School Workshops
EMBA partners with schools to create bespoke, in-person and online workshops and residencies that enhance your expressive arts curriculum and wellbeing provision.
Ready to transform your school day?
We’d love to help you build a bespoke workshop day that fits your school’s unique needs.
Browse the workshops on offer below.
British School Al Khuairat Student
“The workshop was extremely fun and useful to anyone with an interest in theater!"
American Community School (AD) Student
"I think the workshop went really well because they were giving us an appropriate level of difficulty with the workshops yet still made it fun."
Brighton College Al Ain
- Sarah (Head of Music)
“The workshop was beyond expectations. Workshop leaders were absolutely phenomenal with students!”
If you are putting on a show
Cleo is co-founder of EMBA and UAE-based. She works alongside your staff on the parts that eat the most rehearsal time: choreography, blocking, acting through song, vocal work, costume and puppetry. That can be one day on a single number, a block of rehearsals in the run-up, or the whole production from read-through to opening night. Most schools bring her in for the numbers nobody can crack, or for the show entire if they want someone carrying it.
Tell us what you'd like and we'll design a session for you.
Musical theatre, with Cleopatra Joseph
Cleo trained at the BRIT School and ArtsEd, and holds a BA in Theatre Dance from London Studio Centre. She has performed in the West End and on national tour, including Avenue Q, where the puppet, the song and the character are worked at the same time and in full view. More recently, Cleo co-directed Matilda Jr at a top school in Al Ain, responsible for choreography, singing, acting and wardrobe. She teaches singing one to one from age four.
TEACHER & CHOREOGRAPHER
-
BA (Hons) Theatre Dance
-
University of the Arts London
-
Twenty years private teaching, one-to-one, from age four
-
School productions - Urdang Academy, and co-directed Matilda Jr in Al Ain
-
West End in Schools Schools workshop programme
-
Professional choreography:
-
Magic of Motown
-
World of Musicals
-
PERFORMER
-
Motown (Shaftesbury Theatre)The
-
Scratch Reggae Opera (Her Majesty's Theatre)
-
Jesus Christ Superstar (Barbican)
-
Hairspray (Leicester Curve)
-
Soul Sister (Olivier-nominated, national tour)
-
Avenue Q (National tour, puppetry)
Workshop Leaders
A sample of our network of experienced West End Musical Theatre practitioners can be found below (subject to availability)
%20f1%20-%20Full%20Resolution-2_edited.jpg)
Sharon Rose
Sharon Rose is a West End leading lady who opens as Em in One Day at London’s Garrick Theatre on 17 November, reprising the role she has already played in the show. She has played Eliza Hamilton in Hamilton, created the title role in Sylvia at the Old Vic, and made her West End debut as Little Eva in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. On screen, she played Joanne Jangle in Netflix’s Jingle Jangle and DC Chloe Abbott in the BBC’s Silent Witness. She leads EMBA’s Hamilton workshops in UAE schools.
Vanessa Fisher
Vanessa Fisher joins the West End company of One Day at the Garrick Theatre from November 2026, after appearing in Stranger Things: The First Shadow at the Phoenix Theatre. She previously starred as the Narrator in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat in Toronto, from 2022 to 2023, after appearing in its London Palladium run. Her West End credits also include Motown: The Musical and Young Stella in the 2019 return of Follies
Natasha Leaver
Natasha Leaver has performed in the West End since 2017 and is in the original ensemble of the Broadway revival of Evita, opening at New York’s Winter Garden Theatre in 2027. Her credits include The Bullet and cover Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton at the Victoria Palace Theatre, Florence Ballard in Motown: The Musical and Fermina in Man of La Mancha at the London Coliseum. After training as a teacher in 2022, she founded Musical Theatre Masterclass, coaching young performers in acting, dance and singing.
Cherelle Williams
Cherelle Williams trained at the Sylvia Young Theatre School and made her West End debut as Young Nala in The Lion King at the Lyceum Theatre. She originated the role of Mary Wilson in the West End production of Motown: The Musical, stayed for its full three-year run, and regularly covered Diana Ross. She won rave reviews as Dorothy in The Wiz, directed by Matthew Xia.
Natalie Andreou
Natalie Andreou played Sherrie in Rock of Ages at the Shaftesbury Theatre from its London opening in 2011, later returning to the role. She went on to become standby Elphaba in Wicked in the West End. Her other credits include Mamma Mia! in the West End and on film, and UK tours of Evita and Footloose. She was also a contestant on the BBC’s Over the Rainbow.
Richard Morse
Richard Morse is an actor and singer from the Black Country who trained at LIPA. Most recently, he appeared in the BBC’s We Go Again (2024) and in Flowers for Mrs Harris (2023). He spent four years with School of Rock, in the West End and on the UK and Ireland tour, where he was first cover for Dewey Finn. Earlier, he played Max Bialystock in The Producers on its international tour and Brian in Avenue Q. He is a high baritone and also plays guitar and bass.
Duane Lamonte
London-born singer and actor Duane Lamonte trained at the Anna Scher Theatre and WAC Performing Arts. His West End credits include The Lion King, Motown: The Musical, Hairspray and Daddy Cool, and he performed in The Lion King: Rhythm of the Pride Lands at Disneyland Paris. He came to wider attention on The X Factor in 2009 and later partnered Jessica Wright on Dance Dance Dance. He leads EMBA’s Lion King workshops.
TRASH
BAND
Students build percussion instruments from waste and rehearse as a coordinated ensemble.
Trash Band is a percussion programme for UAE schools. Students source discarded materials (car wheels, scrap metal, wood off-cuts, plastic) and build their own playable instruments. They rehearse as a coordinated ensemble, with Arabic rhythmic feels woven in, and perform at internal school events and in the community.
Why schools take it on
-
Structural alignment with ADEK NIM, MSC, We the UAE 2031, and five UN SDGs.
-
Waste that would head for landfill becomes a functional instrument the school keeps.
-
Community sourcing brings in a local garage, a carpentry workshop and a recycler.
-
Photo and video captured throughout, for the NIM portfolio and social channels.
What the school keeps
-
NIM portfolio evidence mapped to Culture, Values and Citizenship.
-
Photography and short video from build, rehearsal and performance.
-
Three community partnerships introduced and retained.
-
A working ensemble available beyond the term.
-
The instruments themselves.
How it runs
Three formats. A 90-minute taster workshop for enrichment days or sustainability weeks. A three-session build sprint ending in a short internal performance. A 12-week ECA, one 45-minute after-school session a week across a full term, at AED 90 per child per session. Group size 10 to 20 students. Workshop and build-sprint rates are quoted on application.
How to book
Use the request form on this page. We confirm availability, share a supplier pack for your finance team, and issue an invoice once the purchase order lands.
Facilitated by Tamir Karp, EMBA (FZC).
About Tamir
Tamir has been teaching music for ten years, in London and now the UAE, most recently as Director of Creative Arts at a school in Al Ain. Private tuition has run alongside throughout his life. Before teaching he spent seven years touring as a rock drummer. Three crowdfunded albums, a hundred shows a year, signed record and publishing deals.
His earliest training was classical: violin and trumpet, orchestras through his school years, before he switched to drum kit professionally. He teaches across brass, strings and percussion, and has delivered everything from beginner sessions with five-year-olds through to A-Level Music Technology and Grade 8 exam prep.
What Tamir cares about is getting students to a place where they know why they're doing what they're doing, and can take ownership of their own progress. Every lesson ends with something clear to work on. Every student leaves more capable than when they walked in.
