Tyde-Courtney Edwards

Born and raised in Baltimore City, Tyde-Courtney Edwards is a graduate of the Baltimore School for the Arts Dance Department, Dance Entrepreneur, Social Innovator, Founding Director of Ballet After Dark, Creative Director of BAD Ballet and Founder/Chief Dance Officer of BAD Studios. She's a classically trained ballet dancer with over two decades training and performance experience. And like most pre-professional dancers, has never been able to secure a company contract. Her love for dance has allowed her to launch a variety of dance related opportunities for dancers local to Baltimore City. She's taking a leap into the future of dance and making sustainable income an option for pre-professional dancers and performers everywhere.

In 2018, her work with Ballet After Dark caught the attention of consumer goods corporation, Procter & Gamble, and multi-talented artist, Queen Latifah. Ballet After Dark became the first feature subject of their latest initiative, The Queen Collective. Subsequently, a short documentary about our work was produced. Affectionately titled Ballet After Dark, the short documentary premiered at the 2019 Tribeca film festival. The film has streamed on Hulu, Amazon, Showtime and BET and is currently streaming on Discovery+. Ballet After Dark had its first network screening in 2020 on the BET Network and once again in 2021 on the OWN Network hosted by Oprah Winfrey. The film continues to circulate throughout film festivals.

Tyde-Courtney is the grand prize winner of the 2021 United Way Changemaker Challenge, the grand prize winner of the 2021 Johns Hopkins Social Innovation Lab, DANCE/USA fellow, Halcyon Inspires fellow and currently an Innovation Works fellow. She was recently acknowledged as one of The Baltimore Sun's 25 Women To Watch and was recently featured in Forbes.

Photo Credit: Schaun Champion