo Kinetic Affect in the summer of 2007.

Alexis Harris began her modern dance training with Wellspring in 1996 and became a Company Member in 1997.  Prior to this, she danced with The Kalamazoo Ballet Company for 10 years.  In 1999, Ms. Harris received an Irving S. Gilmore Foundation Emerging Artist Grant to participate in a Continuum movement workshop with Emilie Conrad in New York state.  She also has studied anatomy and movement at The School for Body-Mind Centering in Massachusetts.  She holds a bachelor’s degree in bio-medical sciences from Western Michigan University and is a practicing certified massage therapist.  On November 14, 2003, Alexis and her husband Brent, co-owner of the Alchemist Sculpture Foundry, welcomed their first child, Elijah Harris.

Jennifer Hudson has been involved in dance and community theater since she was a child.  In 1996, she received a bachelor’s degree in dance from Western Michigan University, where she performed in many productions, including annual concerts of dance, Orchesis concerts, and American College Dance Festivals.  In 1994, she received a scholarship to the Gus Giordano Dance Studio in Chicago.  Ms. Hudson has been dancing with Wellspring since 1998 and is a certified massage therapist.

Rachel Miller started dancing at the age of seven and went on to train with Southold Dance Theater as a member of their training company.  She performed with the University Dance Company at Ohio State where she studied as a dance major.  She then resumed teaching, choreographing and professionally performing with the Southold Dance Theater.  Rachel began dancing with Wellspring in 2001.  She then graduated Magna Cum Laude from Western Michigan University with a BA in English with an emphasis in creative writing.  Recently Rachel studied in Prague with the Batsheva Dance Company of Israel where she received high honors for her choreography. In 2005 she received an Irving S. Gilmore Foundation Emerging Artist Grant to choreograph and perform a new evening-length work titled “Prose In Motion.”  Rachel is a certified Stott Pilates instructor as well as an Aerial Artist for ZFX Flying in Louisville, which gave her the opportunity to perform at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas in 2006.

Francesca Pileci-Bates received a BA with Honors in Creative Arts and earned her MA in Dance Studies from the LABAN in London.  As a full-time member of the professional performers' union British Equity, she danced with Dance Company 7, a modern dance company based in London. Since coming to the U.S., Francesca has danced with companies in Michigan and Ohio.  Performance credits include London Theaters, BBC Television, ITV, Channel 4, Music Hall and Opera House.  Choreography credits include Eastern Michigan University's dance program, NDEO and MAPSA.  Francesca joined Wellspring as a company member in 2005.  She is also a Michigan certified K-12 dance teacher and a resident artist with KRESA’s Education for the Arts.

Paula Rinaldo studied dance throughout Canada and the United States prior to becoming a Wellspring company member in 1998.  She graduated cum laude from Western Michigan University in 1997 with bachelor’s degrees in dance and social work.  While at WMU, she received the Dalton Scholarship, awarded to an “outstanding and exceptional dance major,” and was named Outstanding Dance Major by the National Dance Association in 1997.  Paula and her husband Jake are the proud parents of Simon and new baby girl, Maya.