Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Monica Remes. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Monica, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

Before I lived in Los Angeles, I lived in Salt Lake City, Utah. I performed, choreographed, and taught classes with multiple dance companies there, including one that was founded by me and two of my best friends. One of the companies I was in, Sugar Space Co.Da, was a cooperative dance company. I got to choreograph a piece on that company and to this day it is still one of my favorite things I’ve ever created. I titled the piece “Hips, Quakes, and Stones”. It was a celebration and exploration of iconic women in rock n’ roll. I worked with my dancers to find movement that they themselves developed and created while listening to the likes of Joan Jett, Heart, Pat Benatar, Stevie Nicks, No Doubt, Tina Turner, etc. I also watched live performances of these iconic front women and took inspiration from the way they moved on stage while performing. The piece was meant to celebrate these women, these forces of nature, to rock out to their music, dance to their music, and be inspired by their music, whether it was experienced at a live concert or listening through headphones in your bedroom. I also received the best choreographic review of my life in the local dance magazine! I would love to someday reset that piece on dancers here in Los Angeles.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m what the world would call a multi-hyphenate. Or recently, someone told me that I’m a Manifest Generator! I wear many hats. I have always been an extremely creative and curious person. I have many gifts that I’ve had since I was a child, and other gifts that I’ve had to work for. I’ve been able to sing ever since I could speak, I was one of those toddlers with a vibrato – I could sing my a$$ off, but I was quite shy and nervous about it for a long time. So naturally, I was drawn to music and was put into music classes, choir, and band. I fell in love with dance and theatre, so I spent the first junk of my life being in every musical theatre production, play, and recital that I could be in. I began majoring in Musical Theatre when I went to college, but ultimately switched schools and majored in Dance, which is where I fell in love with film! I minored in Cinema Studies and focused on creating Dance for the Camera – which then took me to Utah. The University of Utah offers a Graduate Certificate Program in Screendance, the only one of its kind, so I had to do it! I lived in Utah for a few years, going to school, danced professionally, performed in musicals, began teaching fitness, and worked as a freelance videographer and video editor. I studied acting there as well…which then pulled me into voice acting. I studied voice acting with a private coach and added a new skill and dream to my life – to voice video games and animation. I wanted more opportunities and new experiences and thats how I ended up here in Los Angeles.

So as you can see, my creative curiosity and skills have taken me in many directions, and still do! I still teach fitness and yoga here in LA, I voice act in video games (still waiting to book an animation), I’ve been performing with a wonderful company called Liquid Gold Productions – they produce and create original narrative driven shows that involve a variety of theatre, dance, music, burlesque, etc. I sing in a super fun cover band called The Hit List, we’ve got a great set list of hits so people can sing and dance along all night! So if you need a party band, you found us! I’m singing and dancing in a big variety show created by my talented friend Ilan Weber-Nunez – coming up this February for Valentine’s Day weekend <3 I'm also working on restarting my own freelance videography and editing business, as I did in Utah, but this time it will involve more social media content creation - photos, videos, posters, stories, etc. I'm calling it Remes Creative. AND I'm thinking of going back to school for vocal performance and get into songwriting. A lot has been happening and going on over the past year alone. My life continues in a creative path with many twists and turns, but always something artistic. One of my goals it to get back into performing and choreographing modern/contemporary dance work, on stage and on video. My heart constantly yearns to create!

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I think many dancers can relate to this. At some point in my last semester of college studying dance, I fractured my spine – unknown to me! I was just in horrible pain and it often incapacitated me. I was misdiagnosed with something else. After graduating, I was offered an Adjunct Faculty position teaching dance, and it was when I was teaching for a semester that I finally went and got a CT-scan and discovered what was really wrong, my L5 vertebrae was fractured and sliding out of place. I still had a few months of teaching, but I was not allowed to dance anymore, wasn’t allowed to move or do anything really! So I got incredibly good at teaching dance with just my words – which is a skill I’m so grateful for because I am often complimented on how clear and descriptive I am when teaching fitness and yoga. When I was allowed to move again, it took many years to rebuild the strength of my core and spine. To this day I lack a lot of flexibility in my spine that I used to have and will still experience pain from time to time because my vertebrae is still out of place even though the fracture is healed. Nonetheless, I am still moving and dancing as much as I can! Sure, there have been many other injuries that changed my body, but the spinal fracture really altered my life for a long time and I really had to learn from it.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

I’m not sure it’s smart for me to put this out there right now…but why not. Ever since the pandemic, teaching fitness and yoga has become incredibly difficult, in regards to making a living. The studio life is just not working for me anymore. I use to teach many classes in a day – studios use to give me enough hours and they paid me enough, but not anymore. It has also shifted into MANY emails, MANY texts, and MANY meetings. I find that I am doing a lot less teaching and more work for less money. It has been a struggle for me. So, I am currently working towards getting my Personal Training and Nutrition Certifications! Something I’ve always wanted to do and am finally doing it. Hopefully over the next couple months I will be pivoting from the studio life and into the personal training/coaching world, which I do already, I teach private yoga, barre, TRX, strength training sessions, but now I will have more knowledge and more opportunities available to me. Hopefully I will begin making more money and my extensive knowledge and experience will be better appreciated.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://monicaremes.wixsite.com/remescreative
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/monica.remes/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheHitListofficialband

Image Credits

Last photo shot by withthe.band