PODCAST 193: Morgan Teel
Release Date: 1.22.26
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Beyond the Product: The Dance Process with Morgan Teel
Episode 193: Show Notes.
Morgan Teel is the mind behind Dance Waterloo, an organization making dance more accessible through site specific and site responsive shows in Austin, Texas. During this episode, she joins us to share the story of how she first fell in love with dance, what deepened her knowledge of choreography, and the motivation behind launching Dance Waterloo. Morgan also shares what first drew her to site-specific work and how Austin audiences have embraced it, from intimate community performances to larger shows like Quixotic States at the Zilker Hillside Theatre Stage. We discuss her inventive projects, including a spelling bee themed dance production, and how she works to make the creative process as visible as the final product. Along the way, she reveals where she finds inspiration for her pieces and why accessibility, experimentation, and community connection remain at the heart of her vision for Dance Waterloo’s future.
Key Points From This Episode:
- Morgan Teel’s introduction to the world of dance as a child.
- Applying for colleges and honing her skills as a choreographer.
- What motivated Morgan to start Dance Waterloo: making dance more accessible.
- Working full-time in an arts administration role.
- Naming Dance Waterloo, fundraising, and putting on their first show under an overpass.
- How dance classes for families allow children to see their parents as equal collaborators.
- The legacy Morgan hopes to build with Dance Waterloo.
- How she is working with Austin’s senior population.
- Marketing Dance Waterloo and growing its network.
- What first drew Morgan to site-specific work and how it has been received.
- The spelling bee dance production she recently put on.
- Where she finds inspiration for her pieces.
- How she is working to make the process of dance visible beyond the product of it.
- Quixotic States: a dance show at the Zilker Hillside Theatre Stage.
- Plans for the future: dancing with teenagers.
- How Morgan cross-pollinates her skills.
ABOUT Morgan
Morgan Teel is a choreographer, dancer, and the founder and artistic director of Dance Waterloo, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that provides performances and dance education programs to adults and children, and to other artists at affordable rates. By integrating her passion for dance and expertise in community engagement she aims to bridge the gap between institutions and their communities, enabling mutual growth.
Morgan founded Dance Waterloo after realizing there was a gap in how dance was being shared with the community. For a city known for its cultural vibrancy, she was struck by how few people had ever experienced modern or contemporary dance. When she talked to strangers, many said they didn’t watch modern dance because they didn’t feel like they “got it” or thought it wasn’t something for them. This opened her eyes to an opportunity: how could she offer dance in a way that felt accessible and inviting to everyone? In 2015, Dance Waterloo launched with their debut performance, Under the Overpass, a night performance at Skylines in Boggy Creek Greenbelt Park. Since its inception, Morgan has led the organization as it has expanded into community programs, virtual monthly workshops with proceeds supporting BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and disabled communities, mentorship for emerging rural Central Texas BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and disabled choreographers, and performances in partnership with Austin institutions like Lady Bird Lake, Epoch Coffee, and more. Through Dance Waterloo, Morgan believes in creating multigenerational work that brings the choreographic processes to a more digestible level, invites the audience to participate, and makes dance community driven.
In addition to her work at Dance Waterloo, Morgan is a Certified Enneagram Coach specializing in time management with an intuitive approach. Instead of using rigid systems, she helps individuals understand how their natural tendencies, motivations, and energy cycles influence how they manage their time. By focusing on self-awareness and adaptability, Morgan encourages people to work with their own rhythms, creating a sustainable balance between creativity, productivity, and rest. This approach aligns with her work in dance and community engagement, both of which require flexibility and the ability to adjust to shifting priorities while staying focused.
Morgan is committed to serving artists in Austin. In 2025, she joined the advisory council for Keep Austin Beautiful, an organization that has been serving Austin since 1983 to ensure that the community stays safe, clean, and beautiful. She has served as the president of Austin Emerging Arts Leaders (EAL), a collective of Austin-based arts practitioners, administrators, and advocates offering professional development opportunities and inclusive community building. During her tenure she co-created the mentorship program which identifies and cultivates the next generation of arts leaders by selecting approximately five emerging artists and arts administrators and pairing them with established mentors to build relationships that aid their personal, professional, and creative development.
Morgan holds a masters of fine arts in Dance from The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and a bachelors of fine arts in Dance Performance and Choreography from The University of Southern Mississippi. Her artistic works have premiered across the United States—including Florida, Arkansas, Indiana, Mississippi, Texas, and New York—and internationally in Italy. For more information please visit, dancewaterloo.org.
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