Wawasee Grad Steps Toward A Career In Dance
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
Dancing as a life-long career?
To some, it may sound impossible or futile.
At one point, Jeremy Plummer admits he didn't see it as a possibility.
"I didn't know, coming from here, I didn't know I could dance. I didn't know that was an option for an occupation besides going to Las Vegas and doing razzle dazzle," he said Thursday.
Now, however, Plummer, 23, is making dance his career, his life.
He and his parents moved to the Warsaw area when he was 7 years old. He started at Deb Collier's School of Dance, Warsaw, at age 8.
"I had taken two years previous at another town but I really wasn't dancing a lot until I came here. Then I started here and was here with Deb for 10 years until I graduated (from Wawasee High School), until I was 18," he said.
"She encouraged me to do everything. We were always going to workshops. Every weekend we'd be gone. We'd be in Chicago, we'd be all over the place, just trying to take class."
After graduation from WHS in 1996, he went to Ball State University for a year as a dance major but didn't think he was getting "to do what I wanted to do now because a dancer's body lasts only so long before you can't do it anymore."
He heard about a studio in Chicago with a good scholarship and apprenticeship program. He auditioned and got a scholarship there, and moved to Evanston, Ill., to study at the Gus Giordano Dance Center, Chicago, for about nine months.
Then he auditioned for River North Chicago Dance Co., which he said he was really interested in.
He said, "I auditioned for them and I was hired into a company position, which is rare because normally they hire as an apprentice first. You train with them for a while and then they'll bring you into the company, but they hired me right into a company position. That was after I was in Chicago for a year first. I toured with them for three years."
The company is primarily a jazz-based company, he said. They do jazz concerts but "we really stretch the meaning of jazz dance." He said it is a hard company to dance for because dancers must be able to do everything at any time.
"It was a really great company. I learned so much from them and they helped me so much," he said.
While with the company, he also got chances to do other dance-related jobs. He started to do some film work, working with many production companies in Chicago.
"To dance in a dance company, it's not to make money, it's because you want to do it. We get paid hardly anything," he said.
While at the dance center on scholarship he connected with an entertainment company called Elite Force Entertainment. "And they did, like, bar mitzvahs, birthday parties, company parties, where they would bring in a DJ and a light show and dancers." He got paid to go to the parties and dance on weekends.
"So that's how I survived while I was there," he said, "to pay my rent and everything because with our schedule, you couldn't be a receptionist, you couldn't have a job because everyday all day you were in the studio. So it was either you called home for money or you found other ways to do it. And I never wanted to have to call and ask for money once I left."
Plummer just left the company and is doing a lot more choreography. He's trying to branch out.
Recently, he got involved with Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines and started choreographing for them last fall. He did some choreography for "Explorer of the Seas" and just choreographed some new shows.
On Aug. 27, he leaves for Miami and will be there to work on some shows for two months and then be on the ship for four months for shows.
"Ever since I moved to Chicago 4-1/2 years ago, I've turned into a workaholic and it's been every day, nonstop. I hardly take a day off. I started teaching as soon as I moved to Chicago in the suburbs as well as in the city," he said. Working with the cruise lines, he said, will be like a paid vacation.
In March, when he returns, he will be working on trying to get more into the video and film aspect of dance. There are different sections of dance, he said, and he wanted to do concert work first because a dancer can do it for only so long because it's so demanding. Now, he wants to try the commercial side of dance, but if he doesn't like it, he will go back to the concert side.
"I want to do it all in a short amount of time," he said.
Thursday, Plummer spent his day teaching students at Deb Collier's School of Dance. He taught the students a dance called, "Machete," that is a jazz, hip-hoppy, New Age "deal," he said.
"It's going to be a huge challenge for these kids," he said of the dance.
Of Plummer, Collier said, "His enthusiasm for ballet was not there. But we went to workshops and ... he would go with us. I told him to be ready at 5 o'clock, he'd be ready at 4:30 with his bag. People are always, like, 'How does Jeremy get so good?' 'Cause he goes to all these out-of-town workshops. He danced all the time. He's always dancing." [[In-content Ad]]
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Dancing as a life-long career?
To some, it may sound impossible or futile.
At one point, Jeremy Plummer admits he didn't see it as a possibility.
"I didn't know, coming from here, I didn't know I could dance. I didn't know that was an option for an occupation besides going to Las Vegas and doing razzle dazzle," he said Thursday.
Now, however, Plummer, 23, is making dance his career, his life.
He and his parents moved to the Warsaw area when he was 7 years old. He started at Deb Collier's School of Dance, Warsaw, at age 8.
"I had taken two years previous at another town but I really wasn't dancing a lot until I came here. Then I started here and was here with Deb for 10 years until I graduated (from Wawasee High School), until I was 18," he said.
"She encouraged me to do everything. We were always going to workshops. Every weekend we'd be gone. We'd be in Chicago, we'd be all over the place, just trying to take class."
After graduation from WHS in 1996, he went to Ball State University for a year as a dance major but didn't think he was getting "to do what I wanted to do now because a dancer's body lasts only so long before you can't do it anymore."
He heard about a studio in Chicago with a good scholarship and apprenticeship program. He auditioned and got a scholarship there, and moved to Evanston, Ill., to study at the Gus Giordano Dance Center, Chicago, for about nine months.
Then he auditioned for River North Chicago Dance Co., which he said he was really interested in.
He said, "I auditioned for them and I was hired into a company position, which is rare because normally they hire as an apprentice first. You train with them for a while and then they'll bring you into the company, but they hired me right into a company position. That was after I was in Chicago for a year first. I toured with them for three years."
The company is primarily a jazz-based company, he said. They do jazz concerts but "we really stretch the meaning of jazz dance." He said it is a hard company to dance for because dancers must be able to do everything at any time.
"It was a really great company. I learned so much from them and they helped me so much," he said.
While with the company, he also got chances to do other dance-related jobs. He started to do some film work, working with many production companies in Chicago.
"To dance in a dance company, it's not to make money, it's because you want to do it. We get paid hardly anything," he said.
While at the dance center on scholarship he connected with an entertainment company called Elite Force Entertainment. "And they did, like, bar mitzvahs, birthday parties, company parties, where they would bring in a DJ and a light show and dancers." He got paid to go to the parties and dance on weekends.
"So that's how I survived while I was there," he said, "to pay my rent and everything because with our schedule, you couldn't be a receptionist, you couldn't have a job because everyday all day you were in the studio. So it was either you called home for money or you found other ways to do it. And I never wanted to have to call and ask for money once I left."
Plummer just left the company and is doing a lot more choreography. He's trying to branch out.
Recently, he got involved with Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines and started choreographing for them last fall. He did some choreography for "Explorer of the Seas" and just choreographed some new shows.
On Aug. 27, he leaves for Miami and will be there to work on some shows for two months and then be on the ship for four months for shows.
"Ever since I moved to Chicago 4-1/2 years ago, I've turned into a workaholic and it's been every day, nonstop. I hardly take a day off. I started teaching as soon as I moved to Chicago in the suburbs as well as in the city," he said. Working with the cruise lines, he said, will be like a paid vacation.
In March, when he returns, he will be working on trying to get more into the video and film aspect of dance. There are different sections of dance, he said, and he wanted to do concert work first because a dancer can do it for only so long because it's so demanding. Now, he wants to try the commercial side of dance, but if he doesn't like it, he will go back to the concert side.
"I want to do it all in a short amount of time," he said.
Thursday, Plummer spent his day teaching students at Deb Collier's School of Dance. He taught the students a dance called, "Machete," that is a jazz, hip-hoppy, New Age "deal," he said.
"It's going to be a huge challenge for these kids," he said of the dance.
Of Plummer, Collier said, "His enthusiasm for ballet was not there. But we went to workshops and ... he would go with us. I told him to be ready at 5 o'clock, he'd be ready at 4:30 with his bag. People are always, like, 'How does Jeremy get so good?' 'Cause he goes to all these out-of-town workshops. He danced all the time. He's always dancing." [[In-content Ad]]