Meet our instructors and discover the amazing talents they bring to Metropolitan Performing Arts Academy!
Noah Scott
Creative Director
Mr. Noah Scott has dedicated over thirteen years to Arts Education and the Performing Arts. He started his career at the ripe age of six, when he auditioned and made it into Los Angeles’ prestigious Piedmont Theatre Academy. At the age of sixteen, Noah then began a career in professional Broadway tours such as Bye Bye Birdie, Mamma Mia, Rocky Horror Picture Show and Saturday Night Fever. Despite the successful career as a performer, Noah’s passion and focus has always been in education. He has attended five different colleges as well as grad school to be able to provide the highest level of Arts Education to our community. Mr. Scott has held the title of Executive/Creative Directors at Performing Arts Schools such as Curtain Call Performing Arts Academy and BMT’s Stars School of Performing Arts and taught all over the United States. In his thirteen year career, he has directed over forty musicals and choreographed fifteen shows. His goal is to bring the arts to life in Vancouver and continue to create a true home for quality Arts Education and Musical Theatre through his current role as Creative Director of Metropolitan Performing Arts Academy.
Dustin Adam Brown
Dance Instructor and Choreographer
Dustin has spent virtually his entire life with the performing arts. Since the fourth grade, he has performed in community, educational, and professional settings, and he couldn’t be happier to continue surrounding himself with theatre and dance. At the age of 16, Dustin portrayed Professor Plum in Clue: The Musical at both the Missouri State and National Thespian Conferences. He started exploring choreography at the age of 17, when he staged numbers for high schools and community theatre. At 19, Dustin choreographed his first full musical, Thoroughly Modern Millie. Dustin received his BFA in Dance Performance and Choreography from Missouri State University, where he trained in ballet, contemporary/modern, jazz, tap, and dance-improvisation, as well as choreography, kinesiology, and dance history. At MSU, he was a member of Inertia Dance Company and performed several times in various regions at the American College Dance Festival. Throughout his college education, Dustin was given numerous opportunities to perform in shows such as Beauty and the Beast; You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown; and Anything Goes!, as well as several contemporary dance concerts and multiple productions of The Nutcracker. Since moving to Portland, OR, Dustin has maintained his passion for live theatre and dance, and he is immensely enjoying his experience as an instructor and choreographer with Metropolitan Performing Arts Academy in Vancouver, WA.
Shannon Dake
Dance Instructor and Choreographer
Shannon Dake was born and raised in Nampa, Idaho and started dance when she was 5 years old at Anita Damiano Kennedy School of Dance. She has been trained in ballet, tap, jazz, modern, lyrical, pointe, and hip hop. In High School, she was a part of the Skyview Blue Angels Competition Dance Team (2003-2007); that won National and State Titles.From 2007-2011, she attended the University of Idaho and received a Bachelors of Science degree in Dance. Her degree focused not only on performance, choreography, and quality of movements; but it had great emphasis the human body and how it moves. She began her teaching career her junior year of college and has loved teaching ever since. Shannon has education in athletic injuries and taping techniques and is interested getting her master’s degree in Athletic Training for dancers in the future. In June of 2012, she moved to the Portland Metro Area to pursue her love for dance by auditioning, performing, and teaching. She has been a teacher at Metro since last September, getting her start as the assistant choreographer for Legally Blonde and is currently teaching Jazz classes and working on the Best of Broadway Revue.
Courtney Morris
Dance Instructor of Ballet and Tap
Courtney Morris has been dancing for 23 years and has been teaching and choreographing for 8 years. She is a classical ballerina, performing principal & soloist roles in Giselle, Romeo & Juliette, Sleeping Beauty, The Nutckracker, La Bayadere, Coppelia among other productions. Even though ballet is her first choice, she is a big tap fanatic and is trained in tap, jazz, lyrical, modern & stage mime. Her home base for training was at The Idaho Ballet Theater & Anita Damiano Kennedy Academy of Dance in Boise, Idaho; the latter where she found her passion for teaching. She also toured for six years on the competition circuit with her dance/drill team. Courtney is also a licensed massage therapist and sports injury therapist. She is honored to have found a place to call home with MPAA.
Wendy Steele
Vocal Technique Instructor
Wendy Steele has been singing and teaching professionally in the Portland area for the past 20 years. She earned a master’s degree in voice and opera performance from Northwestern University in Chicago and and undergraduate degree in voice and music education from Pacific University. She is a frequent soloist and chorister with Cappella Romana, Portland Baroque Orchestra, and Resonance Ensemble and is the resident alto soloist at St. Mary’s Cathedral. Her private vocal teaching includes a private studio and frequent adjudicationing for area vocal competitions. As a member of NATS (National Association of Teachers of Singing), she enters her students in competition and is a judge in both the musical theater and classical contests. As in her teaching, her professional singing is a mix of classical and musical theater styles – she was last seen on stage with Broadway Rose in their cast of “The Sound of Music” this past summer. When she isn’t teaching or singing, she is a wife of 21 years to another music teacher/baritone, and a mother to twin 9 year olds. Wendy is thrilled to be a new part of the MPAA family.
Rebecca Chelson
Music Director, Vocal Instructor
Bio Available Soon
