Claudia Melrose, a professor in the University of Wisconsin-Madison Dance Program, has performed in major cities of Europe, South America, North Africa and the U.S. as a member of the Alwin Nikolais Dance Co., as choreographer/director of the Melrose Motion Company, and as performer/choreographer in the Melrose & Morgan Duo. The recipient of over 40 grants and awards, she has choreographed more than 60 dances, many of which have been performed in Europe, South America, Asia and the U.S. Her latest group work "Dolorosa" reflects her interest in the relationship between black Catholic icons of the Virgin Mary of Europe with Yoruba deities in the Atlantic African Diaspora. The powerful dance was selected to represent the UW-Madison at the American College Dance Festival regional in March 2004.

Prof Melrose has been a perennial advocate of African dance and music on the Madison campus for the past 15 years. Ms. Melrose's affinity for African-derived dance forms evolved from the profound influence guest artist Pearl Primus had on her when she was a young dance student and was later rekindled when, as a teacher in the UW-Madison Dance Program in the 1980s, she collaborated with another of Madison's visiting artists, Clyde Morgan, a specialist in Afro-Brazilian dance.

She studied dance at the University of Ghana-Legon in the summer of 1993, returning in 1994 as a Fulbright Fellow. There she visited regions throughout Ghana rich in traditional dance and ritual, observing these forms in full cultural context. During this time she not only taught but also participated in some of the many regional performances she recorded. At the Ghanaian National Theater's dance ensemble in Accra, she taught modern dance and creative work in conjunction with the Ghanaian dancers and musicians; and together they created a 20-minute original work.

She shared her experiences and passion for West African dance with her colleagues and students in Madison by bringing in the exciting Ghanaian dance and drummer, Habib Idrissu, as guest artist in the fall of 1995, and by continuing to teach her popular elective class in West African Dance and Music. Prof. Melrose spearheaded and implemented the yearlong African/African-American Dance Festival in 1997-98 on the UW-Madison campus. In addition to being a charter member of the African performance ensemble "Kweku Ananse and the Sweet Vibrations", Prof. Melrose with the sponsorship of the Wisconsin Center for the Humanities, conceived of and directed an evening concert called "Aseye! From Hi life to Hip Hop" featuring expert Ghanaian and Wisconsin musicians and dancers, (April 2003). A new African performance group was born out of that creative project which now performs in schools and community functions throughout the area.

Other African based dance/music forms are of great interest to Professor Melrose. She traveled to Cuba in1996 and 2000 to study Afro-Cuban dance and culture in Havana and in Santiago, Oriente Province in addition to attending the respected Afro-Cuban Dance/Music workshop (2002) at Humboldt College, California. With her instigation, the UW Dance Program and the Center for Latin American Caribbean and Iberian Studies, have consequently co- sponsored UW campus-community workshops and performances by Richard Gonzalez from New York/Puerto Rico, Jose Barroso and Danis Perez Prades from Cuba.

Most recently Prof Melrose has designed a new upper level course open to all university students and cross listed with Afro-American Studies and the School of Music entitled "Cross Cultural Forms: West African Music/Dance in the Americas". This 3-credit course is open to all university upper level students and satisfies the university's ethnic studies requirement. In addition she continues to teach a very popular African based dance class and a more advanced performance class, both of which received university approval as new courses two years ago.

In the past year, during her sabbatical Prof. Melrose received travel funds from the African Studies Program to return to Ghana to verify her research and field tapes done in 1994 in the Brong Ahafo region and which will be then edited into a classroom video. Prof. Melrose has given three paper presentations about the expansion of worldview, increased respect for other cultures and the transformation of values possible through methods of teaching West African dance in the U.S. The venues included University of Florida-Gainesville (Congress of Research in Dance Conference and Gwendolyn M Carter Conference in African Studies) 2004, Michigan State University (National Dance Educators Organization conference) 2004, and Dakar Senegal (West African Research Center's Bouki Blues Festival II) Jan. 2005.