A collage of many of the PATS and guest instructors who have taught at the school. Created by Matthew McLaughlin on the occasion of PATS' 10 year anniversary, February 2018.
Meet the Staff
PATS combines fantastic in-house teachers with numerous guest instructor residencies in the course of each year to maximize opportunities for learning and inspiration.
The school is directed by Meredith Klein, who has been dancing tango for nearly 20 years. Her dance partner, Andres Amarilla, a Buenos Aires native and PATS co-founder, teaches with her during 5 months of the year.
Kristin Balmer, an artist and tango teacher, does a phenomenal job with our weekly beginner classes. No one makes tango so immediately accessible and fun as Kristin does.
Amy Yang and Elly Fernandez teach occasional classes for PATS. Matthew McLaughlin is our in-house photographer and lifter of heavy objects (like kegs!).
Additional staff includes:
Alexei Borovik (Classical Ballet)
Emiliano Messiez (Piano - tango and other genres)
See below for complete bios for each staff person, or skip to our guest instructor residencies.
Meredith Klein
Meredith Klein has been dancing tango for 22 years, including three years spent living in Buenos Aires. For the past 13 years, she has run the Philadelphia Argentine Tango School. Over the past three years, the school has become one of the most prolific presenters of live tango music in the United States.
Andres Amarilla
Born and raised in Buenos Aires, Andres Amarilla began dancing tango in 1987 at age 11. While still a child, he studied with and performed in the dance companies of three of the greatest tangueros of all time: Gustavo Naveira, Juan Carlos Copes, and Rodolfo Dinzel. After 10 years of intensive immersion in the music, culture and movement of traditional Argentine Tango, Andres became part of a small group of young people seeking to push the limits of the traditional art form. Together, they analyzed and codified the movements, sequences and rules of traditional tango and began to play with the “grammar” of the tango language, thereby developing uncounted new sequences of movements, and giving birth to a new means of teaching, dancing and thinking about tango. This way of analyzing tango has become the basis of most good tango pedagogy in the world today.
A greatly sought-after teacher, Andres has taught in more than 70 cities worldwide, including Istanbul, Beirut, Warsaw, Gdansk, Moscow, Sydney, Brisbane, Belo Horizonte, Buenos Aires, San Francisco, Vancouver, Montreal, and New York, among many others. In 2008, Andres and his dance partner, Meredith Klein, founded the Philadelphia Argentine Tango School. Until Covid-19, Andres split his year between Philadelphia and traveling to teach in other parts of the world. Now, he has taken on an important new role as full-time steward of Sheldon the Tango Cat. Meow!
Kristin Balmer
Kristin Balmer has been dancing tango for 22 years, and teaching for 15 years. She started dancing in Philadelphia with Lesley Mitchell and Kelly Ray, and soon began taking yearly trips to Buenos Aires, where she studied with many teachers, including Ernesto Balmaceda, Graciela Gonzalez, and Luciana Valle. She learned how to teach tango from Daniel Trenner, one of the first tango teachers in the U.S. (and the person who was instrumental in bringing Argentine Tango to this country).
Kristin is also an accomplished painter, bookbinder and printmaker, and graduate of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.
Emiliano Messiez
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and based in NYC, pianist/composer Emiliano Messiez has become one of the most in-demand tango pianists in the world. He has played some of the most notable music venues in the United States, including Lincoln Center, and performed with some of the world’s top musicians, such as Paquito de Rivera, Dino Saluzzi, and Concha Buika. With Jose Luis Infantino, he recorded the album, “Silencio,” in 2004, which received an UNESCO Prize for music.
With a versatile and unique style, Emiliano performs in a wide range of genres from classical music and jazz, to rock and Latin American rhythms. In the worldwide tango community, Emiliano has become known as one of the most brilliant tango pianists of our time. His playing is absolutely infectious and highly danceable. Whether Emiliano is performing as a soloist, in small group formations (duo / trio / quartet), or directing his entire orchestra, the Tipica Messiez, you can’t sit down when Emiliano is playing.
Emiliano graduated from the National University of the Arts in Buenos Aires. He later joined the faculty there, teaching in the Department of Composition. He also graduated from Berklee College of Music’s Escuela de Music Contemporánea in Buenos Aires.
Emiliano is the pianist for the hit show, “Forever Tango,” which has been seen by over eight million people worlwide, including on Broadway and the West End in London. He performs “Tango Dueling Pianos,” a unique concept featuring two tango pianists, with Latin-Grammy nominee Pablo Estigarribia.
In 2020, Emiliano released a new CD with the Underground Tango Ensemble, “El Charrúa,” a tribute dedicated to his friend, Latin Grammy winner bandoneonist Raúl Jaurena.
A prolific composer, Emiliano wrote the music for “The Guava Tree” and “Bordello”, an in-development musical based in 1920’s Buenos Aires. He is currently at work on a new musical for Creede Repertory Theater in Colorado.
For more information, please visit www.emilianomessiez.com.
Amy Yang
Amy began dancing tango in 2009 through the Temple Tango Club at Temple University in Philadelphia. Having never considered herself a dancer in any sense of the word, Amy was bewildered to learn that she could relate to tango, and thus become a dancer, through structure. Bewilderment quickly became deep admiration and love, and she became a co-organizer for the university club. To further her studies in Argentine tango, Amy began taking classes with Meredith Klein and Andres Amarilla at the Philadelphia Argentine Tango School. Amy became one of the first interns at the Philadelphia Argentine Tango School in 2012, assisting Meredith in classes and helping organize school events. In 2014, Amy started teaching independently, through group classes and private lessons.
Matt McLaughlin
Meredith’s husband Matt makes PATS possible by lifting the things no one else can lift (like kegs!), strategizing the things that no one else can strategize (like lighting designs for our milongas!), and stepping into the role of PATS photographer since our first brilliant photographer, Helio Ha, moved away. Almost all of the wonderful photos on this site were taken either by Helio or by Matt.
Sheldon
Sheldon performs important work at the tango school, crawling into everyone’s lap and giving them a cuddle so they feel comfortable here. If you’re feeling worried about trying something new, or doubting your ability to learn to dance, don’t worry: Sheldon is ready to make you feel at home!
D'Arienzo the Tango Cat
D’Arienzo the Tango Cat arrived from the streets of North Philadelphia to live in the tango studio for just a year and a half. In that time, he made countless friends and became a bigger celebrity than any of the humans who frequent the tango studio (even the really big tango stars!).
He passed away suddenly on July 28, 2017 and broke our hearts. We will love you forever, D’Arienzo.
2030 Frankford Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19125
617-291-3798
[email protected]