By: Sindy
Sindy: Hi Montana. I know everyone wants to know how your young career got started, so what happened?
Montana: Well I really got started was when I was about eight by doing some modeling down in Florida. While I was working the photographers would always ask if I knew how to dance or how to sing, and I didn’t know how to do any of that yet. Then I went to one of Darren Henson’s (from Darren’s Dance Grooves) dance workshops in Orlando and even though I hadn’t had any experience he came up to my parents and said I had a lot of potential and said we should move to LA or New York and that I could be booking a lot of stuff.
Sindy: That must have been nice to hear.
Montana: Totally, he was doing the American Music Awards and wanted me to be on that, but the timing wasn’t right and we couldn’t really move right away so my mom ended up opening her own dance company in Florida called Pop Stars. It was a hip-hop training center and she invited choreographers from New York and LA down to teach so I got a lot of amazing dance training and I ended up winning the World Hip-Hop Dance Championships with that and started back up dancing for Ashanti and all these different artists. And when I was doing those shows I was like, “Hey, I wanna be that that performer out there on stage doing my songs in front of thousands or people.”
Sindy: Then what happened?
Montana: Then I started taking voice lessons from Betty Wright (From Making the Band 3). She’s Beyonce, John Legend, and Gloria Estefan's voice coach. She really helped start my singing career and soon I was opening for Ciara, Lil Wayne, and Omarion down in Florida. Then I won a contest and got my song Ain’t No Stressing on the Step Up 2 The Streets Soundtrack. From there I met Flo Rida when I opened for him and Rick Ross down in Florida, and he had a song on Step Up 2 too. We decided to work together and I just finished recording a song called Turn it Up with him. It should be hitting the radio soon, and I have a snippet of it on my MySpace.
Sindy: Wow, you’re working hard. Who are some entertainers you looked up to when you were getting started?
Montana: I would definitely say Jennifer Lopez and Beyonce, because there are a lot of artists who come out and are successful with just one song, but I admire Jennifer and Beyonce because the can sing, they are amazing dancers, they act, they even have clothing lines. J-Lo started as a dancer and then became a singer just like I did. There have been so many comparisons between us, I was even supposed to play her daughter in An Unfinished Life but they ended up changing to role to a girl with red hair who looked more like Robert Redford. I also recorded her song A Mile in My Shoes, which is the theme to Desperate Housewives, and it’s on my MySpace too. Both Beyonce and J-Lo have had such long, successful careers and you never seem to hear anything bad about them at all, so that’s something I aspire to be like.
Sindy: What would you say is your biggest strength as a performer?
Montana: When I’m out performing I don’t really get nervous because I love to perform so much and to play with my audience. I’m not just getting up there and singing. I like to connect with my audience.
Sindy: Is there anything that you have to work on?
Montana: I think everyone, even the biggest stars, are always learning and wanting to get better. Everyday I try to work on new singing techniques, new dance moves, and even new acting skills.
Find out more about Montana and hear some of her music on her official website or MySpace.
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