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chonique sneed Archives - Sparkles Lund

Nov 22 2014
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ASH Dance Tour In Santa Clara

By | Convention, Dance | No Comments

I am dancing at Ash Dance Tour in Santa Clara, California this weekend. It is my first dance convention of the new season and I am thrilled to train with some great choreographers. After school I piled in the car with my mom and Austin (instagram: @theaustinbubbles_ ). My dad was in Cleveland and Denver this week, so he flew into San Jose to meet us.

Lisette Bustamante - Choreographer and amazing person

Lisette Bustamante – Choreographer and amazing person

Last night was a great start to the weekend. We learned a fun hip-hop piece with Lisette Bustamante. I fell in love with her choreography at Hollywood Connection  so now I find a way each year to take class from her. About Lisette: from her website http://www.lisettebustamante.com/bio/

She’s danced alongside superstars such as Madonna, Gwen Stefani, Justin Timberlake, Janet Jackson and Usher on stages all over the globe, and has choreographed for Pink, Prince, Britney Spears and Jennifer Lopez. She’s been featured in commercials for Gap, Pepsi, Pringles, iPod and Sprite, and has choreographed for film and television, with credits including supervising choreographer on America’s Best Dance Crew.

Four years ago, Lisette and her longtime creative partner, Chonique Sneed established Creating Opportunities, a mentoring company that offers classes, seminars and other programs for young dancers, singers and choreographers.

A few of my friends of mine at the studio have participated in the Creating Opps program and they said it was amazing. “I am confident.” If you know Creating Opps, you know what I mean by that.

Braham Logan Crane, Director of ASH

Braham Logan Crane, Director of ASH.

The second class last night was a first for me with Braham Logan Crane. We learned an intense contemporary piece with some amazing floor work that had us literally dancing on our heads! Braham is the director of ASH – which stands for Artists Simply Human. The weekend is not designed as a competition, but as a workshop. Each class is an hour to an hour and 15 minutes long. I love the longer classes. Some conventions are trying to cut the classes to 45 Minutes – BOOOOO! ASH also offers a performance showcase like Pulse. They do not have a competition. Braham taught at Broadway Dance in NYC.  I took a class there about a year ago.  So much fun.

I am running three dances tonight for the teachers. The core theme of ASH is expression in dance. My goal for tonight is to put a lot of emotion into each of my pieces.  You will be able to watch the acts live tonight thanks to Sugar and Bruno who are sponsoring a live feed on ustream – http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ashproductions

Here is a run down of the dances and the times.

I’m really excited for the Monday night finale of Dancing with the Stars too!  #DWTS and @dancingABC. Im going to be on it with a bunch of my friends in the opening number! It’s on ABC at 8:00 EST and Pacific. To read my post about it, click here http://sparkleslund.com/will-dancing-stars/

Here are my dance schedule for tonight

Here are my dance schedule for tonight

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” /]