Daily Inspiration: Meet Danielle Richter

Today we’d like to introduce you to Danielle Richter.

Hi Danielle, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I was born and raised in rural Missouri. I was one of those kids who would not stop moving especially when there was music involved. My mom put me into dance and the rest is history!

I trained at Dancearts of Columbia in Columbia Missouri and I danced at the Missouri Contemporary Ballet briefly before jetting off to college. I danced in college at Lindenwood University where I was a part of the first team in the program history to win a national championship. We then went on to win every year following that I was on the team. Twice in jazz and once in Hip Hop. While attending I got my B.S. in Exercise Science with a minor in health and wellness. This education and experience has made me a better educator. I am able to look at dance from both an athletic and an artistic perspective.

I moved from Missouri to Orange County in 2022 and started working locally as a dance teacher. I met an amazing small business owner, Emily Williams. We became quick friends. I went from teaching a couple of classes twice a week to being competition director, to owning the studio over the course of 3 years. Emily paved the way for the studio that stands now and we continue to elevate and improve.

Now I own THE AIM Dance Space. We offer high level training and we work with the local dance team schedules. The dancers that thrive and excel are the ones that participate in both. They are two completely different worlds that go hand in hand in making a diverse, employable, and elite level dancer. We are also one of the only studios in the area that requires all team members to take tap. Tap can be an intimidating style of dance to take on.

Our staff deserves a large heap of the credit for the studio’s success. Emily Williams, Kennedy Berthiaume, Morgan Dragsbaek, Franki Peji, Hanna Landazuri, Kaley Logan, Cristina Chamberlain, Heather Sprauge, Natasha Lubanko, Jesicris Bato, and myself are the full time staff members training our students. We also have Sophia Lucia who currently holds a residency and teaches Elite Contemporary and Elite Technique once a month. We are extremely lucky to have such a fantastic resource and educator with us this year.

Dance has always been a my passion and I do truly believe I was put on this Earth to teach and share the art form. Dance has saved my life in more ways than one at many different periods in my lifetime. To be able to genuinely love what I do for work is a blessing and I do not know what I did to deserve it.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Oh god no.

Dance is hard. I wanted to quit countless times. Every year in college was “I am not coming back next year” and I always found myself at auditions for the next team.
When you want to do anything at an elite level you have to grapple with the sacrifices necessary for achieving greatness. I missed many birthday parties, sleepovers and social events, but sports specifically teaches you discipline, dedication and teamwork. I never quit mid-season (my mom would never let me) but because I would never put my team in jeopardy.

Not only that my parents were not swimming in money and dance is famously super expensive. Thankfully my home studio offered assistance for tuition. In regards to the other expenses; I had to be good enough to get scholarships. Which didn’t start happening until I was in High School.

Taking over the studio was honestly pretty smooth the first year, Emily made it super easy to take over and I had a lot of help. This year in particular has been extremely difficult. There are many issues that I did not face last year. I am staying positive, taking it all in stride and viewing it as a learning experience.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I specialize in technique and injury prevention. What sets THE AIM apart is the focus on safety, proper training and injury prevention. I specialize in optimizing the medium in which dancers art is expressed: their bodies. My dancers train like athletes because they are athletes. Not only do I specialize in the physical but also the mental. A dancers mentality can make or break how they dance. Dancers are some of the most physically fit and mentally strong people I have ever met. Regardless of what they do after they leave the studio they leave understanding dedication, discipline, teamwork, and sacrifice.

I am the Creative Director and Competition Director at THE AIM Dance Space. I oversee all of the routines that are competed on our competition team. I choreograph in many different styles.

I am most proud of our progress over awards mentality. We have shifted the focus away from meaningless medals, arbitrary adjudications and cheap trophies and focused in more on the art itself. While accolades and awards are rewarding an nice there is no universal judging system and is based heavily on judge bias and opinion. With the pressure of creating a “winning piece” off the table it actually frees our choreographers to explore and push not only their artistry but the dancers as well. The teamwork that happens between dancer and choreographer is a collaborative art that is unlike any other. The trust that is required for this to occur is something that takes time to build. Our dancers spend countless hours training and perfecting for just 2 minutes on the stage.
The polished final piece is truly a labor of love, teamwork and expression.

I have a soft spot for families with dancers in financial need. I am currently working on a project to help generate and connect funding with dancers that show great promise and are in need of financial assistance.

Who else deserves credit in your story?
I have two educators that have changed my life and deserve the credit for the dancer that I am today.
Ken Brasso, my ballet instructor, and Marie Robertson, my tap instructor, studio owner and competition director.

Ken Brasso took my technique to a level I would not have reached otherwise. Ken made me fall in love with ballet. Young dancers often shy away from ballet and go more towards Jazz or Hip Hop because of the fun music and the sassy moves. Ballet is structured and has a lot of rules, but it makes the strongest dancers. It requires extreme awareness of your body and teaches control while looking effortless. Ken is an exciting instructor. He is loud, dramatic and makes executing and remembering proper technique easy. He was exactly the instructor I needed. He would often bring in his wife, Elizabeth Hartwell, as a consult. She is etherial. She wouldn’t come in often but when she did I always enjoyed it. She was light but powerful like a strong wind. She was always real with us on the girls in ballet side of things. She shared her struggles and how she overcame them and as an insecure pre-teen/teenager to have a successful adult tell me they struggled even at the professional level made me feel relieved. She is the reason it clicked in my brain that dance is not something that you can master and be done. It is a constant living and breathing skill. There will be peaks and valleys. There will be injuries that set you back but then you will come back stronger and feeling better than you ever have. I was able to let go of the toxic perfectionist mentality because of her.

Marie Robertson taught me discipline. Marie is everything that I have ever wanted to be, knowledgeable and talented. She was very strict and had HIGH expectations for us all. She pushed me harder than I had ever been pushed in my life. Tap did NOT come easily to me. There were many times I was dismissed from the classroom because I would cry in frustration. (There is no crying in dance class.) I was the kid that needed goals set for me and structure provided around those goals. She was extremely good at this. I was a terror especially in my pre-teens and teens. I had a huge attitude problem. The only person that could check that was Marie. Having someone other than your parents to fear disappointing is something that is necessary for a kid, especially myself. Marie also only believed in attending conventions. Conventions are classes put on by the judges of the competition. They often consist of high profile instructors that we would not have access to otherwise. Because of this belief I had a plethora of opportunities to take class from some of the best in the industry. Marie is the educator that shaped me into a dancer and a person that is reliable, resilient and flexible.

My parents didn’t have a lot of money growing up and dance is famously extremely expensive. They did everything they could to make sure that I would be able to pursue my passion and dream. They held my feet to the flame and dealt with so many extreme highs and lows. I didn’t even know that money was an issue until I went to college. I didn’t even know we were on a payment plan until well into my adulthood. My parents kept that stress from me while slowly trickling down knowledge of money and how it works. They did it in such a seamless way that I didn’t notice we didn’t have as much as others until high school. My mother drove me to every class, competition, convention, and made sure I was able to take any and every outside opportunity that came my way. She was always honest with me and about her thoughts on my performances which I valued so much. To have someone you know you can trust 1000% to tell you the truth about your performance, even if it is not something you want to hear is hard to find and SO valuable. My father picked me up every night from class and made sure I was properly fed and fueled up post class. He came to every recital and he built props for the studio. While he didn’t understand it in it’s full complexity like my mom did but he was always there and was always in with full support.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.theaimdancespace.com/
• Instagram: @theaimdancespace

Image Credits
all pictures were taken by CEVENT PICS