Sue Samuels is an American jazz dancer, choreographer, and dance teacher based in New York City. A protégé of jazz master JoJo Smith, she co-founded JoJoâÂÂs Dance Factory in the 1970sâÂÂan independent studio that became a precursor to Broadway Dance Center (BDC)âÂÂand has taught on BDCâÂÂs faculty since the center opened in 1984. In 2009 Samuels founded the Jazz Roots Dance Company to preserve and present classic jazz repertory alongside her own choreography. She received a Dance Teacher Award in 2018 and a Dancers Over 40 Legacy Award in 2021, and has served on the selection committee for the New York Dance and Performance âÂÂBessieâ Awards.
Raised in Florida, Samuels trained in classical ballet before relocating to New York City as a teenager. In New York she studied jazz with Luigi, Nat Horne, Phil Black, and especially JoJo Smith, whose musicality and rhythmic approach became central to her style. She has credited her early ballet trainingâÂÂparticularly emphasis on alignment and injury preventionâÂÂas an enduring influence on her teaching.
By the mid-1970s Samuels was working in New YorkâÂÂs commercial and theatrical dance scenes. On Broadway she appeared in the revue The Fifth Dimension with Jo JoâÂÂs Dance Factory at the Uris Theatre (1974), and in the musical Got Tu Go Disco at the Minskoff Theatre (1979), where she danced in the ensemble and understudied the role of Lila.
In the 1970s Samuels joined JoJo Smith in opening JoJoâÂÂs Dance Factory, one of New YorkâÂÂs early large, multi-teacher studios for drop-in classes. The studio functioned as a forerunner of Broadway Dance Center, and when BDC opened in 1984 Samuels became part of its regular faculty. Trade press also identifies her as a co-founder of JoJoâÂÂs Dance Factory and notes its connection to BDCâÂÂs subsequent development.
Samuels founded Jazz Roots Dance Company in 2009. The troupe presents new choreography in a âÂÂclassic jazzâ idiom while reviving works by mid-20th-century jazz choreographers and by JoJo Smith.
Samuelsâ classes are noted for a ballet-based âÂÂjazz barreâ warm-up and for live percussion accompaniment; she has long taught multiple levels of Broadway jazz at BDC. Her pedagogy emphasizes clean lines, rhythm, and musicality, a blend that trade publications have described as influential in training generations of musical-theatre dancers. Former students include performers such as Brooke Shields and Irene Cara.
Samuels was married to choreographer JoJo Smith; they have two children, tap dancer Jason Samuels Smith and producer/arts manager Elka Samuels Smith. JoJo Smith, widely known for his work in Broadway and commercial dance, died in 2019.
Trade publications have described Samuels as a âÂÂlegendaryâ New York jazz teacher whose stylistic blend of ballet technique and jazz musicality has had long-term influence; she is frequently cited for her role in linking the 1970s jazz-dance generation with contemporary practice through both studio teaching and the repertory efforts of Jazz Roots Dance.