Today we’d like to introduce you to Vonte Marquiss.
Hi Vonte, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Dancing and Movement was always a part of my upbringing. I found a love for dancing at a pretty young age, started my first dance crew in 5th grade with a bunch of my best friends. Inspired by music videos & award show choreography, I was ALWAYS creating. But at a young age, I was always told “Dance isn’t a job you need some kind of degree” so I never thought to take it serious in my younger years. And never had the proper “training” that a lot of dancers I grew up watching had but I had a drive to become one of them. Throughout junior high, I continued to dance for fun with friends creating routines & making videos just to pass time and stay out of trouble.
I joined my high school step team my freshman year just looking for something to do pre-track & field season as this was my passion at the time and this is where my dance “fun” turned into a passion. Becoming the leader of the step team my Sophomore year shifting it from a step dominant to a step & dance team creating school, showcase and competition routines. My senior year I enter us into one of the biggest dance competitions our city holds; Seattle, Bubblin’ Brown Sugar. With my school not placing in this specific competition in over 2 decades and lots of stiff competition I started preparing us pretty early being we were the only team with no coach beside me. We end up placing 3rd in the competition and this is where a lot of my dance support systems were created. Right out of High school I auditioned for a hiphop dance team I looked up to for YEARS; Kutt N Up made the team and that’s where my training started.
My first year out of high school, I started flying myself out to LA to train by taking various classes. Then made a spontaneous move to Phoenix, Arizona to be in driving distance to LA for more accessible training. My first week in Phoenix I met a local business owner who was opening up a brand new dance studio and wanted me to be on the staff. Lived and worked at the studio for about a year not getting to go to LA nearly as much as I thought until I decided to move back home to Seattle for a bit.
Fast forward to recently, still while living in Seattle I started taking trips to LA every two weeks to build connections, train and see how it would be if I just did the big move. Now being in LA, I have danced and trained more than ever, more than I dreamed and I wake up every day with a stronger love for dancing and creating.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It hasn’t been easy getting to where I want to. From lack of a support system to finding time to dance while I had to work a regular 9 to 5 to support my training.
Like I mentioned, I never grew up with the formal dance training most professional dancers have so I sort of went backward as I started training after I was an adult. Making a lot of the things my dance peers knew new information to me as I was pretty ignorant in some aspects of dance like ballet, jazz, tap, etc. being I was never introduced to those styles until later in life.
Now that I’m an adult and fully support myself it’s a lot easier to manage when and how I train making sure I get those styles I may have been lacking. I love to grow so putting myself in rooms where I’m uncomfortable because I know I’m growing is super fun to me.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I love to choreograph, to dance, to CREATE. I don’t really know what style of dancer or creative I would box myself in being I like to dibble and dabble in many different ones and hate limiting myself. Recently, I have been growing a bigger audience for my heels choreography I put on lady dancers, this was kind of an accident as I heard a song one day and asked a group of friends to do it in heels and it came out better than I imagined now creating heels choreography is something I really enjoy watching the process of, from my brain to the final production.
There’s a lot I could say I’m proud of myself for, from never quitting on dance to using the last money I have to go take a class and train to continuing to check off goals on my vision board. Three specific things I had on my vision board for years was; dancing under Parris Globel, dancing with Rihanna & performing in a Super Bowl halftime show and I just got to check all three of those off as I performed in Super Bowl LVII, definitely one of my newest most proudest moments.
I know one thing I have that is getting lost in our industry is passion. I’ve always loved dance and have always believed in quality over quantity because “perfecting” my craft to the best of MY abilities is something I’m so admin about and that’s not something we see much of anymore.
How do you think about happiness?
Dancing is a big part of my happiness. I can listen to a song and start moving and whatever I was going through prior just disappears. Dance has always been one of my main outlets for pretty much anything in my life as long as I can remember.
Contact Info:
Image Credits
Maxine Eve Stay Kozy
