THE EVOLUTION
I have wanted to start writing blog posts for a while now… but where do I start? So for the sake of not just randomly popping up with new post about KJD Dance I’m going to start at the start and tell you how KJD Dance studio evolved.
KJD Dance started in Penrith area in 1998 with only two teachers my mum Janine who focused on ballet with her RAD background dancing in the Australian Ballet and me, Kristie who focused on Jazz and my all time favorite dance style Hip Hop. It wasn’t long before KJD Dance became well know for its Hip Hop we were what you would call specialists in Hip Hop, I was travelling to America to study it and learn from the best, we offered break dance, krump classes, popping and locking, Acrobatics boys Hip Hop AND soon developed what has to be one of my most favorite experiences as a dance teacher even after a lot of other higher profile experiences (but hey its Hip Hop) KJDs Junior Hip Hop Dance Crew Splurb!
Splurb took the world by storm, literally! For 4years running they placed 1st in Australia in the Hip Hop Championships and were ranking 3rd and 4th IN THE WORLD travelling everywhere to compete and perform. They met celebraties in the Industry gosh they even knew people like Justice crew (just to name 1) before they were famous in fact while I was venturing off to America to increase my knowledge in Hip Hop the Justice crew boys were covering my Hip Hop classes at KJD Dance.
Everyone in the Penrith area wanted to learn Hip Hop from us and soon we had 3 Hip Hop crews and plenty of Hip Hop classes, boys Hip Hop and break dancing being especially popular.
But the main team Splurb was growing up and starting to focus more on their technical side of dance and a NEW generation was coming through the doors of our studio… We started bringing in more ballet classes, Jazz classes, babies classes and even musical theatre classes. More professional work was coming into the studio and it wasn’t just the Hip Hop dancers getting the work anymore.
The kids and students were surrounded by teachers who worked as professionals in the dance industry and now, because of the shows I was producing we were beginning to work with singers too.
KJD Dance was evolving. We opened dance classes in Greystanes, Holroyd area but pretty soon that grew too so we moved over to a professional studio in Wetherill Park next door in the Fairfield area. Now there were two KJD Dance studios and I had to take a look what everyone was wanting and what KJD Dance with its Industry contact and knowledge could really do… So… we created our talent and artist development programs, we are still strong leaders in Hip Hop but I wanted to find something… a program to really focus the kids on how to build and grow their industry skills in programs that were time effective for parents but still gave the students the experiences and enabled them to learn in a way that really developed their talents.
Our artists development program launched for our singers first and in a few months we were on the set of Xfactor with one of our artists Luke. 4 yes’s from the Judges and Luke was through to Bootcamp! Singers kept coming and KJD Dance was ready to launch its next chapter, our talent development program for Dancers…
NOW… I want to tell you more but… I don’t want to give away everything in my first blog, SO I hope you enjoyed this little journey through KJD Dance. Keep watching this space for more to come!!!
