Theater director and writer, visual artist, dancer, dance studio owner, designer, café owner, businessman, producer and it seems as though Yasha Jacob Michelson’s list of things he is good at will never end. He does what he wants when he wants to do it. That may sound a bit like a dabbler initially, but there is a huge difference between someone who flirts with something on a whim and then walks away the way Yasha manifests his dreams into solid realities. When he decides that he will do something, he actually takes the time to learn it from the inside out and then does it – wholeheartedly.
People with his enormous capacity for creating new projects and molding them into a substantial presence are rare indeed. Yasha was born in Georgia, when it was part of the USSR, then he lived in Latvia and Israel where he studied dance. Later, he got into the fashion design business in 1989 when he moved to Los Angeles to see what opportunities were there for him and his wife. Besides exploring the fashion industry in Southern California, a great deal of other possibilities caught his curious eye. His love of design, fine art and photography led him to produce a feature film called, Sonhos de Peixe, which took the Prix Regards Jeune award at the Cannes Film Festival in 2006. And shortly after that, he was introduced to pantomime, which led Yasha into even more exploration, this time into the world of theater and dance that he had abandoned decades before.
He always intuitively knew that he would return one day to one of his first loves –dance – and he did so passionately and intelligently. From his interest in Pantomime, he developed what he called “Dancing Pantomime,” which ultimately transformed into “Mime&Dance” and then that became “Mimodance” and he eventually shortened that to Mimoda, which became then name of the dance studio that he bought in Los Angeles.
Mimoda Dance studio is Yasha’s studio where he teaches his latest and the most important project, Dance Jazzo, which he personally developed since he came back to dance at age 50. Jazzo Dance Technique unites all non-structured, personal and freestyle dances under one umbrella and according to Yasha, it is open source dance activity, similar to role of Jazz in music. Yasha’s many years of intense research enabled him to create Dance Jazzo based on Dance Biomechanics, which is a generic movement, an extract from all styles of dance how the body moves when dancing. His unique dance and movement methodology allow anybody, professionally trained or non-professional dancers to enjoy the benefits of Jazzo’s dance biomechanics’ principles for those that want to explore dance as an art, fitness, work out or just dance as a hobby.
Yasha sees Jazzo, as tools that empower any individual to find their own personal dance style and to enhance their physical and mental well being, along with facilitating a focused quality while dancing. His very popular class Dance Jazzo in Slow-Motion is also a very unique Meditative aerobics class, a group synchronized dance activity in Slow Motion, a powerful movement that allows us to merge movement with a melody or rhythm. It is a dynamic meditation for those that want to relax without stopping or to stop and continue running. It is the combination of a powerful work out at your comfort level together with experience of pure calmness and happiness which is taught at his studio 3 times a week.
For more about Yasha J.Michelson and his classes check out:
Dance Jazzo Biomechanics:
And to see his beautiful dance troop performing Jazzo check out his theatre website at:
