Coming home: Teaching at BROADWAY DANCE CENTER
Some places hold the kind of memory that feels alive in your body. For me, Broadway Dance Center is one of them.
I can still picture it: taking the train into the city with my mom. We were in Rochester for one of her golf tournaments — she’s a professional golfer — and carved out time to ride into Manhattan so I could take class. I was young, buzzing with nerves and wonder, about to dance at the Broadway Dance Center. Such a precious moment.
Walking through those doors felt like stepping into a current so much bigger than myself. The mirrors, the energy, the pulse of possibility. That day marked something in me: the sense that this was where art and life could meet, and where my own path might begin to unfold.
Years later, BDC became the first place I had the honor of teaching in New York City. I was still finding my voice as a teacher and choreographer, still learning how to hold space in a way that felt authentic. It was the beginning of a chapter that would shape so much of who I became.
And now — I return again. But this time, under a new name, my true name: Sarah Marie Picard.
Sarah Marie Picard teaching contemporary class at Broadway Dance Center in NYC.
Letting go of “Sarah Brinson” was terrifying. That name had carried me through so many seasons of my life and career — it was how people knew me, how I was booked, how I was remembered. To release it felt like stepping into uncertainty. Who would I be without it? Would I disappear? Would my work matter in the same way if people didn’t recognize the name attached to it?
But underneath the fear was a deeper knowing. That the name I had carried wasn’t the whole of me. That to step forward into the work I am meant to do, I had to step fully into myself.
So here I am, home again at Broadway Dance Center, carrying not just years of experience, but also the courage it took to begin again. Even now, my eyes well up as I realize: this is who I am, this is the work I believe in, and this is the story I am here to tell.
Class Schedule
📅 Tuesday, September 2 – Intermediate Contemporary
📅 Thursday, September 4 – Advanced Beginner Contemporary
These contemporary classes at Broadway Dance Center carry the heart of Acting For Dancers— weaving together presence, story, and movement. Not just how we dance, but why.
Looking for dance intensives beyond New York? Join me in Santa Barbara this October for Acting For Dancers: Theatre Lab — a two-day dance workshop for contemporary dancers ready to explore presence, story, and artistry.
To return to BDC now, with this work alive in me, feels like closing one circle and opening another. A homecoming, and a new beginning.
👉 Register for BDC classes at Broadway Dance Center
👉 Learn more about Theatre Lab [here]
With love,
Sarah