What makes you different? About five years ago, Pharrell launched a program called i am other. It is a pretty simple concept. We are all different, and “individuality is the new wealth.”
i am other is the philosophy that Pharrell carries through all of his businesses and charities. He told us that he only surrounds himself with people who share those beliefs and he tries to instill it in others through all of his projects in music, film, television, apparel, and what not.
Somehow, someway, Pharrell, or Pharrell’s people found me, and invited me to a very special event to launch a collection of school supplies in partnership with Yoobi. Yoobi is a pretty cool company. They have adopted the idea that made Tom’s shoes famous. Yoobi takes a portion of everything they sell and give free school supplies to children in need right here in America. Pharrell helped design the line of school supplies around the themes of i am other.
When you go to events like this, you have no idea who is going to show up. Somehow I was not surprised to see four other immaBEAST dancers, and even a few Disney Channel stars at the event. We all had a really great time, and it is super fun to get dressed up for the red carpet. Overall it was a super fun evening, and one I will remember for sure!
The Beast Network was announced today! All of us at immaBEAST are so excited to follow and support Will Willdabeast Adams, Janelle Ginestra, BTB Creative Agency (John, Brazil, Nelson) on this new journey. If it grows like immaBEAST has grown the past three years, who knows how big it will be.
Will and Janelle had a BBQ for the team at their house this week to share the news with the team. Looking around at the team, my friends, I could not help but to feel grateful for the opportunity to work and train with so many talented, hardworking friends. The immaBEASTS are strong at every level – adults, teens, juniors, and minis. My manager Nelson Diaz posted on Facebook this week that if you want to be a lion, you must train with lions – surround yourself with people on the same mission as you. So true!
Will gave an inspiring speech to announce The Beast Network. He started by putting his hand on Janelle’s belly like they were announcing that they were having a baby – PSYCH! Then he told us about how he and John Hyland went to Toronto to discuss a TV deal. I guess a lot of networks – Disney, Nickelodeon, and others expressed interest in making a documentary about Buildabeast 2016 – the hip hop intensive that immaBEAST is having this summer (I have discount codes :-). Apparently that meeting was inspirational because it resulted in the launch of The Beast Network.
The Beast Network will be a bit different. Will grew up with TRL, 106 and Park, Freestyle Friday – I am part of the DanceOn Network (until The Beast Network goes live!). The Beast Network will produce and publish videos about Lifestyle, Music, Dance, Fashion, Health/Fitness, and Reality. So many members of the immaBEAST team have talents far beyond dance. The Beast Network will deliver a place for us to collaborate and continue to grow together.
Click Image below to view the behind the scenes with of my photo shoot with Bonnie Nichoalds. This shoot was in Santee Alley, the heart of the Los Angeles fashion district. This is the first time that I have worked with Bonnie.
I am writing this from Hollywood Vibe in Phoenix. This is my last city on Team Hollywood Vibe. Since we are only allowed to dance in the competition in our home city, there is time to chill at night and do homework or get caught up on my blog. Before I get started – you may recall that I am on @willdaBEAST #immaBEAST team. They are holding the audition July 28th – August 1st. You train for a week then comes the Audition on the last day. Using the code lund5 you can get a discount. Sign up here http://www.immabeast.co/buildabeast
As you know if you are a kid, the last month was brutal with the end of the quarter in school. Gotta keep those grades up! It gets harder and harder to juggle school, comp, training, and work. I guess that I should put it in the order of work, school, comp, training. When you book a job or have an audition, the best laid plans for the day or week go right out the door. Know what I am talking about? Somewhere on that list is keeping up with my blog, which becomes harder and harder to do. Hard work pays off though – Grades came in great and I was awarded Regional Dancer of the Year in Northern California (San Francisco) for the second year running at Hollywood Vibe! A huge hug goes out to the Hollywood Vibe faculty, especially Liz Imperio for all of their training and encouragement. My DPAC family are my roots and I love each and everyone for how they have trained me for this. So blessed! #DPACStrong
Last month was a whirlwind. If you have been following me on Instagram, you know what I am talking about.
I did this industrial shoot for Target – It was super fun to work alongside my friend Charlize Glass. She ran the shoot ahead of me so it was great to watch her do her magic and build my confidence. She is such a pro. #goals.
Industrials are pretty interesting. It is pretty much “backfill work” for dancers. There is no audition, they pick you from your head shots and the photos and videos are used for pitching marketing programs. Sometimes, if they love you – you can direct book a national commercial from these. Wouldn’t that be nice?
I really did not understand the crossover between dancers and models. I know from the work that I did last year for Macy’s and for Otis School of Design that dance adds magic to the runway, but I am surprised by the amount of work that dancers get in print just because they are fit and healthy looking. Shout out to my supporters including Divina Dancewear, D2I skullies, Sugar & Bruno, and Sadie Jane. Seriously, as much time as I spend dancing, this gear comes in handy. Happy for the merch love.
Earlier this season I started out working with the amazing Jillian Clark on a piece called Diamonds – Musical Theatre – great results – love that. Secondly, I have been working with Keara Blake Bolland on a lyrical piece called Opportunity. It is to a song that I fell in love with through the whole Annie Movie/Dancing with the Stars bit from last year. The music and the choreography fell together perfectly for what I want to do as a dancer. More great results! Love that too. I have been working really hard with my two favorite red heads – Juliana Keller and Taylor Costa on our lyrical trio. Hollywood Vibe was a break our performance for that number. I can’t wait to perform it again. It is so close to being epic! What a journey we have had so far. Next, I am working to pull together a hip hop piece. It is getting close.
April hit with a bang! I was able to work with @willdaBEAST, @janelleginestra, and @antionetroupe at @vyraldancetour. It was a special day hosted by Nor Cal Dance – I came out of it stronger with an unbelievable addiction to Janelle Ginestra’s choreography. It hits hard but is still girly. Here is the YouTube video – the first one from our dance studio built in the garage. Hope you like it.
One of the great parts about The Pulse On Tour is that they offer dancers the opportunity to set numbers much in the same way that we do when we are working. Even though I book jobs and so some work each year, this training helps keep me sharp. This last weekend at Pulse in New Orleans, I participated in a workshop called From Start To Stage. It goes like this.
When you arrive on Friday, you rehearse for 2 hours. The piece is set by a choreographer but the Pulse Elite Proteges help you learn it. It is a great way for the Elites to learn to work with dancers to clean dances too. Saturday morning, dancers participating in the workshop have a call time of 7:30 a.m. to run the number again for an hour and clean it. Thats it. Two rehearsals over three hours and you put it on stage. This process is the same as doing a commercial or setting a piece for television or movies. If you are doing a professional dance production for stage or Broadway, it is pretty much the same as the way you prepare competition dances in your studio.
Thank you Discount Dance Supply.
My mom was traveling so my dad had to get me prepared for the weekend. He is a great dance dad, but he forgot to read the information about Start to Stage where it clearly stated that dancers needed to wear red and black for the performance. We were hopeful that we would be able to pick up what I needed from the clothing vendors there. The Discount Dance Supply booth had the most amazing Gotta Flurt high top sneakers with sparkles. They were perfect. Unfortunately, they were not selling them at the show, but Erin Edmondson who was at the booth was kind enough to let me wear them for the performance. They were the perfect size (3). Aside from being really cool looking, they were very comfortable and even have cozy furry stuff on the inside. Thanks for Discount Dance Supply for saving the day and keeping my dad and me out of trouble for forgetting the right shoes.
Many thanks to mom for going to Riverwalk to get shirts.
We buy a lot of things at Discount Dance Supply. I like their booty shorts, sports bras, leggings, tees, and stuff like that. It is really good quality and they have a big selection of things that they do not have in stores around Arroyo Grande.
Thanks to The Pulse On Tour Faculty for setting me as a featured dancer for the number. Here is one of my favorite shots. I will load the video of the piece to my YouTube page and follow me on Instagram @sparkleslund for more photos.
As most of you know, I am a model for Divina Dancewear. Today, I will be telling you all about this year’s shoot which I participated in last weekend. Last year, I modeled for them for the first time and loved it! This year, I was so happy to be invited back and be re-united with all of the Divina girls.
I flew in after school on Friday. We had to go to Phoenix first, and then on to Utah from there. This is kind of weird because we had to go south before we went north due to our tiny local airport. We got in at around 9:30 mountain time, then had to rent a car, and finally start driving to our hotel. The drive was roughly 30 minutes, so it wasn’t too bad, but we didn’t check in to our hotel until about 10:15 because we got a little confused about where the lobby was. The next morning was the first day of shooting so I was super excited!
The weekend consisted of two days. The first day was video, and the second day was pictures. On the video day we filmed a few things. One was a video called Divina A-Z, which was a walkthrough of all the Divina products in A-Z order. For example, they have one product called the Lola top, so for L, someone would be dancing in the Lola top. See how it works? Something else we filmed on the first day was choreography choreographed by Haylee Rodrick. The piece was performed to the song Hideaway, by Kiesza. It was a contemporary jazz routine and I absolutely loved it! On day two, we took pictures in all of the clothing for the catalog and website.
The girls I danced with were Brooklyn Davis, Rachel Parkinson, Daisy Stoneman, Cailie Horner, Celine Horner, Jazzi Johnson, Maddie, Ashlund Ortiz, Chloe, Tatum C. , and Cheyenne MurilloI’m really sorry for not remembering the last names of some of the girls. They were all super nice and great dancers.
I hope you enjoyed hearing about Year 2 of my Divina Dancewear experience. The catalog and the videos will be out soon so stay tuned!
Recently, 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!
After 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.
surprised to see four other immaBEAST dancers, and even a few Disney Channel stars at the event. We all had a really great time, and it is super fun to get dressed up for the red carpet. Overall it was a super fun evening, and one I will remember for sure!
Recently, 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.
After 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.