This is the podcast for us dance teachers balancing our teaching job with other jobs, commitments, and just life in general! We don't need to know how to run the whole studio, work with students 20+ hours a week, or win big at competitions; we just want practical advice and real conversations about how to be the best dance teachers we can be with the little time we have with our students. Join Maia on the casual dance teacher's podcast and in the casual dance teacher's network on Facebook.
Maia
Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Casual Dance Teachers podcast. This is your host, Maia. Today I'm joined by a very special guest and a very unique situation.
I actually invited this guest on the show today to speak on a totally different subject, but the conversation was so deep and so rich, and we just got into so many topics that went beyond the scope of the initial intention that I had for the conversation that I've broken it up into two episodes, and we're actually starting today with more of an introduction to the work of this artist and their journey working within the dance industry across a wide variety of different businesses and ventures, navigating all of that and growing that and just finding what fuels you personally as an artist through all of that. So let me begin by introducing you to today's super special guest, Ian Howe. Ian is the owner and artistic director of Pacific West Performing Arts and teaches at various studios around the Seattle, Washington area while also traveling, setting competitive choreography and running intensives.
He created Influx Dance with Anika Parr, a new company that focuses on choreography and style. Ian has performed regularly with Third Shift Dance and was also the associate director for Third Shift Dance Youth Ensemble. He works with Platinum National Dance Competition as director, judge, emcee, and teacher.
He's choreographed numerous musicals. He also started the dance company Apropos Modus in 2021 with Karen Tobin, and in 2022 started his own small photography business, Dance Meets the Eye. Ian has worked with artists such as Lauren Edson, Eva Stone, and has many more projects coming down the line.
So I'm sure you can see where there is just so much depth to what we can talk about. One more really quick note is that at the time that we were recording this, Ian was actually in Australia doing some guest teaching, and he had these really loud birds. We don't know what kind of birds they were right outside his window where he was recording.
Overall, the sound quality really is not bad on this. So don't get scared away by that, but if you hear a little bit of screeching or a little something in the background, it's these birds, and we talked about them in the other episode that we recorded together. But this was a little bit later in the conversation where we're kind of jumping in to getting a little bit more in depth about Ian's entire career, and I just wanted to mention that.
That's what you're hearing in the background. I am so excited to get into this today. Without further ado, here's Ian Howe.
Where do you want to start? Because you've diversified so much, I don't even know where to begin.
Ian
Did you have any questions when you were kind of going down the rabbit hole? I know that in general, in your note, it was just like, you do everything.
Maia
Yeah, I mean, I could ask you about so many different things.
I definitely really am always trying to keep it focused. It's the Casual Dance Teachers podcast, so let's talk to people that are listening from that point of view of being casual dance teachers. But I think within that kind of theme, so to speak, I would be really curious to hear about your studios, where that started from.
What was the seed and how did it grow into you now having three locations and hundreds of students?
Ian
Ironically, out of everything we could talk about, this is probably the shortest. I did not think that I was going to own studios anytime soon. I did not start my studios from the ground up because I do not have that motivation, nor do I want to go through the pain and agony of starting a studio from the ground up.
I was, it was 2019. I had been teaching at Pacific West Performing Arts for two, two, three years at that time. I had taken over the contemporary classes.
So we were at competition. It was hour 40 something. We were getting ready to leave and the previous owner literally walked up to me as we were getting ready to leave and be like, hey, have you ever thought about owning a dance studio? And I was like, sure, maybe at some point, you know, brain dead, wanting to go home and just rot.
And she was like, would you want to buy PacWest? Literally in the lobby of wherever we were. And I was just like, maybe, blah, blah, blah, blah. She's like, well, that's cool.
So I asked two of the other teachers that have been here longer than you, and they both separately said no, but they also both separately said that they would work for you. So if you'd like to buy the studios, let me know. What in the world? That's literally how it came about.
That was March of 2019. By July 1 of 2019, I officially had everything signed over to me. And then March of 2020 is when the pandemic hit.
Right. So not only was I still learning just how to manage a business that had been at that point in business for 15, 16 years, you know, 20 plus staff, 450 plus students. I also then had to figure out how to keep this business alive, how to, you know, work with my co-owner to change a physical in-person business to a completely online ecosystem in three weeks, four weeks.
And then, you know, everything that came along with COVID, learning about the laws, learning about shutdowns and what this meant and what that meant. So yeah, it definitely, owning a studio one was not something that I thought was going to happen. And then owning a studio and then trying to figure it out during a global pandemic was not on the bingo cards for 2020.
So to be basically back, I mean, last year was our best year as far as enrollment. This year is a little slower, but it's an Olympic year, so it makes sense. But, you know, to be where we are, to have three locations, we never had to like fully, like we had to shut down, obviously, during COVID, you know, when everything was mandated.
But to basically still be in our same buildings, to expand, to have new programs, to have new teachers, extremely lucky.
Maia
So do you still teach the majority of the contemporary classes there? Again, how? How are you doing this?
Ian
This is the long answer. And I'm very open about this.
I'm very, this is part of the reason why I travel as much as I do. Like COVID really took it out of people. COVID really took it out of studio owners.
But as studio owners, because we are the people that we are, we put our head down in the trenches and kept the business open, hopefully, tried to keep art and dance alive for our students to have something when they were stuck at home and couldn't do anything. So for me, it was a very, very hard like three, four years of just head down. My co-owner, who was in state, moved to Florida to be with her family because she was pregnant.
So not only was I the only owner on site there, just a lot of things. I realized coming out of COVID that there was just a lot of mental health issues that weren't addressed, needed to be addressed, but didn't know how, thought it was just normal because we're dancers. We push through everything.
We say yes. We blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And oh my gosh, last year, January, I ended up having massive panic attacks and anxiety attacks realizing that I needed to do something about that.
And in going through therapy, it was, which I totally recommend dance teachers, studio owners, my God, go to therapy. You'll learn so many things about yourself. But one of the things that I realized is that because of how COVID was and because of the roles that people had to take, I can't walk into my studio now and be just a dance teacher.
I'm dance studio owner, Ian, who happens to teach dance. And that was draining on me. But I didn't realize that when I was teaching at my studio.
So one of the big things I had to do mid-year last year was take myself out of teaching. Like mid-year had to find subs, all of that. But I was just like, I can't mentally not in the space to do it.
One of the best things I ever did still show up to my studios. I'm more involved now than I was the past couple of years. But teaching is still not in that place to try to cross that line again, because that was a boundary that was getting crossed.
And I had to establish that boundary. And it's been amazing. I teach at other studios, only like a few classes here and there to still get that itch.
But right now, my focus is just helping rebuild the competition team specifically. But just kind of being the personnel, bringing in new connections, that type of person. But traveling to teach, choreograph, working the competitions as a judge and adjudicator and director and all of that is what brings me the most happiness right now.
Maia
That's great. Yeah, that ties into some of the other conversations I've had recently. And it's nice that dancers and dance teachers can have those conversations now, because I think that that's a relatively recent development in the dance industry.
Ian
It is. Well, I mean, my therapist was telling me like that the industries that were hit the hardest now are the industries where the people basically didn't have time for themselves, if that makes sense. You know, again, it's for me as a dance studio owner, I didn't realize half the thoughts that I was having and how depressed and unhappy I was until, again, panic attacks.
But also just having somebody else to talk to and just realize it. Oh, my gosh, this is not normal. You know, and that's part of the reason why I travel so much too and just talk to people, like talking to studio owners, talking to teachers and hearing.
And one, letting them know you're in good company as far as, you know, what people are going through. But then to like, what are you going to do about it? How are you going to put yourself in a doesn't necessarily need to be positive, but how are you going to put yourself in a better situation so that you can get to that positivity so that you can figure out like, is this where I still need to be? Do I need to step back from things? Do I need to, you know, there's a plethora of things. But until you actually just get to the point of acknowledging that there might be an issue and being OK with the fact that there might be an issue and realizing that people will support you and if they don't support you, then peace out.
That has been such a big eye opener the past year, year and a half, especially with as much traveling as that I do was just talking to people and hearing the same situations, but people not necessarily feeling like they can do something about it or feel like it's normal. Because again, we're dancers, we push through and I can tell you right now it's not normal. It's actually very detrimental to your health and it's really hard to acknowledge it.
It's really hard to go through that. But once you do make those decisions, put up those boundaries and figure out like where you need to be, it's amazing.
Maia
Is there anything? Well, I guess photography is like definitely different, but is there anything that you do that's not dance related to take some of that off of you?
Ian
I like to go eat at new restaurants.
Maia
Yes, I love it.
Ian
No, I mean, I think like for me, I mean, I guess, for example, like where I am right now, I worked on cruise ships years and years and years and years ago and I was very humbled and lucky to do that right out of high school. I got to travel for seven and a half years.
You know, I got paid to do it, got paid to dance. But being able to travel again and now like being in a place where I can travel internationally to me, even though, yes, it's work, I taught like the first few days I was here, being able to literally, again, sit in an Airbnb, looking out my window, you know, at downtown King Cross, I think it's technically the neighborhood, but the water's right there. You know, it's, this is, this is my happiness right now.
This is, you know, being able to lounge in an Airbnb and be in a different country and then, you know, have those schools that I reached out to and taught at be like, OK, so when are you coming back? And already having July 2025 trip planned and they're already like, hey, we're going to do this, we're going to do that. I'm going to try to go to London next year, you know, just to teach. And this isn't, there hasn't been any offers necessarily.
It was just like, oh, I want to go here. I'm going to reach out to studios. And, you know, that's how this happened.
I found cheap plane tickets to come here and I was like, well, all right, I'm at least going to go to Australia and use my passport that I've had, put it on Facebook and people just reached out. So even though, yes, it is dance related, this is my why right now, I guess, to be cheesy and cliche. Right now, at this point in my life, this is my why.
This is what brings me happiness. This is what I consider work, but also play, also vacation. I mean, I was on the beach all day yesterday.
I went and, you know, climbed a cliffside to go sit and watch whales out in the ocean. You know? Yeah. So yes, it's, I don't consider this dance related.
Like I consider it the first part was dance related, but now it's just getting to walk to different places. And again, like when I say try new restaurants, I've literally tried a new restaurant every single night for dinner. Yeah.
I don't know if that fully answers the question, but that's where I'm at right now is like, I just found something that really scratches all the itches and I'm going to run with that until I find something different or I run into a wall and be like, okay, I'm bored with this now. What can I go do?
Maia
Yeah, that's perfect. Can I ask where your dance company fits into all of that? Where you got involved with that, how you got involved with that and what your involvement is like currently?
Ian
So I used to dance professionally, not beyond cruise ships when I came back home, still wanted to dance a little bit.
And it was partially just to prove that I could still dance into my 30s, which seems really stupid, but I could do it. Did it for eight years. So I danced with Third Shift Dance and then COVID hit.
So it obviously all went away. So me starting my own dance company was with a friend who I danced with previously. And we were both just kind of like, let's do something.
So that's how Apropos Modus was born. And we decided, because it was a great idea to create it during COVID, because why not? Unfortunately, it is one of those things that just we haven't been able to do a lot with. She moved away to Idaho.
I'm still in Seattle. She's living out literally in the woods with her partner and loving life. And I'm like, nope, I'm going to be still in the city.
But we're planning, we want to do, we're talking about doing a show or little vignettes or something just to start putting stuff out there. Like, I'm going to try to go visit her, hopefully, maybe during the winter. We'll see.
Not the biggest fan of snow. That just was born out of, again, just wanting to do something, wanting to have the ability to do something. I think that's the biggest thing was wanting to have the ability to do something and wanting to do it my way or our way as opposed to somebody else's way.
It's the same thing with Influx Dance, which is not a dance company, but it's a traveling intensive or trying to make it traveling intensive. But that was just born out of wanting to create a safe space for dancers from all over the state to come and dance and learn choreography and learn style and then be able to pick those things up very quickly and then video it right away. So that whole idea was literally just, I had ideas.
I was like, hey, come dance here. I'm going to rent three hours where you're going to learn two or three combos in those three hours, and then we're going to videotape it. And it was a bigger success than what I thought it was going to be.
I thought I was going to get three or four kids. I had 18 or 20 come the first session, driving two, three, four hours from around the state to come work with me. And I was like, OK, this is cool.
And then out of that is the assistant program because, again, older, need help. But I really want to try to offer the opportunity for dancers who are serious to learn how to assist and then also ultimately be able to create their own classes and guest teach. So hopefully next year I'm going to have two or three, I'm going to say full time, but just assistants to travel with me.
I already have one that we've been talking about bringing her here actually to Australia with me next year and come and teach and assist, do all that, get to travel in internationally. You know, she's going to be 15, 16. If I can offer that platform for her to get that experience, let's go.
Yeah, I was trying to find different ways to be a part of the community to help either that again, through like just traveling and teaching and getting to talk to people or offering dancers the platform to expand their knowledge in different ways. So, yeah.
Maia
I don't want to come across like I'm trying to portray any part of COVID in a positive light, but I am gathering that from everything negative that happened and going through all those challenges and trying to navigate owning a studio, it did kind of open you up to diversifying a bit more and doing more kind of for what fuels you and brings you joy. Is that accurate?
Ian
I would, yes, I would say that's 110%. It was one of the funny things going to therapy, honestly, was finding out officially that I was a perfectionist, which any dance teacher I'm sure could nod along and just be like, yeah, what are you talking about? But to actually figure out what that truly means and then to figure out ways to combat that for better or for worse, even though it took a few years, it kind of just forced me to figure out things. It forced me to actually look at what we as dancers, what we as artists considered a dance career and then have to flip it on its head literally and metaphorically as to what now it actually means.
Because I mean, the dance industry changed so much during COVID and it's changed so much now and it's still changing. I don't know better for worse, but what was considered normal, what was considered things that you could do, couldn't do pre-COVID just don't exist post-COVID anymore, at least in some degree. So I think that for any dancers, dance teachers, studio owners, whatever that are still trying to live in the pre-COVID world, it's going to slap you in the face sooner or later just because things have changed as much as we may not want to think that they have to certain degrees.
So having the ability and the want to change, even if it's scary, I think it's a necessity at this point. Being able to make a decision, run full force with it until you run into a wall or a diversion and then figuring out which way you need to turn and then just running full force with that and not feeling bad about it and realizing that the people that will support you will be there along with you. And the ones who don't, that are either complaining about why did you change or don't understand it, they're going to be left behind.
I think that was a hard thing to accept and understand in this whole journey too. But again, positive.
Maia
Yeah. I like the idea of running into a diversion and not a wall. Thinking about like improv, saying yes and, and I'm just going to go with it.
Ian
Exactly. That was one of the biggest things I learned in therapy, honestly, was that sometimes you literally just have to make a decision regardless of what you may conceive as a wrong choice or it's going to wrong somebody or whatever. Sometimes you just have to make a decision and go until you literally either run into that hardcore wall and realize, oh, this was not the decision to make, but I did it until it didn't work for me anymore. And now I'm going to go a different direction or you find the diversion that it worked for you up until that point.
And now you have two different ways that you can go or six different ways that you can go. And then you get to decide, okay, what do I want to do now? How is this going to benefit me? Is this way going to be what I want to do right now? And realizing that you are not beholden to that new direction for the rest of your life. You can literally hop off the train, get on the next one at the next station and go a different direction.
But, I think as dancers, we are trained this way. It has to be this. It has to be done this way until you get the next job, until you get to do this, whatever. No, it doesn't. I mean, it might be harder at some points, like taking myself out. Maybe you're when I was teaching five days a week because I at that point needed to, and I was trying to help people and not helping myself.
There's always an alternative. It just depends on how you do it and the way that you present it to people.
Maia
Yeah, I know you already talked about wanting to travel more and you're really enjoying what you're doing now and you basically already do everything.
But is there anything else that you can see down the road for you that you're wanting to pursue?
Ian
At some point, I would love, so three things. On a smaller scale, I still have yet to produce a full length like evening show. Out of the many years and everything I've done, I haven't done that yet.
I would love to do that at some point. And I don't know if this is something that I would do for a long time, but I think it would be fun to try is create a dance convention, like a full-fledged, have teachers do that. And then somewhere very, very far down the road, create a theater school building essentially that houses everything, dance, music, production, all of that, and have an all-inclusive dance program essentially.
Maia
That would be so great.
Ian
But yeah, all those things need a lot of money and I currently don't have any of that.
Maia
I love that because then you already are setting the example of diversifying and learning all the technical aspects of the craft.
And we know that that's going to become more and more important as the industry shifts. So yeah, we've got to start getting on that model because right now the model is very much...
Ian
Yeah, it's very segmented still. It's very much like, oh, you could be a dancer who goes to LA and works in commercials and tries to get a tour.
You could go to New York and you could try to work on Broadway and you could go work on cruise ships. It's still very hyper-focused, which I think there's definitely a pocket for everything. But I think as dancers get older, it gets harder to learn new things.
So learn some of those tools now so that when you do, you're done touring. You don't want to live that life anymore. You want to be in one place.
You already have the ability to be like, oh, hey, I know how to light a show. I know how to create sound for a show. I could go be a stage manager.
I know how to do X, Y, and Z. I could go work here. I mean, that's the thing. I know I could walk into a theater right now and be able to create a show.
I may not know the finer details of certain things, but I know that I could basically go in and be like, okay, I want these type of lights. I want the sound here. I want this to look this way, this to look this way.
And depending on the system that they have in the theater, I'd even be able to figure that out. But I know that I've worked with enough people and asked enough questions and done enough stuff to know what looks good, what doesn't look good, and how to do that. I don't know if a lot of dancers could say that right now.
So yeah, diversifying. It is the word of the day, and I think it needs to be the word of the industry for a while is stop trying to contain people in just certain boxes and just be like, no, go learn everything. Not just different dance styles, but go learn everything.
Maia
On that note, my family has been being very quiet, but I hear them now. I think they're like, okay, you had your time. Bang, bang, bang. I'm going to wrap it up. Last question now. I know we're wrapping up, but do you have a favorite quote that you want to share?
Ian
I don't know if it's a quote, but the only reason that I got a job over other people was because I could cover up my mistakes better than the other people.
So that was one piece of advice that I got right before I was working on cruise ships and auditioning was literally like, the only reason that X has a job over you is because they covered up their mistakes better.
Maia
Hey, it's Maia coming back on to conclude the episode with my final thoughts and thanks. Let's start by thanking Ian again.
I am just so, so grateful that Ian took this conversation that we initially started out talking about dance photography and just offered up to me like, hey, I have so much more to share. I have so much more to offer. Can we get into this a little bit more personally? And that conversation was so great.
I hope you all got as much out of it as I did. And I'm just so grateful again to Ian for opening up and being vulnerable and sharing that conversation. I think a lot of us as dance educators and professionals within the dance business need to hear.
Thank you to GB Mystical as always for the theme music at the beginning of the show. Be sure to stay tuned for our future episode with Ian regarding dance photography. He has a lot of great insight about that.
And if you haven't already join us on the casual dance teachers network on Facebook, where we can connect and discuss and you can ask questions, share your own input, anything that you have to share with the community there. Thanks again. And I'll see you next time.