Meet the fabulous team bringing you Mile High Blues 2025!
To meet the Board of Directors for Mile High Blues Organization, please visit this page.

Aimee Yen (she/her)

​​Co-Lead, Finance, Registration, Program Management

Aimee began dancing in the womb and didn’t stop after! She also began ‘organizing’ all the kids at the playground as soon as she could tell them what to do; a skill which she’s been developing ever since by creating and running employee affinity groups, mentoring groups for aspiring engineers and scientists, dance communities, and dance and capoeira events. 
Since co-running a monthly contra dance in the mid-2000s, she has supported, created, and/or run (and sometimes taught and/or DJed at) monthly and yearly dance events in CA, WA and CO in both Blues and Fusion. This is the 6th Mile High Blues she is a primary organizer for and this year she is so excited for the AMAZING team we have! Currently, she lives in Albuquerque, NM where Mango the cat helps her to organize by not stepping on her keyboard.

Kanit Dararutana (he/him)

​Co-Lead, Venue, Volunteers, Vendors, Sponsors and Grants

One fateful day, a dear friend invited Kanit to a Blues dance workshop weekend and said “It’ll change your life.” 8 hours of workshop and a night full of dancing later and Kanit was hooked. He spent as many nights of the week as possible dancing different styles, but Blues, as the first style he learned, has always been close to his heart. As time went on, Kanit elevated to teaching dance, DJing, organizing local events, and even running events at the national level. Kanit is extremely excited to bring you this year’s Mile High Blues and is eternally grateful to work with the talented and dedicated organizing team this year. 


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Jen Delk

​Music Coordinator

At age 3, Jen started her DJ career in the basement, on a Fisher Price record player, before an audience of dolls.  She spent countless hours listening to funk, disco, soul, jazz, R&B,and pop music throughout her childhood and went on to study music from elementary through high school.   After moving to Austin, the “ live music capital”, she fell hard for dancing in dive bars to gritty blues, jazz, and swing music. She started DJing for a live audience in college when she ran a small swing dance club on campus and started teaching classes.  Jen started learning blues dances in 2004 when they crossed over into the lindy scene.  She joined the bluesSHOUT! Team in 2010 when it came through Austin.   As years passed she became more involved in driving the mission and vision of the event by working on content curation and eventually the curriculum and lectures.
Jen lives in Denver now, teaching and DJing blues at the local level and events out of town. Drawing on her vast musical knowledge to help dancers find grounding, a voice, and a better connection with the music.

Pomona Longshadow

​Graphics

After graduating from design school in 2015, Pomona worked on many different projects in many different countries. Nowadays, she bends the laws of marketing for good–working with artists, festivals and small businesses to grab the attention they deserve. Check out more of her work at pomona.dance/design.

Kat Rose (she/her)

​Marketing, Housing, Family Accessibility

It was the fall of 2004 when Kat (she/her) and her dad, Norm, rented a VHS from the local library on How To Learn the Lindy Hop so they could attend an upcoming NYE Swing Dance. Did Norm know he was introducing his daughter to her life-long love of social dancing? Did he know Kat would find herself dancing to the Blues as well as Lindy? Did he know she’d end up traveling to dozens of dance events across the world and throw dance house parties and DJ for Blues dances and organize dance workshops and then marry a dancer and have dancer babies and then do Marketing, Family Accessibility, and Housing for Mile High Blues 2025?!!?!? No, he did not. But now he does, because Kat still talks to him pretty much every day.


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Felicia Bode

​Music Coordinator

Felicia grew up listening to her uncle’s band playing gritty Chicago blues, and the music has just been a part of her being since then. When she started social dancing, she was immediately drawn to blues music, and has since committed to honoring the people and history of blues music and dancing. She ran the Cleveland Exchange swing dance weekend and the blues dance scene in her hometown of Cleveland, has helped them to start their first ever workshop weekend event, Lake Effect Blues, and now heads up Denver’s monthly blues dance event, Shimmy Shakin’ Blues. As a musician herself, Felicia knows what makes good music, but also seeks out musicians and DJs who know how to set the tone right for a fantastic night of dancing. She and Jen are working together this year to give you the best music you can find in the state of Colorado– be ready to be summoned to the dance floor and dance your tooshies off at MHB this year!

Victoria Hermosilla (she/her)

Marketing

Victoria has been partner dancing for over 24 years, and began her Blues Dancing journey in Tucson Arizona in 2012. Since then, she has been helping with organization, teaching, and outreach within the community. Victoria has drawn great inspiration from the legacy and gifts of Blues, and wants to apply her organizational skills to the continued success of MHB so that others may be inspired as well.  

Damon Stone

Culture and History Consultant

Damon has been dancing his entire life, starting with vernacular Jazz/Blues first taught to him at the tender age of six by his grandmother. After nearly a decade of learning at the heels of his elders, he went on and eventually studied numerous dance forms until coming full circle in 1995 to focus primarily on the history and styles of partner dances as his family danced them with a special focus on the Southern Blues styles from the Mississippi Delta region. He has studied the development of vernacular Jazz/Blues dance across the United States learning from a number of the original dancers.

He is largely regarded as one of the foremost authorities on Blues idiom dance and has been interviewed as a dance historian in documentary, radio, and newspaper. Damon has been a featured instructor at camps, festivals, and workshops regionally and internationally.

Changeling Spaces

​Access & Safety Co-Lead

Changeling Spaces is a joint project by Fen Kennedy (they/them) and Jaesic Wade (they/it) to develop a sustainable culture of access and safety within the social dance community. We offer support with policy development, event facilitation, and individual consultations to organizers and attendees. Since its founding in 2023, Changeling Spaces has provided comprehensive support to Blues Muse, Steel City Blues, Red Hot Blues and BBQ, Austin Fusion Festival, Uncaged Fusion Festival, QT Fusion Festival, Rochester Afro-Latin Dance Festival, and many more. Our mission is to provide a pro-active, multi-faceted, restorative approach to access in our communities, and to make access sustainable for local and national scenes.

Fen Lastra (they/them)

​Access & Safety Co-Lead

Co-founder of Changelings Spaces Fen Lastra is a full-time dance professor and the winner of the 2024 National Dance Education Organization’s award for outstanding dance teaching in Higher Education. Their research on inclusive pedagogy has been published in the Journal of Dance Education, Dance Education in Practice, and various anthologies. They have taught classes at HiFi Fusion, Uncaged Fusion, Fae Fusion, Totality Fusion, and many more, and in 2024 they led two highly competitive fusion teaching residencies in Seattle and San Francisco. In their home state of Alabama, they run a free monthly queer dance class in partnership with the Magic City Acceptance Center.

​Photo credit to Impassioned Art Photography

Jaesic Wade (they/it)

​​Access & Safety Co-Lead

Co-founder Jaesic Wade is a nationally renowned partner dance instructor and DJ, professional jazz singer, and DEI practitioner and life coach based out of Rochester, NY.

Photo credit to Impassioned Art Photography

Katrina Rogers

​Instruction Coordination

Bio to come.

Remy Martyn

​Website and Coding

Bio to come.
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