We were lucky to catch up with Shanae’a Moore recently and have shared our conversation below.

Shanae’a , appreciate you joining us today. Often the greatest growth and the biggest wins come right after a defeat. Other times the failure serves as a lesson that’s helpful later in your journey. We’d appreciate if you could open up about a time you’ve failed.

This story starts with a much earlier core memory of mine. My father when I was in high school was a choir teacher and due to job changes in the school was told he needed to teach orchestra. My dad, having the most integrity, believed he couldn’t teach orchestra effectively or honestly without knowing how to play a stringed instrument. So at the age of 44, he taught himself how to play the viola. That in itself was a triumph. After countless nights of my father devoting every night to making the most horrific noises in our spare room, finally emerged with a deeper understanding an appreciation of this discipline. Fast forward to his first concert, a time fraught with nerves on all sides and pressure like never before felt. High School is very dramatic. I sit in a little seat at the top of the theatre and watch my father mount the conductor’s platform with easy suave confidence. He raises his batton and starts conducting these students he has been teaching for a few months having learned an instrument with painstaking care in a song most people, even the tone deaf, can hum. It starts out strong, but by the middle starts to lose steam and finally crash from pitch and tempo, in a brilliance of dumbfounded shock. The students stop playing and look at my dad who is still conducting in silence for his life. My father drops his arms and I am more horrified that I have ever been. Embarrassment, shame the likes of which can only be felt by the adolescent floods me. Then my dad turns, looks out to the audience and changes my life. He says “Ladies and Gentlemen, This obviously didn’t go well. But it is in no part these incredible students’ fault, Sometimes in life, our best wishes and hardest work doesn’t pan out. All we can do is claim it, and try again. Hang in there with me and maybe we will make something better than music.” Then he turns and lifts his batton and tries again. They limp through the song, and finish with a flourish and they receive the best applause that auditorium has ever heard. I cried. From pride. My dad taught me life that day. That there is nothing more important than the risk. Than the risk of doing something new and important, though it will probably fail. I carry that with me everyday as a writer and an actress and a creator. Risk it all and all failure serves the world. Because the failure is in service to a greater purpose. Maybe one day I’ll create something better than theatre, than a story. Maybe I will deliver healing and purpose to someone’s life the way my father did to mine that day. So yeah, I love my job, it sucks, it hurts, its thankless, and makes absolutely no money. But it’s what I was created to do. The biggest and truest failure I could possible have is to not try. Not to risk. Not to put my heart out there.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I am a freelance actress and writer in the Houston area. I have been a teaching artist, standardized Patient, teacher, dance instructor, director, editor, voice actor, party princess, choreographer and many other things to supplement an artist’s income. I have done some screen work, but I am primarily a stage artist. I’m originally from Juneau, Alaska and got my BFA in Musical Theatre from Sam Houston State, and then my MFA in Contemporary and Classical Text at The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow. I am a passionate and innovative artist that is excited and proud to be a part of the Houston scene. I have a passion for the arts and I am working quite honestly to the bone to provide important works for the Houston community.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

Oh boy. One of the biggest and most frequent questions we get asked as artists is “How do you memorize all those lines”. Yes, that is a big part of my job, but it’s only the first step. If my lines aren’t memorized I can’t do the thousand other things I have to do. I have to effectively tell stories with my heart and soul on display. I can’t do that without my lines memorized.

Then there is the constant Job-less-ness aspect of my life. When I am “successful” at most I have a job for three months, then I am jobless again. I am constantly working on finding work, doing good work, and then moving on with little to show for it, but the credits on my resume and people’s memory. There certainly isn’t financial freedom tied to it. I have to work multiple jobs to make ends meet and sometimes, they don’t do that. It’s a really really heavy burden the financial struggle, especially with being a part of a family. But we rely on theatres and they rely on donors. Gone are the days of the personal patron. There was a time where people would fund artists to do their art. That isn’t common now as much as I hope I could one day win that lottery. Nothing is impossible.

But the biggest biggest difficulty to understand is the idea that all the things over so many years, tears, and time that I have worked. All the things I have done with my passions and projects, all of the things I have prayed for. The shows, the characters, and productions, they exist only in pictures, name and memory. It is the impact in people’s lives that these pieces reside. They will not be put in a gallery or used in business they enhance our everyday, our morality, our inner-most lives. It’s a bit meta, but it’s the beauty of art.

Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

I got to see the most amazing productions in my life, but one that changed everything was “Let the Right Ones In” as a part of the National Theatre of Scotland’s touring production. They not only had incredible acting and production value, but they made magic on stage. Unexplainable beauty on stage. They way they told the story and the things they created were… there are no words. It illustrated and honestly proved that there were no rules when it came to the theatre and entertainment. The doors are open if only we decide to go through them. It’s what sent me to grad school and got me writing my first play, what made me challenge the limits that I thought were in stone not only on stage, but also in myself. This is all sounding quite artistic, but honestly, there is room to tell all stories, you just need the right passionate people who are willing to take risks! Since accepting that, I have found there are many more like me out there. I can’t wait to tell some of these stories with these amazing amazing people. Maybe someone in the audience will feel inspired and seen and they will go on to create bigger and bolder things that make the world a better place. There is no better mission that sending someone home feeling important and worthy of life and art.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.shanaeamoore.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shanaearae/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shanaea.moore
• IMDB https://www.imdb.com/name/nm7570854/