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Voler (Volay) - Thieves of Flight, Kansas City's Premier Aerial Academy and Aerial Performance Collective, is an edgy and experimental collaboration of aerial dance and acrobatics, comprised of performing artists from the Kansas City area. Our mission is to demonstrate the beauty of collaborative movement that is inspired by various acrobatic, dance and performance backgrounds. The ensemble features ballet and modern dancers as well as specialty circus and performance artists.
Aerial Fabrics (also known as aerial contortion, aerial ribbons, aerial silks, aerial tissues, ribbon or tissu) is a type of performance where artists wrap, suspend, fall, swing, and spiral their body into and out of various positions on a suspended fabric without the use of safety lines. Performances are an exciting display of skill, athleticism, coordination and flexibility.
Voler performers specialize in various disciplines including: aerial silks, aerial hammock, aerial net, aerial carousel, aerial diamond, aerial straps, lyra, corde lisse, machete dancing, modern, jazz, tap, ballet, pointe, latin, ballroom, flamenco, hip-hop, capoeira, broken-glass walking, fire spinning, fire-breathing, bull whip, bed of nails, living statues, tumbling, body-balancing, and anti-gravity movement.
Voler Video Performances
(please allow pop-up windows)
Voler Promotional Video 2010 |
"Sirens" Aerial Silk Trio |
"Body Balance" Modern Acrobatics |
"Mechanics of Movement" Aerial Carousel |
Busker Festival Compilation |
"Viper Vapor" Aerial Silks Duet |
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More videos available on our YouTube Channel!
Voler Aerial Academy Classes
Voted Best Fitness Class - Rachel McMeachin - 2008 Pitch Awards |
Students range in ages 6-60, both men and women alike fall in love with this practice! Students will learn conditioning and stretching techniques that will help to improve overall stamina, strength and balance. Workshops are designed with you in mind. Learn this popular and beautiful aerial form, like dancing on air! As with all classes, you'll progress at your own pace and comfort level while learning graceful poses, wraps and transitions. Learn positions low to the ground, and move to higher skills as your strength and ability grows. |
Introductory Silk Classes |
Come learn the basics of aerial silks. Your first step to becoming an aerialist! For the first time student, you will learn the basics of aerial conditioning, climbing and foot locks and more! Learn at your own pace with other beginners. The Introductory Sessions are designed to give you a taste of what aerial movement is all about. |
Level I and Level II Silk Classes |
Learn the art of aerial silks with a professional aerial teacher and performer! Take some time to learn the grace and beauty with this form of circus artistry. A fitness, dance, circus skills class like no other. Gain strength, flexibility, balance & agility. Level One Silks build on the Introductory classes and are for students who are comfortable with climbing, conditioning and foot locks who want to explore flexibility, single foot locks, movement and series training. Level Two Silks classes are for those students who are comfortable in the air and are interested in building sequences, techniques and presentation skills. |
NEW! Lyra (Hoop) Class |
Our new lyra classes features strengthening, balance and spinning techniques with our newest instructor Greta! A classically trained dancer and international performer, her all-level classes will give you the fundamentals and techniques of this versatile aerial apparatus. |
All Classes held at The Loft (click for map)
West Bottoms - 1331 Union Avenue, Kansas City, MO 64101
Click on a Class Time to Reserve Your Space!
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Costs:
$25 Single Class
$80 - 4 class package (Valid for all Aerial Classes)
Private lessons and advanced aerial (by appointment only) - 75 min. sessions
$50 one person / $75 two people / $85 three people
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Artists /Collaborators /Sponsors
Voler Logos
(right click to save)
Contact Us!
Voler is available for many types of performances as Guest Artists or Feature Acts. We have performed for festivals, fundraisers, public and private events, fashion shows, cabaret shows, special events, television shows, awards functions...you name it!
We collaborate with: Bands, Videographers, Photographers, Fire Artists, Circus Artists and more!
Feel free to fill out our booking inquiry form
(click the Booking tab above)
or you may contact us directly at info@thievesofflight.com.
Company Performers
Andee Nichole Hayley Rachel Jade Leslie |
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Andee Hindery
andee@thievesofflight.com |
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Andee Hindery is grateful to have began her dance training as a girl with her mentors Cliff Kerwin and Paul Chambers. She went on to complete her degree in dance at the University of Kansas. Andee's been performing in Kansas City since her days in City in Motion's Children's Dance Theatre and more recently with A-Ha! Dance Theatre and Kacico Dance. She's very happy to have taken off with the lovely girls of Voler, and feels quite at home in the air. |
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Company Performers
Andee Nichole Hayley Rachel Jade Leslie |
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Nichole Raab
nichole@thievesofflight.com |
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Nichole Raab has performed with the Kansas City Symphony, The New Theatre Restaurant, Starlight
Theatre's Epic Entertainment, Storling Dance Theatre, and The Shoji Tabuchi Show (Branson, MO). Nichole
teaches throughout the city and in the past at Missouri Western University.She has trained in Tap, Ballet, Point, Jazz, Modern,
Floor Tumbling/Acrobatics, Aerial Acrobatics, Musical Theatre, Yoga, some Stunt Work and various
Martial Arts.
Nichole studied dance at UMKC while receiving a B.S. in Biology and a minor in Chemistry. Other Dance education includes; She has studied dance at
UMKC, The Ailey School (NY, NY), Project Bandaloop (Oakland, CA), Diavolo (Los Angeles) and other
various company workshops throughout the country... and where it all began… Hilltop Dance Studio and Nallia School of Dance (Shawnee, KS)! In 2008 Nichole received "Best Choreography" & "Overall Highest Scores" for her first time ever choreography entry, a modern/abstract piece "Mad World," in both Dance Masters of America and the International Dance Competition, which brought the piece to a New York City stage in Times Square.
Nichole is grateful for all the support she has received along the way in her 27 years of learning to be a “mover” and strives to continually give back the so many gifts she receives daily from friends, family and the community. She strives to continually learn and to share gained knowledge. She thanks all her students for teaching her in return without even trying!
“I enjoy movement arts for many reasons, for the artistry/imagery aspect they create… to create a painting in motion for the eyes to grow lost in. I enjoy them for their entertainment purposes; to make people smile, to make people laugh and want to move themselves. And…I enjoy movement arts for their story telling purposes. I like to tell stories, hear stories, be a part of stories and share - the body is such a great tool to utilize for such a purpose. Without any words, what can it say? What can it make you feel? To me movement is a gift in all forms and my greatest pleasure of the movement arts is to inspire! The body is a gift and I’m quite amazed to see what it can do! I strive to push the envelope and find new horizons. As a six foot tall woman I face many professional rejections but my ears do not fall short on such words as “categories” or “limits,” to me they are rules to break.”
“Tell me I can’t… I dare you!” |
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Company Performers
Andee Nichole Hayley Rachel Jade Leslie |
Hayley Cherveny
hayley@thievesofflight.com |
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Hayley Cherveny began her dance training as a young girl training in ballet, tap, jazz, hip hop, and lyrical dance. She furthered her dance education obtaining a bachelors degree in dance from Kansas State University. During her college training she specialized in Modern dance, performing at many national dance festivals and was asked to have her original choreography adjudicated at the American College Dance Festival.
In 2004, Ms. Cherveny had the opportunity to perform in the Czech Republic with the Lynn Barr Dance Theatre as a featured modern dancer. Hayley has also been a company member of the AHA! Dance Theatre in Kansas City and has been commissioned in guest pieces for local and national choreographers.
Her performance career really “took flight” in 2008 upon meeting the other women of Voler and starting to train and perform in aerial silks, hammock, body balancing, and acrobatics. Voler has given her continued opportunities to perform nationally and internationally, reinvigorating her love of performing and collaboration. Hayley is driven by a continued interest in the balance of strength and grace through movement… and the love she has for her sisters in flight. As a performer she strives to lure the audience into a shared experience of pure joy, bound by nothing, limitless through imagination. |
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Company Performers
Andee Nichole Hayley Rachel Jade Leslie |
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Rachel McMeachin
rachel@thievesofflight.com |
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Rachel McMeachin: "In a life governed by laws and bound by gravity I choose to steal away a little piece of flight. Within the performance group Voler - Thieves of Flight, I have found a means to create a human performance celebrating strength, fragility and the splendor of playful expression."
I am forever the child in awe of those in-between spaces we often overlook in passing. Doorways, bridges, that imagined spot of a faraway gaze – in midair they are neither heaven nor earth. These are the places I occupy to illuminate the transition from one moment to the next. A simple swatch of silk hanging aloft becomes the perfect juxtaposition to express this fluid transformation. Adding music, the clear melodies and distinctive rhythms accentuate each movement into a gesture like ripples on water.
Like Peter Pan, “Play as you go!” is the mantra that motivates me daily, exploring aerial silks as both a practice and a meditation. Synthesis, metamorphosis and balance twists the spirit and triumphs in the body. I taunt the laws of gravity to steal a little piece of the sky and fly. |
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Company Performers
Andee Nichole Hayley Rachel Jade Leslie |
Jade Osborne
jade@thievesofflight.com |
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Jade Osborne is a multi-disciplinary performance artist who believes that each form of expression is a facet of the 360 degrees of a spherical self.
As a performer, I draw upon my training in ballet, jazz, latin, tango, modern, capoeira, contact improv, and aerial acrobatics. My work is a combination of cultural experimentation within bodily forms, structures and movement. I have trained and performed with Touch Dance, Kansas City Friends of Alvin Ailey, Quixotic, MarKed, City in Motion, Beribazu Capoeira International and currently as a core performer with Voler, Thieves of Flight.
My passion is the interlacing of these opposites, creating movements that draw a lifeline between the opposed classical and liturgical styles to reveal the ultimate connection and similarities within us all. |
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Company Performers
Andee Nichole Hayley Rachel Jade Leslie
(click on performers for more information)
Voler performers specialize in various disciplines including:
aerial silks, aerial hammock, aerial net, aerial carousel, aerial diamond, aerial straps, lyra, corde lisse, machete dancing, modern, jazz, tap, ballet, pointe, latin, ballroom, flamenco, hip-hop, capoeira, broken-glass walking, fire spinning, fire-breathing, bull whip, bed of nails, living statues, tumbling, body-balancing, and anti-gravity movement.
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