Aug 18 2014
0

immaBEAST DVD

By | Dance, Friends | One Comment
Sparkles Lund and Will Adams Willdabeast

Willdabeast

 

A few weeks ago, WilldaBeast (Will Adams) invited all of the lilBEASTS (including me) to come film Year 2 of his immaBEAST instructional DVD. For those of you who have no idea what any of this means, I joined a hip hop crew called lilBEASTS recently, click here to learn more about it, but if you’re only confused about the DVD part, I will fill you in now!

Instructional DVD’s can be used for anything from “How to Knit” to “How to Dance” which in my case is the purpose. In this instructional DVD, Willdabeast teaches a ton of his dances that he originally taught in class. I think its really great because if you live far away, but you want to take a class from WilldaBeast, you can!  He offers it to hip hop dancers and aspiring hip hop dancers around the globe to have the chance to take class from him even if you don’t live in Los Angeles where he lives and teaches. His video from last year just hit 30 Million views – so you can understand the quality I am talking about.

The way that lilBEASTS is involved is we assist him for one of the dances, to the song, “Get Me Bodied” by Beyónce. It was really fun, because most of us (including myself) didn’t know the dance yet, so it was like a private class just for us! The choreography was a little bit challenging, but I picked it up quickly. The dance was hip hop, but it was a little bit sassy too. I mean, come on, you can’t not be sassy when you’re dancing to Beyónce! Man, I love that girl. Anyway back to the point, we spent about an hour filming, and then we were finished! That was the end of yet again, another amazing day with all the lilBEASTS and WilldaBeast.

I hope you enjoyed learning about when I filmed an instructional DVD with WilldaBeast!  If you would like to pre-order the video you can click here!  It will help raise money for WilldaBeast and all of his amazing dance efforts!   Tell me what you think of the video after you buy it!

Here is the Trailer

 

 

Aug 09 2014
1

Chonique Sneed Releases New Single LET IT GO

By | Dance, Friends, Stuff I Like | No Comments

Lisette Bustamante and Chonique SneedIf you are reading my blog, you are probably a dancer, and you probably know Chonique Sneed. She is one of my favorite teachers and choreographers. She was born in Hollywood and started dancing at the age of 8 – which is about the time that I started to take dancing seriously. She is an adult now, and tours the nation with Hollywood Connection on the faculty. She and choreographer, Lisette Bustamonte, also with Hollywood Connection, mentor a group of teen dancers each year to grow in character and confidence. The program is called Creating Opportunities or, Creating Opps for short. From them I have learned that there is a difference between dancing and being a dancer. Dancers are strong, powerful people who are caring and aspire to be the best they can be in everything they can do.

Chonique has choreographed for artists like Missy Elliot, Christina Milian, Britney Spears, Pink, Jennifer Lopez, V Factory, Diddy and more. She is also on the faculty of Monsters of Hip Hop (hopefully #lilBEASTS will go to that).

Join me in celebrating the release of her hit single – Let It Go! ***caution – there are a few words in the song that are not totally rated G **** but it is not that bad – you may want your parents to listen first.

I tried to embed the code from SoundCloud – but it does not seem to be working (someone please help that reads code). For now – just click this link to Chonique’s song on SoundCloud. Please share! Everyone needs friends giving them a little boost!

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/162289636″ params=”auto_play=true&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”300″ iframe=”true” /]

 

Aug 07 2014
0

Spocha Colab – sparkles and mocha on fashion

By | Stuff I Like, Vlogs | No Comments

Another video from me – @sparkleslund and my pal Mocha. In this episode we do a kinda clothing hall/fashion segment for girls. Yep, believe it or not, 11 year old dancers are really into clothes – especially dance clothes with sparkles on them. We were supposed to talk about “how to do the most amazing hair bun,” in the world – but we totally spaced out on that. Bun too tight? Maybe!……..

The colab channel is new idea – so if you think you like it and want more – be sure to thumb up the video on YouTube, subscribe, share, leave a comment – and that sort of thing. Hearing no feedback…..we will get the message and try something different.

Some of the stores mentioned in this post:

Ivivva – http://www.ivivva.com

Forever 21 Girls Leggings – Forever 21

California Kisses – San Diego Girls Dancewear awesomeness. http://www.californiakisses.com

Thanks in advance for watching!

Jul 28 2014
1

Dance Craziness Pt. 2

By | Competition, Convention, Dance, Friends | One Comment

When I left off on my last post, I talked about how much fun Hollywood Vibe was. In this post, I will talk about how exciting The Pulse Las Vegas and my first performance with #lilBEASTS was!

Sparkles Lund and Will Adams Willdabeast

Willdabeast

Jordyn Jones and Sparkles Lund

Jordyn Jones

We left for Las Vegas on a hot summer’s Thursday and got there at about 3 ish. It was probably 103 degrees outside. I felt like I was going to pass out. Once we got into our room, we went straight to the pool to find some of my dance friends Jordyn Jones, her brother Skylar, and Sean Lew. We probably swam for about 2 hours and then Jordyn and I decided to go shopping. There was a very large mall across from our hotel, called Miracle Mile because it’s a mile long. We went there for roughly 2 or 3 hours and then had to go to rehearsal for #lilBEASTS.

The next day, I went to the pool again with Jordyn and we stayed for about 2 hours. At 2:00 p.m. that day I had my first day of classes at Camp Pulse. Those ended at 5:30 and then I had an acting class with the one and only Lane Napper. It was so much fun! We did a few improv exercises and practiced saying a little bit about ourselves on the spot.

The following day, I had classes starting at 9:00, and they ended at 2:00. At 3:00, I had another #lilBEASTS rehearsal before our first performance. After that rehearsal, we all felt very prepared to perform.

We were the 10th number so we all got to watch the dances before us. They were amazing! So amazing, that the time went by really fast because they were so good. The dancers at Pulse are some of the best of the industry. Many of them are professional dancers and they know how to perform for an audience. I enjoyed the show a lot.

I was really excited when it was our turn to perform because this was the first time we performed live as a team. The audience loved us. We even won an award to bring our crew to the Open Call competitions in 2015. Can’t wait to perform more with my fellow #lilbeasts and work more with Will, our director!

If you missed the first post in this series, go back and look at http://sparkleslund.com/2014/07/23/dance-craziness-pt-1/

 

Jul 23 2014
1

Dance Craziness Pt. 1

By | Auditions, Competition, Convention, Dance, Friends | One Comment
Hollywood Vibe

Hollywood Vibe

I’m so sorry I haven’t written in a while, I’ve just been really busy with all of the events that I have been participating in for the past few weeks. There’s so many of things going on that I’ve decided to break this into two or maybe even three posts! I am just going with the flow depending on how much of this I get done today. The things I’ll be talking about in these two or three posts are Hollywood Vibe Nationals, The Pulse Las Vegas, #lilBEASTS video, and Macy’s Glamorama. That’s a lot right? I guess I’ll start with Hollywood Vibe Nationals, so that I go in time order.

This crazy week all started on Thursday, June 26, with my first scholarship dance rehearsal. We learned this dance over a video sent to us in an email. Unfortunately, my video wouldn’t play, so it was very stressful for me once I got to rehearsal. I had to learn every single piece of the choreography on the spot that day.

The next day was our first day of classes, taught by Hollywood Vibe’s superstar faculty. We learned all styles in these classes for four days. Also, during those three days I had competition. After the first day of classes, I performed my trio entitled Whipped Into Shape and my solo, Bees Knees, which was competing for Dancer of the Year. After the second day of classes, I had all of my small groups with the rest of the juniors. We were lucky enough to win 1st Place in the lyrical category and Best Costume with our gorgeous lyrical dance, Tears of an Angel. After the third day of classes, I had both of my large groups, Feels Good and MJ Tribute. Both got Platinum but didn’t place. After the fourth day of classes, it was finally time to for the Final Night Gala. This was where the National Dancer of the Year for each age group was announced and I got to perform the scholarship dance and the Dancer of the Year finalist piece that we had been working on for the past week choreographed by Liz Imperio. Both of the dances felt great and then it was time to announce Dancer of the Year, and Vibe Company, which means you get to assist the teachers and perform with the faculty. They started with Vibe Company, and I got it! So did my good friends Juju, Trevor, Tyler W., and Jordan. We were all super excited but we were eager to find out who won Dancer of the Year. They started announcing the juniors, it was no one I knew. Then they moved on to intermediate. Unfortunately, I did not win but that’s okay I’ll just keep trying and maybe I’ll get it next year! They moved onto the teens I did not know the female winner, but Trevor won for male! Everyone was so excited that they didn’t even pay attention to anything that happened after that.

I had a bunch of fun at Hollywood Vibe and can’t wait for next year!

In the middle of Hollywood Vibe, I had to drive to Los Angeles for #lilBEASTS rehearsal. Which leads to the next post…….The Pulse Las Vegas and #lilBEASTS Showcase Performance.

Here is Part 2 of the series http://sparkleslund.com/2014/07/28/dance-craziness-pt-2/

Jun 24 2014
1

Video Interview with Mocha

By | Competition, Convention, Dance, Friends, Vlogs | No Comments

In this video I introduce one of my best friends, Mocha. We have known each other since preschool (like 3 years old) and our families are friends too.

It’s a girls’ world in this video – clothes (Outfits of the Day), nails (how to glitter your French Gels), and of course – a bit about dance. Mocha and I have also danced together forever. We are about to go to Nationals for dance – lots of rehearsals and lots of nervous excitement! Both of us are up for Dancer of the Year! Wish us luck.

Be sure to watch to end to get convention tips that you may not already know.

There is a cameo from Austin – dog extraordinaire. Follow him on Instagram at TheAustinBubbles_ – he only has 28 followers – so help a doggie out!

 

 

If you want to see my first ever vLog, check out this post

http://sparkleslund.com/2014/06/24/vlog-1/

Jun 24 2014
0

Video Interview with Juju

By | Dance, Friends, Uncategorized | One Comment

If you don’t know what a vlog is, it is a video blog. To switch it up a little bit, I decided to do a vlog instead of a regular blog post. Hope you enjoy!

In this video I introduce one of my best friends, Juju. We have known each other since I started competition dancing at age 9, and our families are friends too. She is also a professional dancer and books a lot of work (#proudfriend, #loveher!). Follow her on instagram at http://instagram.com/jjjjjuju (5 js).

In this vlog, we talk about favorite movies – outfit of the day – and a story about the scariest thing that happened (think HOUSE ON FIRE). Not to spoil the ending, but it is not what you think and it is really funny.

Note to remember – Stay Calm……..sometimes your breath can go a long way to save the day.

Jun 11 2014
0

#lilbeast AUDITION 2014

By | Auditions, Dance | 3 Comments

Two Sunday’s ago, I auditioned for the popular hip-hop crew owned by Willdabeast, lilBEAST. There is also another crew for ages 14 and over owned by the same person called immaBEAST. For those of you who don’t know what a hip-hop crew is, it is a type of dance team that specializes in hip-hop. These dance teams called crews perform at many events including World of Dance and Carnival, two very big dance shows. Today, I will be telling you all about my experience auditioning for lilBEAST.

At 1:00 on June 1st, I went to LA to audition for lilBEAST. The line was wrapped around the whole building so I was very worried that it was going to be very hard to be noticed, but once we got inside of the room it wasn’t too bad. We started learning the choreography and I understood it right away. I was pretty proud of myself because usually it takes me a while to pick up the choreography. After we learned a lot, we split up into groups and the judges chose who they wanted to move onto the next round. I, luckily, was one of those people! I was so excited!

After that round, I had to wait a while because they had the boys go first, and then I went. I killed the choreography, meaning I didn’t forget any of it and I went super full out. To make things even better, I made it through that round too! After that part, a bunch got to freestyle if they wanted too, and that was very fun because of all the different styles that people did. This was pretty much the end of the audition, except that we did the combination a few more times but it wasn’t judged.

Once it was really over, my mom and I thought we should thank Willdabeast for inviting me to audition and being so kind to me, so we did. We had a nice long chat and then he quietly told me that I made it but it’s still a secret. After that, I thought I was going to pass out I was so excited! At that moment, I knew that I have officially “made it” in the dance industry.

tumblr_n6xet9zQHd1sj4z5zo1_r1_1280

May 22 2014
0

Science Camp

By | Friends, School, Travel | No Comments

Red Tailed HawkLast Wednesday, I left for Rancho El Chorro, also known as 6th grade camp, or Science Camp. Those of you who live in California, you know that this is a big deal for 6th graders. For those who aren’t, I will explain. In sixth grade, you get a big trip, normally close to the end of the year, and it is called Science Camp. Today, I will be telling you about everything I did during those action-packed three days.

Day 1

On Wednesday, we arrived at roughly 11:00 a.m. We got to eat lunch, and then one of the naturalists (camp counselors) old us to go unpack our bags in the cabins. Our cabin had four bunk beds (8 beds), but we only had five people so we got to choose if we wanted the top or bottom bunk. I chose the bottom because it was easier to get up if I had to go to the bathroom. After we unpacked, we started what the naturalists called the Welcome Walk. It was basically where they took us around the whole campus and showed us where everything was. My favorite part about that was when we go to go inside the Science Lab and look at a bunch of interesting animals. Later that day, we had dinner. In order to enter the lunchroom, we had to answer questions about the things we learned that day. I thought this was really cool. I sort of wish that we did this at regular school to enter the cafeteria. After dinner, we had our night hike. It was very cool because we got to see a lot of wildlife that you can’t usually see during the day. We also did an activity with Wintergreen LifeSavers. We partnered up and then the naturalist gave each of us one LifeSaver. We put it in our mouth while keeping it wide and started chewing it. You could see little sparks! It was so cool! The naturalist said that it was a chemical reaction created by the artificial flavoring in the mints and your saliva. We finished off the night by a nice poem read to us by the naturalist who took us on the night hike. I slept not so well but it was okay.

Day 2

In the morning, we had a delicious breakfast of eggs and potatoes and then got started on our first hike of the day. It was probably the longest hike we did as well as the most tiring because it was a hill hike. I liked it, except when I got to the top of the mountain and ran out of water. It just went downhill from there, literally. After the hill hike we had lunch and then free time for about 30-45 minutes. That was also the time slot we had for showering. The showers weren’t too bad, three people had to go in at one time.

In the evening after dinner, we had a group campfire. Other schools from around California were there too, so we were able to meet other kids. We sang a bunch of fun campfire songs including some that you may know like the “SCAT” song and “Baby Shark”. I slept very nicely that night because I was so tired from the day’s activities.

Day 3

The next day was unfortunately our last, but we did get to do lots of cool things to close out the week. For example, we got to visit the raptor room which is where the naturalists keep all of their large predator birds (“raptors” in science words). We got to see an injured red-tailed hawk up close with a bird handler. It was beautiful, but also very sad because the bird could not fly. After that, we had our closing ceremony.

Throughout the whole week, we had name tags on with our real name as well as our “nature name” that we could make up. My nature name was starfish. Sparkles may have worked as a nature name given the stars in the sky, but I like starfish too. Every time we finished a hike we would get a bead on it and at the closing ceremony we got one last bead that had a leaf on it, it was very cool. Next, we had to pack up our bags and head home. I had so much fun and I hope you enjoyed hearing about it.

Did you go to science camp when you were a kid? Comment below.

May 06 2014
0

Otis Parson School of Design Fashion Show

By | Auditions, Friends, modeling, Work | One Comment

Otis Parsons Fashion ShowRecently, I had an audition at Otis parson school of design. It was for modeling, so the audition process was really fun and that is what I’ll be telling you about today.

When we got there, the audition was supposed to end at 3:00 and we got there at 2:59. Yikes, right! After we walked into the room, the guy said, “I remember you! I picked your headshot; adorable!” I was glad he said that because we weren’t even sure if I was going to be able to audition given our arrival time. After that, a woman walked in and said, “Have her try the one that no one fit into.” When she said that, the guy picked up an outfit and handed it to me. There was a small room guarded by curtains that he signaled me to go inside and change. The outfit fit perfectly! I think that that was a good thing because remember how earlier I told you what the woman said about how it was the outfit that know else fit into. Well, it fit me!

Pre Show Party DanceAfter that part of the audition, I put my own clothes back on, and I had to freestyle to Happy, by Pharell. It seems like every audition I’ve gone to lately has always been to that song. It’s super weird! I felt really good about it and the casting director seemed happy.

A few days later my mom got a call from my agent saying that I got the job! I was sort of expecting it because the casting director seemed really pleased with my audition. I was excited that I did get the job, but if I didn’t I would still be happy because I knew that I did the best I could. This is one of those occasions when I feel really lucky being fun sized.

After about two weeks I had the fitting for the job. It was a little bit weird because they just gave me the outfit and I had to undress in front of everyone in the room! After I put it on, they had me improv to Happy, by Pharell, again. As you can see, I’m getting a little sick of that song. I hear it basically every single day, but anyway back to the point. I improvd and then they made a few modifications to my outfit like put a pin here, tuck this in there, stuff like that. That was actually one of my favorite parts because I felt like a real life runway model! Then, once they made the modifications, I had to improv again. That was pretty much it! The whole fitting really only lasted roughly 10 minutes! But the whole thing was super fun and a great experience.

Two Thursdays later, I had my first rehearsal. I found out that the choreographer was Jackie Sleight, one of my favorite teachers at, as well as the owner of L.A. Dance Magic, a popular convention/competition I went to earlier in the year. The rehearsal was 5 hours long! We started at 1:00 in the afternoon and went until 6:00 p. m. First, we learned a big piece of the choreography and then had a break. Next, once the break was over, we learned another large chunk of it which was the part where we model the clothes for Under Armour, the sponsored brand. After that, we were pretty much done with all of the choreography and we just got to run it and get it in our minds better. The next day, we had another rehearsal but on the actual stage that we would be performing on. We did basically the same thing as the previous day, except it was on stage and the rehearsal was shorter. We also got to have some delicious food provided by the hotel the event was at.

Finally, the next day, we had the show! There were two shows, one in the afternoon and one at night. The night one was for some very important people like famous designers and photographers. In our preparation for the show, we had a few of the students that designed our outfits in the room with us, helping us get dressed and keeping us in order. They were really nice. I was so excited before we went on stage but I was also a little nervous. Once we went on, I felt this big boost of adrenaline and the show was great. The second show was just as great, except better! After both shows, I went swimming with two of my friends that also did the show, Hannah and Hayden. We had a bunch of fun in the pool, and then we had a delicious dinner.

The whole experience was super fun because of all the friends I made, the amazing designers, and of course, my loving parents.

Here is the video from the fashion show. I am at about the 22 second mark.