Sandra Organ Solis is a native Nebraskan, born to Dr. and Mrs. Claude Organ, Jr. and trained in all levels of the Royal Academy of Dancing as a student of Valerie Roche at the Omaha Academy of Ballet and with Creighton University’s “A Company of Dancers” while attending Duchesne Academy. After graduating valedictorian, Sandra was contracted by Houston Ballet as its first African American ballerina, dancing there for 15 years and as a soloist under Ben Stevenson. She worked with internationally renowned choreographers Christopher Bruce, James Kudelka, and Jiri Kylian, while dancing in the works of MacMillian, Balanchine, Tudor, and Ashton, to name a few. She then founded her own contemporary ballet ensemble, Earthen Vessels, The Sandra Organ Dance Company, for which she created 100 ballets and employed more than 120 dancers over sixteen seasons of programming in theatres and sacred spaces.

Ms. Organ Solis has served on the boards of Dance USA and Dance Source Houston, as a panelist for Houston Arts Alliance(HAA), and has received grants from HAA, Texas Commission for the Arts, Mid America Arts Alliance, and the Nebraska Arts Council. She has participated in Urban Bushwomen’s Leadership Institute in New Orleans, and with Liz Lerman’s Dance Exchange Institutes as well as in Regional Dance America’s Craft of Choreography Conferences. Ms. Organ taught in the Adult Ballet and Parkinson’s for Dance programs at Houston Ballet Academy for 18 years, and has returned to Nebraska as a guest artist, master teacher, and choreographer for Creighton, OAB, and Nebraska Dance Camp. Ms. Organ continues to choreograph ballets and speak on behalf of the field nationally, living in the hill country of Texas, where she instructs adult ballet at Ballet Austin, as well as yoga and water fitness for the Austin YMCA, and has just completed her Bachelor’s of Arts in Human Services Administration from Antioch University.