Latest / Making The Impact - A Dance Competition Podcast / Throwback! S2 Ep 45 - A Look At Competitive Dance Through the Years

Transcript

Throwback! S2 Ep 45 - A Look At Competitive Dance Through the Years · Making The Impact - A Dance Competition Podcast

• 0:07
  SPEAKER_02: Have you ever wondered what goes on behind the table at a dance competition?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly what are the judges looking for anyway?
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_02: This is Making the Impact, a dance competition podcast.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_02: Each week we'll cover a different topic related to the world of competitive dance from the perspective of the judges behind the table.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: Hey listeners, it's Courtney Orteens, and we are bringing back the throwback episodes in season eight.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_03: We're going all the way back to season two, episode 45, a look back at competitive dance through the years.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_03: And considering how quickly the competitive dance world continues to evolve, this one is especially fun to revisit.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_03: In this episode, Leslie and I go back in time with Ivy Augs Amber Adel code and competitive our professional dancer and teacher, 34 dogs, to remember the good old days of dance competition.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_03: We're talking about a time before multiple competition levels, endless age divisions, honorable mentions, and so many other things that today's competition dancers probably could never imagine.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_03: But this conversation isn't just about nostalgia.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_03: We dive into what growing up as a competition dancer gave us beyond the trophies, from the lessons and experiences that prepared our guests for their professional careers, and the relationships and connections that remind us just how small the dance world really is.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_03: So whether you competed in the dates of trophy built studios, or you're growing up in today's competition world, come take a trip down memory lane.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_03: Let's jump into our first throwback of season eight.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_03: Season two, episode 45, a look back at competitive dance through the years.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_03: Hi everyone, and welcome to this week's episode of Making My Own Pact.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_03: I'm your host, Courtney Ortskeys, and I'm here with my co-host Leslie Mueller.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_03: Happy New Year, everybody.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, oh my gosh, happy new year.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_03: It is 2021.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_03: Whoa.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_03: And that's just crazy to think because we had such a crazy 2020.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_02: I I don't even remember writing 2020 enough to think that it was actually a year.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: So it's like 2021 should just be fine.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_02: We should just go right into it.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think I think we can all say that we're very excited for the upcoming year ahead of us after after the 2020 that we all experienced and had.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_03: So I hope everyone had a great new year.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_03: 2021 is here.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yay! All right, everyone.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_03: It's time to meet our guests.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: And today we're actually going back in the day and reminiscing a bit about what it was like growing up as a comp kid.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm really excited about this conversation.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_03: It's going to be a lot of fun hearing from our two lovely guests who are joining us.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_03: And they actually are both brand new to the podcast.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_03: You've never heard them on here yet.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: They're brand, brand new, and I'm so excited to have both of them.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm very excited to introduce our first guest.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_03: She is a brand new judge to our roster, the IDA judging roster.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_03: And I've known this lovely lady uh for a long time.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_03: Actually, we go way back in the New York City dance scene.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_03: I'm so excited to welcome Amberna Delcove to the podcast.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_03: Hi, thank you.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_03: So, so glad you are here, and I'm so excited to have you on the roster this season and to get to reconnect with you again like this because it's been so long.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_03: I haven't even seen you in so many years.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: I know.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: I think we like randomly saw each other when we were judging different competitions in Myrtle Beach like five years ago.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh, yes.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_03: You were, I think, doing um maybe Star Power Nationals and we were doing Star Talent Nationals, and it was like Sean Webb, Marissa.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my god, it's totally remote.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: I grew up with Sean.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: I competed with Sean Webb.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: We grew up with he went to my studio for a few years.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my god.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: I love this.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_03: I love this small dance world.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: Sushi brought us all together.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_03: Well, Amber, since you are new to the pod, if you wouldn't mind sharing a little bit about yourself, where you grew up, and any career credits that you want to share now and what you're currently working on.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, currently I am focusing a lot of my time on just like education with kids and virtual teaching.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: But I grew up my whole life in Central Florida, in Daltona.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: So it kind of sits between Daytona and Orlando.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: So we grew up competing kind of in Orlando and in Daytona, very lucky to grow up there.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: Very lucky to have every kind of major competition at the time come through the area.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: But I was diehard competition kid from like 92 to 2003, so about 11, 11, 12-ish years, give or take.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And ever since then, I've just kind of done a lot of different things: cruise ships, theme parks, lived in New York, lived in Nashville, did a bunch of music videos in Nashville, did like some TV show pilots that never aired, but they were really, really fun to do.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's a it's an interesting experience to go through like the pilot creation and then go, this is awesome.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: Never mind.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's somewhere somewhere.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's totally fine.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: But it's a really cool learning experience nonetheless.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I never thought I'd end up back in Orlando, and here I am.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: I worked at Universal for a few years.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of opened and closed the final version of the Beetlejuice graveyard uh review show there, which was my dream show from when I was nine.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: I love monsters, I love horror.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, that's for me.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna be dead on that stage anytime.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: So, and then that venue closed, and then I opened up the newest castle show at Magic Kingdom called Mickey's Royal Friendship Fair.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: So that's kind of where I've lived for the last four and a half years.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: Never thought it was gonna be a thing.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: It took me about 13 years to get a job at Disney, 12 and a half years of auditioning, 13 years before I signed a contract with them.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: So that's that's dedication.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: It you know, it is, and but I I think that's proof in just saying that timing is everything and you're what you're meant to have happens in the time you're supposed to have it, you know.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: I saw so many people get that job, but my first job there was backup dancing for Disney's descendants for Christmas filming, and then from there I just kind of stayed with Disney, and I'm still currently there technically, and shows aren't really back yet, but once that comes back, we're very hopeful and I'm hopeful to kind of grow with the company.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: And my goal is to be like a casting director or show director within the parks a little bit.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and another thing that I love is I actually teach like the youth program dance workshops, and I've choreographed for them at Universal.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm still with all those.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yeah, that's a little bit.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: I love it.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's so great.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: You've done so much.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's been good.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: Orlando can be really, really nice if you know where to look.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_03: Awesome.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I'm so happy to have you here.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_03: So thanks for joining us.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_03: All right, and our next guest that I'm really excited to introduce you to is a friend, a teaching friend of mine that I met many years ago up in New England.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_03: We were teaching together, and she is so lovely.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_03: I got to catch up with her a few years ago when I was out west, and I'm so excited to welcome Clarice Ordaz to the podcast.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: Hi, everybody.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_03: Hi, thanks, Courtney, for having me.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_03: Of course, this is so exciting.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_03: We're I'm I'm really happy to have you join.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_03: And I was thinking of who do I know that grew up in the comp world?
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_03: And then I was like, oh yeah, Clarice.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_03: And especially because you were on the West Coast, I'm so excited to hear your journey because I feel like we all like Amber's nailing Florida, Clarice is nailing the West Coast.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_03: I'm in like the you know, Maryland areas where I grew up.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_03: You were in the South as well.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_03: We're all gonna have very different perspectives of this comp world that we grew up in.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm super excited to hear all about yours.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_03: And Clarice, if you don't mind, sharing with all of the listeners out there a little bit about you and where you grew up, where you're based, and what you're currently working on, and any career credits that you want to share, because I know you've done a lot.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I grew up in Los Angeles, California.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: I've been so blessed to be one of, it's like, you know, they say you're kind of a unicorn when you come from LA and you're dancing in LA because everyone comes to LA from other places.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: So that's been really nice.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I grew up training in Orange County, so I got the best of both worlds in that too.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up as a competition kid, uh, went to high school at a very competitive dance team school.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I got like dual competition under my belt for sure.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: And after that, I was training at Cal State Long Beach in their dance department, and I auditioned for So You Think You Can Dance.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: And on my second, my second try, I made all the way to top 10, and that was just like a huge blessing.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: The biggest, I mean, that was the end all be-all for me.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was literally all I needed to do, and then I was done with life.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: But that's you know, that's not that's the reality of a 19-year-old brain.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I just and and and it was literally, it was the best experience.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: I met some of my best friends on that, and we we still are very close.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: We got to tour uh North America and Canada, and it was my first tour experience.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: It was just so amazing, and that basically catapulted me into my professional career.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't even know that I needed it, but I that was sort of my first experience.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: So since then, I've been auditioning, and about a year or two after, so you think, I booked an even bigger tour, an even bigger experience that I didn't know I needed either.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I toured with Taylor Swift for a year and a half, two years, and that was the most incredible experience.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: I've also done films like Lola Land and Vice.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: I know Amber was talking about those pilots that never get shown, and you're like, whoa, I did that.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: But so Vice was a similar experience.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: We filmed this uh scene that was like kind of a dance scene in in the middle of this political movie, and it was choreographed by Andy Blake and Bueller, who is amazing, incredible.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: One of my one of my favorite jobs ever.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_03: I remember you telling me about this job.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, it was so amazing.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and it just didn't it just didn't make the cut.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: And when I saw it in December as one of my screeners that I get for SAG, I was like, oh my gosh, we're not in it.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: We're not all that worked.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what is that scene?
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: I know, but it was in they put it in like the deleted scenes on the like DVD.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_02: So somebody saw it.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's all good.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody saw it, people are seeing it.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's still it's all good.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: And you got paid.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: I've done, and I did get paid, and I'm I am getting residuals from the city.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: I was gonna ask that.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: I was curious.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: I was shocked, but I I did I am, I'm still getting those.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: I also do theater in LA, so the LA scene is a lot.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, sorry, the theater scene in LA is a lot smaller than New York, but they do happen.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: And McCoy Rigby Entertainment is a big company in LA for theater.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I did West Side Story in 2017, and that I mean, I I've done theater in the past with like Lithgow Pantos, Things in the Holiday, but this was singing and dancing, and it was full theater, and I and I was total newbie, but I didn't know how much I was gonna love that.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I just love the live theater.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: I love live dancing, singing, challenging myself in that way.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: So since then, I work with Spencer Liff, who uh is Broadway choreographer for Head Over Heels.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: I work with him all the time in LA.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: He lives in LA and I'm kind of like his assistant when he whenever he does anything.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: And he uh choreographed and directed Singing in the Rain in 2019.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I was his associate choreographer, I was on in the ensemble, and I was dance captain, so I had a lot of roles in that.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: So yes, I love theater just as much as I love commercial work.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: They're both very different, but I'm just happy that I get to do both.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: And on top of what I do now, I also teach.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: I teach pretty consistently at two studios, which one of them is West Coast School of the Arts, that's where I grew up training, and the other one's McCoy Rigby Arts, which is the McCoy Rigby Entertainment.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's kind of like their kids program where they, I mean, they have so much like aerial musical theater dance, all of the things.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so yeah, I love again, kind of like what Amber said, just the education behind the teaching, safe dancing, all that fun stuff.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: I love giving back to you know the kids today.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's really fun.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh, y'all are so perfect for this.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_03: I love it.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_03: It's so great to to hear, you know.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_03: I I feel like I just caught up with you both, like since I don't get to see you either of you often.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_03: It's just so lovely to hear how much both of you have accomplished.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_03: So great.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you both so much for joining us.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_03: This is lovely.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_03: So happy.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_03: So excited to be here.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, so Amber, we heard a little bit about what your uh years were in the competition world.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_02: Clarice, where where do you fall in in the years of competing?
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so I was competing 1998 until 2010.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think about the same amount of time as Amber.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, like 11, 12-ish, depending on when you started.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I feel like I was there like 1997 to 2005 or six.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_03: So that we have some different generations in a way.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_03: A little less overlap, which is great because I want to hear, you know, all about that.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_02: So like what what did what did 1992 look like?
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_02: Because I think Amber, Amber and I are closer in age, but I didn't actually start competing until 1996 when I was in middle school.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: So I know like, I mean, four years in the dance competition world is huge, especially back then when things were just like ramping up and it was getting to be a thing.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_02: So, like in 1992, how old were you?
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_02: How often were you competing?
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: Where did you compete?
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_02: You know, were you doing 25 dances or were you doing a ballet tap of jazz and that was it?
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: I did a jazz dance group to wild things without the lyrics because it's a dirty, dirty song.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: And we were dressed like little seven-year-olds.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: I think I did actually send you a picture of the group.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: We're in these little black and white pull it up caveman costumes.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: And we had like bones of wild things.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: Wild things.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: So we were little like cave caveman.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: Cave people.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if there's like a politically correct way of saying it.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: But that's what we were just, and we wore, I we probably wore jazz shoes, maybe jazz boots.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: I don't remember.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, a jazz boot.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: A jazz booth.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Can't point your foot, but you gotta have them in every color.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: But we I did a group and then I did two solos, either that year or the following year.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: But my first solos were, you know, seven-year-old me.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I was seven in '92.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: I was born in '85.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: So the same age.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was seven in '92.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: And three dances.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: And if I remember correctly, I'm pretty sure there was the junior age division and then the senior age division.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: And there was no team.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: That was it.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: What's that?
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: There was no team.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: So like juniors went up to like, and I don't think three-year-olds competed back then.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I you just did not, they sat in the audience with their sis with their families.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: And you were like, I think the youngest was like six or seven.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I remember being some of the youngest.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: So I believe junior went up to like 12 or 11.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then 12 and over was maybe senior.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: I I will say we were we were a very small studio, Deltona Dance Academy in Deltona, Florida.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: Doesn't even, it's not there anymore.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: My studio owner sold it literally after we graduated.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: So like the year that I graduated was her last year owning it, and then it switch hands, switch names.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: So, but we we won like every competition.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: But we're seven, so we were like, well, why do we have to practice?
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: We just switched.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: There was no trick.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: There was no but we were seven, and it like, you know, if you think back in the day, dancers weren't quite as cool back then as they are now.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_01: Like people didn't understand dance because they didn't know what it was, you know.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like parents would be like, Why are you letting your kid dance seven days a week?
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: They're not really questioning why the boy plays athletes or plays sports every day, but people just didn't get it.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: And I think as young dancers, we grew up with like-minded people.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: And at seven, I mean, we knew we we wanted to be at the studio every day.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: So the difference was really is that it just wasn't as big, it wasn't as tricky, it it was just very much about everybody's there to compete against everybody, and how you place is how you place.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: If you get an honorable mention, cool.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: If you get a gold, silver, or bronze, cool.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but you you went there to get the paper with the handwritten critiques because there was no audio critique.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I can't wait to talk about all of that.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_03: I can't wait.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I think I think the difference in I I don't know when it went with the teen division, but I feel like it was it was middle school for me, I think.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: It was when I started in 2004.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, 96 a little later, there was definitely that happening.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_03: Because I remember when I was my first solo, which I want to hear about your first experience, Clarice, but I I remember if we're talking timeline, my first solo, I was 10.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_03: I think so I was competing against the 12 year olds and everything, because I was it was only junior.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_03: It was 12 and under at the comp that I was at.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_03: So I rem I specifically remember like placing in the top 10 and I was like, oh my gosh, like I compete like you know, it compete against everybody.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_03: And same with the teen.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, when you're 13, you're competing against 18-year-old, not teen, but I guess the senior category at that time.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_03: You're competing against people that are 18.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_03: I think that the teen category switched over a few years later because I did have a teen category when I was a teen, if that makes sense.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_03: But Clarice, what's your first first memory of comp world?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was 1998 that I was six, probably turning seven, and hot, hot, hot.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yes little ruffles on the shoulders, so much fun.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: Little headband that was just like sequence stretchy bands, you know what I mean?
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_03: Love those.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: And the wristbands, too.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, the wristbands.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: You had to have them.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, absolutely.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: My first experience was I mean, I my mom has photos of this, it's hilarious.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: I was mortified.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: I had been I've been on stage, like in recitals with tap, little baby tap since I was like two.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: But I didn't start competing until six.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: And my mom said I was just mortified.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: I did not want to go on stage, so much so that she has photos of me, and I look like I'm green, like I'm pale.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, pale, like I look sickly.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: And she said I went on because that was for the tap performance, and then I had a jazz.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: So after the tap, she said I came off.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, that was so fun.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then like the rest is history.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_04: Like, aww.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: So, and then I I just had ballet solos until I was probably 11 or 12.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, ballet solos.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I think I started ballet solos only.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: And listen, I am trying to take consistent ballet, even right now, because I just I love ballet so much.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's like I wanted to be a ballerina so bad, you know.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: I still do.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: So dreams never die.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: Don't let that dream die.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: No, honestly, honestly.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, ballet solos until I was like 11, 12.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: Then I did a lyrical solo, and that was like, I mean, lyrical.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't do lyrical until I went to my the new studio West Coast School of the Arts.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: I was only my my first studio, Belinda Zn Studio, for a couple years, and then that change of pace was a lot for me because I feel like I learned so much, and yeah, so the training at West Coast was great.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Lyrical was like love because it's like a mix of you know ballet and jazz, which is like amazing.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um so that's my first conf experience.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: I had a mental breakdown for like no reason because you already knew how to do it.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: No reason absolutely it was just the fact that it was I think it was just the fact that there was judges probably.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody hyped you up about it.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: But no, it was great, and I loved it ever since.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_03: I love hearing I love hearing all of your you know, first stories.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_03: I feel like I'm trying to think of mine.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_03: I joined our company team when I was seven, I think, where we only did one competition a year.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_03: That was like the not the competition team, it was like the step below.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_03: And then the next year I got asked to join the competition team.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_03: And then I think we did about like three comps a year, one Nationals, and my first comp ever, it was Girls on Mini Street was our dance, and we had little mini ears.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_03: Mini Mouse.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_03: Mini Mouse.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_03: Oh cute.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_03: Like we are the girls on Mini Street, and it was like a cute little, like, little.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_03: I want to hear this song.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_03: Where is it from?
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my god, my close friend Natalie did it.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it was like a little like kids poppy, like and it's just so age-appropriate and adorable.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_03: And we had the little stretchy bands on our wrist, and we had like they found us a costume that's like a cute little like skirt and like crop.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_03: I think I've seen this picture.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I probably posted it.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_03: And I wore jazz boots.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_03: I had those di those dang jazz boots on and with a sock, a ruffle sock.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_03: Oh cute.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: You had to have the ruffle sock that matched the costume.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_03: And it just uh a good old jazz boot.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_03: You can't you can't go wrong with that back in the day.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_03: They existed.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_03: People probably are like, what's that?
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_02: You can find them every now and then.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_02: Sancha makes them.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_03: But you know what?
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_03: I want to I want to talk about a little bit of what you hinted at, Amber.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_03: So we have I'm just I'm loving this so much.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_03: So uh we already talked about the fact that FYI listeners, it was junior and senior.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_03: So we talked about that.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_03: All these petite, mini, teen, all these extra categories did not exist at all back in the day.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_03: As well as levels did not exist.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_03: So I'm I'm sure everyone's mind is blown right now.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: But I remember when levels first came to be at like one competition and they placed you in like the diamond or the ruby division for nationals.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_01: You didn't compete at regionals.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: It was like they placed you.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, you're right.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was like I think it was Showbiz.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: Showbiz.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_03: That's cool.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember they placed you.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I was like, this is wild, why are Are we not all competing against each other?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_03: Because it's like based on like what you scored at regionals.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: So whatever you scored at regionals, you if you were in the higher range, you competed diamond.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if you were in the lower range, you competed Ruby.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: It didn't matter how many hours you were in the studio, they placed you based on your score.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: And so I remember it was like you worked your butt off.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I'd rather not place and get into that diamond age, that diamond division.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: You're so right.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: I forgot about that.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's really cool.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_02: I never heard of that.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not mad.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: That was the first experience, I think, of any competition doing a category.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I remember in my first year competing, we went to headliners in 1996.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_02: There were no levels, there were age divisions, but we 100% got a bronze in everything we did.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_02: And we were happy about it, you know?
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_02: That's all you could get.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's all you could be.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_02: You couldn't be unhappy about it.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_02: There just there wasn't another option.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_02: You either got one of these three awards or you didn't.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and back then, one person won.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: There could only be one winner.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: And that's how winning works.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's true.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: My goodness.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: Things have changed.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_02: But I just remember we we were very late to the competition game.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_02: My mother owns a studio and had owned it for, you know, a good 15, 20 years by then, but just never, she didn't grow up competing.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_02: She didn't know people who did it.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_02: It just wasn't a thing.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_02: But I had friends who competed.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: And so I was instrumental, I like to say, in the dancer studio performance company being created because I was like, I want to do this.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_02: Like, we want to do this.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_02: My friends want to do this.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_02: And so we did it.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: But we were a little tragic there for a while.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_02: We had, you remember those costumes that you could buy?
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_02: It was like a three-in-one.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_04: Oh yeah.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_04: But like we were in middle school.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_02: We had middle schoolers and high school or schoolers in these three in ones.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_02: It was a red, and it wasn't terrible, but compared to everybody else.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's a red sequin leotard.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_02: And we had a red, like long, like lyrical skirt.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_03: A fringe skirt?
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_02: We had no, we had a butt bow for tap.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_02: Ooh, cute.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_02: It was cute.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_02: It fit the style.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_02: And then we had Palazzo pants.
• 23:54
  unknown: Oh my god.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_02: And I love a Palazzo pant because it's like a skirt, but it's not.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_02: But but that's what you know, it was like, I'm sure the judges were like, oh god, here's comes that studio in red again.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_02: The whole all of us, the teenagers and the kids.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_02: Because we had like a junior and a senior level of kids and uh everybody had the same costume.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_02: And then we've quickly realized that, oh, that's not what you do here.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_03: It's a learning curve.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it was a learning curve.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_03: You know what though, like you saying that, I feel like that there's a lot of studios that are navigating that now.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_03: Like to this day.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_03: You know, like like just thinking about how many studios compete now that never did ever.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_02: That got pressured by somebody's daughter into doing it.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_03: You know, like pressured by the demand of like the industry of seeing dance on TV, like In So You Think, or Dance Moms or World of Dance.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_03: It's like all these studios that are like against competition or more even recreational studios are like, and the fact that there's levels now, you know, everyone's like, Oh, I gotta, I gotta jump on the bandwagon and go to a dance competition.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_03: Did we talk about honorable mention?
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_02: Not really.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: Not really.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: We we didn't dive into that.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_03: So, um, what's an honorable mention, y'all?
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_03: I don't think anyone in the competition world in 2021 even has ever heard that term in the past 20 years.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_03: What is it?
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: Well, is anybody else wanting to do that?
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody take it away.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: It is it is your participation.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: Essentially, I I I kind of chalked it up to you get this because you came here.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: You paid money.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for coming, thank you for coming.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: Keep it's kind of like the trophies today.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's like the trophies.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone gets one.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone, you like you because there were a lot of competitions back in, especially in the early 90s, where there was a first, second, and third, and then that was it in the in like the category.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: So like lyrical sellos, ages this to this.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_01: Here's your first, your second, your third.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Eventually it went to they gave like some gave gold, silver, bronze, but some didn't.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: They were like, here's the gold, the silver, the bronze of that age division, and then the rest of you get an honorable mention, like ribbon.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_02: A ribbon, yeah.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_02: You didn't even get like any physical hard heavy thing.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: It was just a ribbon, maybe without even a little loop.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_02: I remember my ribbons just that was a ribbon, it didn't have anything to hang it with.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: It didn't you had to push pin it into your bulletin board, like we still have a box of like our gold ribbons and all that stuff at my parents' house.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: My mom has all of it like bookmarked with our like the the programs and stuff.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's a lot, but so cute.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's it's a thank you for coming award on momentum.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_02: And and almost everybody got that because three three groups or three people per age group got an actual trophy, and then everybody else got a ribbon.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_02: Everybody else, I mean hundreds of people only got a ribbon.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_02: Like I think that's the the like head explosion moment I think that people will have is that you know you think about a 500-number weekend.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_03: Which they had.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_02: Like they had number competitions like that back in the day.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_02: They were they were still big comps.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: But everybody got a ribbon.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's it.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_02: Imagine if they did that now.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and there weren't the categories, right?
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: So it wasn't the levels, all of the and there were no levels.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: So you're not talking like, oh, the 30, 40 solos in I don't know, the advanced thing.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's advanced to beginner.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: If you were a beginner, you knew you were going in a beginner.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: Hopefully.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_03: And if a beginner got, you know, silver, that was awesome.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_03: Like, oh my gosh, beginner, because you're competing against advanced dancers before levels existed.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_03: And like that's the thing.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it I remember when platinum got introduced into the ranges of awards, and it it was it was so it was like, oh my god, platinum.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_03: There's something better than gold.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_03: Like, oh my god.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: There was like five a competition.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_03: You knew who was with that's so true.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_03: Right, exactly.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_03: When when someone gets a platinum, it's like, oh, okay.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_03: But but I mean, honorable mention, bronze, silver, gold.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_03: Platinum was introduced because they were like freaking out.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_03: They're like, shoot, what do we do?
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_03: Nobody's gonna come back.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_03: We need to we need to keep this going.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_03: Now look at how it's evolved since then.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: Titanium, moon rock, double diamond, double diamond, double crucible, double platinum.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_03: It's just it's so interesting how it is interesting.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_03: How we look back.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: But it all talks itself up to still gold, silver, bronze in the you know what I mean?
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: Like if you really look at it, it's just called something different.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_02: And the margins of those awards are even smaller.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_02: You know, or they make it so that a silver is like a 60 and nobody's ever, ever gonna get right, you know what I mean?
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_02: Like the point system has has gotten skewed.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_03: Young Arts is the only national organization that champions artists through their lifetime and across all art forms, feeling the ongoing vitality of the arts nationwide.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_03: Their national arts competition is open to artists of ages 15 and 18 who are currently in grades 10 through 12.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_03: Selected winners can receive patch awards, mentorship from leaders in the industry, a lifetime of professional support, and the prestigious honor of being a young arts winner.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_03: As a previous young arts winner myself, I highly recommend that you check out this fantastic program and opportunity for your dancers.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_03: It truly is lifetiming.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_03: The deadline to apply for their 2027 National Arts Competition is Tuesday, October 6th, 2026 at 8 p.m.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_03: Eastern Time.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_03: Learn more about Young Art and start your application today by clicking the link in our show notes and visiting youngarts.org slash apply.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_03: What about those written critiques that you were talking about, Amber?
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_03: What is that?
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_02: Well, what was it?
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_02: Because we couldn't understand anything they wrote because those poor judge's hands were falling off.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_03: I can't imagine writing that long.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: The first year I actually judged for UDA, we did have to write.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: Really?
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: Then the and this was this was not that long ago.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: And then the second year we had to type it.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: But the difference is with like with like the dance team competition like that, it's there's two panels per room.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_01: So like you would have an entire routine that you didn't have to watch to write switch it off.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's cool.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_01: It is it's a lot, it's really nice, it's a lot to write out, and like you better know that terminology, you better know that spelling.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_02: Better already have decent handwriting.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_02: I know.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, actually, I think I just judged at a high school dance competition as well that didn't they don't do the vocal critiques, audio critiques.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_03: They just did writing, so yeah, oh my gosh.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: So my hand was fallen off for sure.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, like, I I will say that I love that about how the industry has changed throughout the years.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_03: And I remember, like, I do remember getting those written score sheets, and then I do remember the transition of cassette tape audio judges' critiques.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_03: That was like a game changer.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_03: I came home from competition with a whole stack of cassette tapes that I couldn't wait to listen.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_03: And you got so much more out of it, the whole experience.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's really cool to like I I think I have like star power like critiques, my score sheets still like at my parents' house.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_03: And it's so cool to see like their handwriting, and it just feels really like sentimental and like personal.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_03: It feels more than like a verbal critique.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_03: So we don't get that anymore, which is where I feel like special awards kind of give that a little bit, you know, in in the comp world now.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_03: But I do remember how much it meant to like hear a judge talk to me like when that transition happened from written to to audio, and now we have video critiques.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, whoa, whoa, yeah these days to see what they saw.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_03: And that's just lovely.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think too, it's you always remember the moment when you were like, I just nailed that triple pirouette, and the judge is writing something, so they didn't see it.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they didn't see it, exactly.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: But you saw me fall out of like that PK turn over there, but you didn't see me like nail this pirouette section, you know.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's it was, I think it it's they get we see their eyes more.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like we got to see their eyes for the first time the entire routine.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I will say my dance, one of my dance teachers, we got a perfect score of one of like one of one judge gave us like a perfect score and she framed it.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: Oh it's hanging in at our studio.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh uh still.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's that.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's so cool.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: From 2000 2002?
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my god.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: Dude, I would have hung it up too.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: I would have made copies.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, it's like it's like rhinestoned, like the frames rhinestone.
• 32:43
  unknown: Fabulous.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh, that's awesome.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_03: What an I mean, what an achievement.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_03: It's just it's just so cool.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: Because you never know, like, you know, people you hear so often that some teachers don't even listen to critiques, and some people, some people just like pish posh them and they're like, oh whatever.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_02: We're we just went to win or whatever.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_02: But it's like moments like that, it's like, no, you made a difference as a judge.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_02: You like, you know, that's still hanging in your studio 20 years later.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_02: That's amazing.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I mean, it's I preach it to like my students is that you're not paying for the trophy, you're paying for the critiques, right?
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: That's why you go to competition is to get professionals to critique you on how to be better so that when it's your turn to step into the professional world, you can take those because I feel like we had those judges.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_01: So that's the judge like I think we all try to be.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: You know, yeah, there was always something.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I I remember having having a tape, and I, because my mom was a studio owner, I got to listen to all of them on the way home.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_02: Like everybody else had to wait, but I was like, nope, nope, we're putting them in right now.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_02: Like, let's listen.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_02: And I just remember there being, you know, occasionally there was one judge who just, you know, we were we weren't good like at all.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um we had we had a lot of you know rough beginnings there, and but there was always somebody who was just really encouraging and saw something, you know, in the group or and would say it.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_02: And it was just nice to like hear that and have that be personalized, like you said.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_03: I think that's the other like another thing that's that's changed for when we're talking about like the critiques in general.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_03: I mean the evolution from written to audio to now video.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_03: You know, the thing the thing that's changed with how we approach listening to critiques has is very different.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_03: I remember when that that switch happened to cassette tapes, but my teacher didn't let me listen to them.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_03: But when we would have rehearsal, the teacher pre-screened the uh critiques from the judges and listened on their own time or before rehearsal, or took notes and then applied the corrections.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_03: We didn't like huddle around the boom box and put the cassette in and listen to the critiques in c during class time.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that it's different now.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_03: I think that it's that's what people do now is okay, let's spend the first 15 minutes listening to the critiques from the judges.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_03: So ever all of the judges' feedback is now presented in a very different way in in competition than it used to be.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_03: I think it used to be a lot more harsh.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_03: I think it used to be a a lot more geared towards the teacher and not the dancer.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that is also something that's been hard to like navigate as a judge, and even me running a judging company for people to to know how to how to do that in in the new world of judging.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_02: Especially if you grew up as a comp kid.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_02: You know, some of our judges didn't, some of our judges didn't, and they're both of them are valuable people to have.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, for the people who grew up like that, I think it was kind of a a mind shift to be like, oh, okay, I have to remember who I'm talking to right now.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_03: It was for me.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, because I it was only a small transitional time between like when I ended comp and then when I started judging comp.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_03: I think I ended like 16 years old, and then like six years later, I was somehow behind the table judging.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: You didn't compete your senior year?
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_02: What?
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_02: How do I not know this?
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_03: I have known you for 12 years and I didn't know this.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_03: I so background and I want to hear your guys, I want to talk more about like our experiences, but like I grew up at comp kid my whole life, and in Maryland, we were called Hotshots.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_03: That's what we were called.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_03: So if anyone's listening and grew up in the Maryland dance team, you might know us.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_03: But we were we had a million names.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_03: We were called Hotshots National Dance Team, we were called Dance Dynamics, we were called MCPA, Mid Atlantic Center for the Performing Arts.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_03: We have a million names.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_03: They're called Mid-Atlantic now, that's what they're called.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_03: But Hardcore Comp Kid, and my goal was to win a trophy taller than me.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_03: That was my goal my entire life.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_03: I'd go to nationals and I'd see those like three million feet tall trophies, and I was like, I want one.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_03: Like, that's what I want.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm short, I'm only 5'2.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_03: Actually 5'1.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_03: So I that was like that was what I wanted to achieve.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_03: And I always wanted to win like a national title or something at nationals because I think the other thing about how nationals has changed is okay, we are limit no levels.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe we have age divisions now, maybe we have teen and senior now.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_03: Great, whatever.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_03: But there weren't as many competitions 20 years ago that there are now.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_03: So when it was a nationals, it was a nationals.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, like you were competing against the best dancers across the country, not just people down the street in your area.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_03: It wasn't like I feel like nationals have now turned into like a giant regionals.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_03: A giant regional with maybe somebody from three states over.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_03: Like people aren't traveling.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_03: I remember going to Ocean City Nationals for Star Power, and I remember studios from California.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_03: They were there.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_03: And that was like, oh my gosh, you know, it's like the first time that you're seeing dancers from it's all over the country.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_03: That's what it's about.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_03: So I ended up not doing my senior year because when I was 16, I achieved my goal of winning a trophy taller than me.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_03: And winning a nationals.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_03: So you're like, I'm done now.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I was and like all my best friends at the studio were two years older than me.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_03: So they're graduating that year.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_03: Like Alexa and my and some of my best friends.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_03: So I was like, Who am I gonna dance with?
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_02: So what so what did you do?
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_02: You took class though, right?
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_03: I think I took a year off.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_03: I took class and then my senior year, I did like dual enrollment with the Towson University, and I got college credit and took class at Towson.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_03: So I stopped competing pretty much when I was 16.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_00: I was that was such a different experience for me.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to keep competing until Claire.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_03: So tell me about yours, Clarity.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_03: So I want to hear you too a little bit more about your comp world life.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, uh, same thing.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: I my junior year, I also won a trophy by G and I won Rainbow's title of Dancer of the Year, and they send me to Australia to compete at their like sister competition.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: Period over there.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's so cool.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: That's amazing.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: And they paid for my dad to go with me, and I was there for like two weeks, and the owner of my studio and her daughter also went, and we competed a duet that I we learned like I mean, it felt like two days.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: I did three solos, she did a couple solos, and we had the like it was it was my first time out of the country, and it was like the time of my life, but I wanted more, like I wanted that again.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_00: I I just I loved I I it made me a very competitive person.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's from the beginning.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: I just it's like that's what I think is so great about the competition world and being growing up a comp kid, is it gives you that competitive drive that you need for professional world because that's kind of what it is.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: Every audition is sort of like your shot to go out there and prove it.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, so I I just loved it so much.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: And again, I I also competed in high school like on the high school dance team as well.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I just I loved it.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: I literally ate every second up.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_03: When your studio, I mean, I feel like a lot of people probably know the name of your studio and know of them because I feel like I remember that name growing up in the comp world.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_03: Do you feel like how many group routines did you have?
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_03: How much did you train?
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_03: You guys would have, I guess if levels existed back then, would have probably been in advanced level.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, absolutely.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we were in advanced levels.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think probably my first year at West Coast, I was 10, 9, 10.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_00: We were like like Amber mentioned, I was in the Ruby category at Nationals, but we won everything.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: So it was like my it was sort of we were working our way up, and uh we were I was in the competitive levels uh all throughout high school.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I was dancing almost every day, I think Sundays and Thursdays and Fridays off, which actually seems like a a lot of time off now in my head.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_00: But they scrunched all the rehearsals.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like I would be in at the studio until 10:30 on uh while I was in high school for these rehearsals.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I was probably in like 10 routines, if you're counting solos and trios and and things, and we did quite quite a few competitions a year, three, three regionals in a national, but then on top of that, there was like the optional solo competition regional.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_00: And then my mom would always sign me up to try to do.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there were years in my middle school and early high school years where I was doing two nationals because it just they just happened to be at the same time in Vegas, and so I do my studio nationals, and then I would run back and do Hall of Fame nationals for my solo, and then like I made a battle.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_00: So then I mean, literally, I was like running in the car.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_00: My mom had the car out in front, jump in, go to the other hotel, go on stage, run back.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was madness, but that's what we did, and like it just I wouldn't have it any other way, it's just madness, and that's life.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, my mom, my mom really we we went.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_02: Did your mom love it?
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_02: Like, was she all for it?
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_00: All for it.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_00: She grew up a dancer as well, but she grew up not in the same way, she grew up uh like a Mexican, there is a Mexican dance called Balet Focorico.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_00: So she grew up doing that, and I think she's always just wanted to be a dancer.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_00: It didn't really happen for her.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_00: She echo, she got a little scared.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: She she mentioned this to me a couple years back.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, What?
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know that.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: This makes a lot of sense now.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, she really she really got me there with her dedication to it because again, like you said, so many people don't understand it.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_00: And even, you know, even family was like, Why do you have your daughter dancing so much?
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what is she what are you guys doing?
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: And then it wasn't until So You Think happened where these people see me on this like platform and they're like, they're like, it paid off.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_02: I see.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's why she couldn't come to family reunion or the graduation or the whatever.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: It really was like dance is my life.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, or came late and your hair's still parties.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_03: What's that?
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we I mean, I feel like we had I feel lucky to say that like towards my high school time, I was talking about this with my mom earlier.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_03: Like, my mom really wanted me to be a normal kid too.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_03: It you know, it's it's hard to balance dance if you're taking dance seriously, you know.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_03: Like, we're talking advanced level dancers here, we're talking dancers who know that they probably are gonna pursue this.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_03: And and I knew I did, and uh, but at the same time, I knew I wanted to be like a kid and a teenager, and I had the choice when I was younger to either go to my arts high school in Baltimore called Baltimore School for the Arts, or to go to my down the street high school.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_03: And I picked the down the street high school because I wanted to go to football games and I wanted to like go to a normal prom and you know, I don't know, just like the things that you don't get at like a arts high school that and it was like we are so the same in that.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: And you know what I weirdly I I weirdly regret it.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_03: I do.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_03: I look back and I regret it a little bit because I'm I'm curious to know like how much my how better my technique would have been if I would have been doing that.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_03: Or, you know, you always look back and think, like, if I just did this one thing slightly different, what would my life be like now?
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_03: In a weird way I regret it, but at the same time I don't because my mom was really great at like making sure that I I had my Fridays off and I could go like hang out with my high school friends and be like a normal kid.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that's important to like kind of figure out how to juggle in this competitive dance world.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_01: I think that teaches that taught me j anyways at a young age, like work life balance because I treated I didn't understand that kids had jobs in high school.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_01: So to me, because I was always dancing, right?
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_01: So I was like, What do you mean you have a job?
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_01: But we we treated dance like a job, but through middle school I did dance seven days a week because I didn't not want to be in my like if if the Sunday.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'd leave church, I'd go to dance.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's just what I did.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted, I wanted extra ballet privates.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to get better at my technique.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: If there was a night I wasn't scheduled classes, I asked to assist classes that night.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_01: My mom was like, Do you not want a day off?
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I don't.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: I really don't.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_01: So high school was similar because I we got Fridays off in high school for football games.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_01: So we didn't have to dance on Fridays, but we were still there at like 8 or 9 a.m.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_01: on Saturday mornings to take our Saturday morning ballet class into our full day of competition rehearsals.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I my mom had asked, like, do you want to do a performing arts high school like your last two years?
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_01: Do you want to go give that a go?
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I was just like, No, I think I always knew I was gonna not be normal in life because it's not a normal, we're not normal people.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: The way that we live inside of our careers, we're very different.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I think I knew I wanted to take those last few years of normalcy and just absorb it.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I graduated at 17 anyways, so like I I did end up going to college for two years for dance just because I couldn't really work until I was 18, anyways, and then I didn't think about not finishing.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, nah, it's two years, I'll just do it, you know.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_01: But it's I I just remember like people would be like, You're sacrificing so much.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, No, you're asking me to sacrifice what I love because you think I should go to the skating rink.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm I'm curious what y'all miss about like back in the day.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_02: Like personally, I miss just it feeling I don't know, it felt more important somehow, I think, because it was the stakes were a little higher.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_02: Competition.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas now it just absolutely just the way that I that I've seen people react to it, just being a judge on stage, like you go and give awards, and the kids are just they just don't seem t to care that much.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_02: And and I remember just caring so much, right?
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_02: You know, because we didn't go, we went to two a year and no nationals, I've never been to a nationals.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_02: My studio still doesn't do nationals.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_02: And so like to me, that two those two events were really important to me.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, and I feel like I look around now and it's just it's just a thing people do for seemingly no reason.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm I miss that like importance.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_00: I would agree, I would agree with that.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's so true.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_03: I mean it it's kind of like what I was mentioning before about nationals.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, you looking back 20 years ago, and there were a handful of competitions.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_03: There weren't 200 plus that there are now in the industry.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_03: So that means that you know it winning a national title in the intermediate category.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, when we add how many competitions, then we add levels.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_03: The levels have created multiple competitions within that event.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_03: So, like, you're not competing against everyone that attended.
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_03: If there's a thousand entries, you might be competing against 300 and it's a mini regional, you know.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_03: So it like you said, Leslie, the stakes were higher because of the format of the event and how many less events there were to attend.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_03: So the best of the best were showing up, and that was your competition, and that's a huge achievement to win in any place, or not even win, just get 10th, you know, whatever.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_03: Because the talent was I mean, I will say the talent now is unbelievable at competition.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_03: Like the way that the talent caliber has shifted to like like unbelievable I seven-year-olds, eight-year-olds that are doing things I could only imagine.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, things we can't even I can't even do now.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_02: Like as a professional.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_03: But I I think that it is it is different stakes.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_03: It's it's it's different.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_01: It is.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I think like when I was in the the highest part of our competition, like I I have a very kind of opposite story.
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_01: Like I was never first place overall winner from my studio.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_01: I only really won or placed in the top 10 when I competed away from my studio.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_01: But we had some like dance prodigies at my studio, so but we, you know, I think my busiest year, I did 12 dances.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_01: So it was like 10 groups and a duet plus two solos.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's a lot.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think I might have been like 11 or 12.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a lot.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_01: But I remember as a kid wanting to compete to be on stage more than once a year.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_01: Like that was the only way in Deltona, Florida, that I was going to guarantee myself to be on stage more than once or twice a year, you know?
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so we did sometimes do four or five regionals and we always did at least two nationals.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_01: But we as a studio, I remember the competitions being big because there's only so many.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: Then when smaller ones started to come around, we didn't love it as much because there weren't as many studios there.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: We wanted to compete.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: We wanted to earn the win.
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_01: We loved going up against the our rival studios and battling it out on stage for that win and knowing that we took extra ballet.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_01: We've been putting in the time on our technique, which that's another thing that I just ballet needs to just be it needs a major comeback in the competition world because it's so important.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_01: And that is your future in the career, you know.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_01: But like I was I was the back row dancer, I was not a favorite of my studio owner, but I loved versatility.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_01: So like I did a ballet solo one year.
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_01: I knew it wasn't gonna win, but I was like, I just kind of want to do it, so I'm gonna do it.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I I think when you when I think back and I miss I miss competing, but wanting to earn the win.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_01: And knowing when you knowing that if you were standing neck and neck with that other studio, whoever won, you were okay with it because you could see why you were both standing there.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_01: And if you've messed up, you weren't gonna win.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, now I think it's like a well, it's it's it's more of a who knows who within the studios as to who's ending up in groups, and there's some really talented kids in some studios that I feel just get overshadowed.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, but that's a performer, and I want to see the performers come out.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_01: I, you know, I think you had mentioned on a previous podcast, I don't really care about how many leg catch turns you can do if you can't do a chasse ball change or a or a proper soda shaw.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah, I'm gonna score you lower if you do 14 pirouettes, but you can't do a proper soda.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like I think also, I mean, going back to what Amber was saying about the rival studio, it's just like hearing that and knowing that there was no social media before a certain time.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like, how how does Rival Studio become to be?
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you just saw them at competitions, and it's word of mouth, even if they were across the country or further in distance, and you know knew they were gonna come to nationals, and that's like the stakes were so high.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't there weren't any other footage of them or anything else out there.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_00: It was just how you performed in that one moment was like she said, it's like if you messed up, well, you're done.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like that would there's the stakes were just so high.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_02: I remember like the kids I was always I wanted to compete more, it just wasn't what our studio did.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_02: But I just remember looking up to some of the people that I saw regularly, and it was like, oh, there's Dance Art Center.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_02: And Dance Art Center in Atlanta is one of the best studios in the state.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_02: Like anytime you saw them, you knew you were like, Oh, I'm so ready for these dancers.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_02: And there's a guy who the man who owns it, or one of the men who owns it, just passed away recently.
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_02: And looking at my Facebook feed and seeing how many people from my past were influenced, and and maybe had never even met him, but had seen his dancers, it was like it was amazing how much influence he had just over the community over so many years.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_02: And there's still a like a premier studio in the city.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_02: And it's just like people influenced you at competitions more than you realized.
• 51:34
  SPEAKER_02: Because it's even to this day, I can remember dances and and certain people who are still successful in their careers now.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_02: It's like, oh yeah, you guys were doing the thing, and all you had was, you know, the one number you saw them do, and they were still just that important and that, you know, influential.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think for me, because again, I can always relate back to saying I wasn't like the top scorer at my studio, but I was the kid that at three years old knew what I wanted to do with my life, walked off stage after my first recital and said, I'm doing this for the rest of my life.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_01: I love this.
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think what growing up in competition, especially in a place like Deltona, that there's houses and schools and grocery stores, and that's it.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_01: So, like, if I wasn't dancing there, then I was probably hanging out at the skating rink.
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_02: The aforementioned skating rink.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_01: The aforementioned skating rink.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_01: I it gave me great education.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_01: I had a, you know, our studio director, the studio owner, our main choreographer, she was brilliant.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_01: And as I got older, I had another teacher who kind of took me under her wing and just gave me versatile dances.
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_01: I never my solos for me were not about winning.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_01: And I I kind of hate saying that on a podcast about competition, but my my solos for me were always about growth and getting that feedback and what can I do better in this genre or in this style, and where is my strength and what do I need to put more work into, you know?
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_01: So education in the dance world and just being exposed to more teachers because we did a ton of conventions as well, and we did a lot of convention competitions.
• 53:00
  SPEAKER_01: So, like Tremaine back in the day was like massive, you know, West Coast Dance Explosion, all those ones.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think just exposure.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: We we traveled and competed like in LA, in Texas, in South Carolina.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_01: We didn't just stay in Orlando because you did start to see towards the end the same studios over and over.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_01: So we wanted to go when we were like 10, we wanted to go to LA and we wanted to see where we stood, you know.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: So we we would do that.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that I learned how to have a thick skin pretty, pretty young.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_01: I was very passive.
• 53:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so if I felt I was being given something unfairly at my studio, my parents were always like, This is your thing.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_01: You need to go have a conversation with her.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_01: You need to sit down and ask the questions.
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_01: And if you don't want to do that, then you suck it up.
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_01: But I learned rejection, which sounds so negative, but I don't think it is negative in our industry.
• 53:55
  SPEAKER_01: I think rejection is lessons for us as dancers, right?
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_01: Every rejection is just a step towards where you're meant to be.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I learned rejection very, very young.
• 54:05
  SPEAKER_01: I learned how to take that and to go, it can either crush me or it can push me.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I chose when I was like eight years old to let it push me.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I kept that mentality all through my career, hence 12 and a half years of auditioning produced me before I got the job, you know.
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think it's a both a pro and a con, right?
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_01: Because there's it's always a political side to studio life, and you either can see it or you don't, but I think navigating that and understanding that that's just part of life is super important, you know, getting to take from teachers that back in the day, like I mean, like Mia Michaels, before she was Mia Michaels, we were she was coming to our studio, you know, so certain certain things of being exposed.
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then I think the cons was just throwing so much emphasis on tricks and then recognizing as I got out into the real world that I needed to be the performer.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't it didn't matter if I could do a triple pirouette or six pirouettes at that Disney audition or at that you know cruise ship audition or at that TV show audition, it mattered that I could perform and engage and bring the audience into my performance with me.
• 55:17
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's spot on.
• 55:19
  SPEAKER_02: I love that.
• 55:20
  SPEAKER_00: For me, I think some of the pros of growing up a competitive dancer and transitioning that into the a professional world has been just being a team player.
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said, I was on dance team as well as the the comp team at West Coast School of the Arts.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, we were a family.
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_00: We were like siblings practically.
• 55:40
  SPEAKER_00: And we, I mean, not to mention we were with each other all the time, but at competitions, like it really was like we had to rely on each other.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like nobody, nobody could mess up.
• 55:51
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody couldn't put the same amount of passion as the next person or the less amount of passion than the next person.
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone had to have that passion and drive together.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_00: And also working with choreographers, sometimes on occasion, we would have guest choreographers come in, and that was really important to execute their piece to their liking.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it didn't matter what we were training in on the daily, weekly, but you know, these choreographers coming in, you better be down to the detail with how they want it to be.
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that was a really good preparation for professional world because I mean, we're always working with different people, and you just gotta do what they want, their vision.
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that's like the biggest thing is team player.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_00: You have to work with everybody, you have to be kind to people.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I mean, the discipline and the etiquette that we had growing up was amazing.
• 56:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I tried instill that in my kids, and and it is hard to get to these kids with some of these things.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you cannot be laughing at kids, your your teammates.
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why do you think you can laugh?
• 56:52
  SPEAKER_00: I get that they're teenagers, but don't don't be a bully.
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like, this is not what this is about.
• 56:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is about being a team, and we we can all rise up together if somebody is knocking someone down, then we all crash.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_00: So that's I think a huge thing for me.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_00: The cons, it just depends where you grew up training.
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_00: But I think when people say, ooh, you're a comp dancer, they think first and foremost of lack of creativity because a lot of the professional world is, you know, I mean, a lot of contemporary and professional world is like, I mean, creativity and improv was a big thing is a big thing.
• 57:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't grow up doing that so much.
• 57:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so for me, that was like the one of the harder things to do.
• 57:35
  SPEAKER_00: I am very versatile now, but getting into the professional world, I didn't do as much hip-hop as, you know, some other people.
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_00: But I did have the training as far as technique.
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_00: So that I had as an advantage.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_00: I just had to be open-minded and know that I'm still a student at 28 and still have things to learn.
• 57:54
  SPEAKER_00: But that's again, like Amber said, it's all your mindset.
• 57:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like you just have to go in and know that everyone is on the same page, everyone's learning all these different things at each audition, at each job.
• 58:04
  SPEAKER_00: And um, yeah, but I mean, but then there's some studios that like went to con that still and did go to conventions every weekend and they were learning from choreographers.
• 58:12
  SPEAKER_00: That just wasn't my experience.
• 58:14
  SPEAKER_00: We I probably went to like two conventions growing up, which is definitely different than even what Amber was saying.
• 58:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like I didn't, I didn't know what Tremaine was until after probably I graduated.
• 58:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so but you know, there are those studios out there that did have that diverse training, got the hip-hop groups, like all that stuff.
• 58:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it just depends where you grew up.
• 58:32
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you just if you didn't have that sort of diverse training, and you just gotta be open-minded in the professional world and know that you got a a lot to learn because every job is always be a student.
• 58:43
  SPEAKER_00: Always be a student.
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I always constantly tell my kids.
• 58:47
  SPEAKER_00: I tell my kids all the time.
• 58:49
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 58:50
  SPEAKER_01: Dance is always evolving.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_01: And can I just tag one thing on?
• 58:54
  SPEAKER_01: I love what you said about being a teammate.
• 58:56
  SPEAKER_01: I preach to my kids and to my workshops to that they get to wake up every day and they get to do this, right?
• 59:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, nobody's nobody's forcing you.
• 59:04
  SPEAKER_01: You get to do this.
• 59:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like, how lucky are you, especially right now, especially through you know, through this past year.
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_01: Like, if we get to do this, we need to respect everybody else who's walking in that door to do it with us, and we have to take each other on that journey.
• 59:20
  SPEAKER_03: Thanks for tuning in to our throwback episode, all about a look back into competitive dance through the year.
• 59:26
  SPEAKER_03: Huge shout out to our guests, Amber and Clary, for joining us.
• 59:31
  SPEAKER_03: Be sure to follow them on Instagram.
• 59:33
  SPEAKER_03: You can find Amber at dance and 678 and Clary at 88Clur8.
• 59:42
  SPEAKER_02: Don't forget to follow Making the Impact anywhere you listen to podcasts.
• 59:46
  SPEAKER_02: And news for season 8, we're on video.
• 59:48
  SPEAKER_02: Check us out on YouTube by searching for Impact Dance Adjudicators.
• 59:52
  SPEAKER_02: And if you want more exclusive episodes, support our podcast by joining our Platinum Premium membership for only$5 a month.
• 59:58
  SPEAKER_02: Subscribers receive free Making the Impact stickers, shoutouts live on the air, add free listening, and exclusive access to our two-day episodes or members only.
• 1:00:07
  SPEAKER_02: Join now at ImpactDanceEdjudicators.com slash Platinum Premium or click the link in our show notes.com and stay tuned next week for some more fantastic episodes of the Night on the Impact Podcast.
• 1:00:29
  SPEAKER_03: We'll see you then.