In this issue’s edition of “The Sitdown,” Mass Media met with Joanne Caidor, a senior and up-and-coming dancer currently attending the University of Massachusetts Boston. The 25-year-old Caidor, also known as Misses JoJo, is expecting to graduate this May with a Bachelor’s degree in Business and a minor in Dance.
She spoke to Mass Media about her current projects, inspirations, and her short and long-term goals. Caidor began dancing 17 years ago, when she was eight years old, and started off as a “street dancer.” Gradually, on her own, she ventured into hip hop and other dance companies.
When asked what drives her to dance, she said, “Dance is what helps me drive toward what I want to do. Instead of me being a mathematician, I’m a dance-matician.”
A gifted dancer, Caidor was always encouraged to try-out for major dance competitions, such as “So You Think You Can Dance,” but stated, “For some reason, I never had the chance to go audition.”
She has been choreographing routines since her freshman year in high school in 2010. When asked how many dance pieces she has choreographed, she responded simply with, “A lot! I can’t even explain it.”
When asked if she prefers choreographing to performing, she struggled with her answer. “That is a very difficult question,” she stated initially. Ultimately, though, she carved out the truth within her, stating, “I have my times when I’m like I need to perform.”
Caidor added, “I feel like I need to be on stage.”
Conversely, though, she stated in regard to choreographing, “When I choreograph, sometimes I don’t envision it on me. I envision it on somebody else. Because they can do something I can’t do.”
Caidor went on to state, “I rather do that on them rather than do it on myself.”
In the end, Caidor’s passion for performing and choreographing are equally important to her. “It is very half and half. I like both.”
Currently, the young dancer is involved with three different dance crews, including one she created herself known as “AFMOHIP” which, as she explained, is an amalgamation of “African [dance], modern, and hip-hop.”
Caidor was able to pinpoint exactly what dance feels like to her. “It’s like a thrill that I had in my body.” She stated that African dance is what lured her to the art form. “When you’re dancing African…when you hear the drums, you feel it inside of you. So when I feel that feeling, it pushes me.”
When she was asked where she wants to go with dancing aspirations, she answered, “When I get out of college, I’d like to be able to teach.”
When Mass Media asked Misses JoJo what advice she would give to anyone not minoring in dance yet still passionate about it, she said that, due mainly to money or parental pressure, “A lot of people are in that situation.”
Yet Caidor went on to offer the advice, “Follow your heart, follow your dreams. You need something to get your blood flowing.”
Caidor ended the interview by stating, “Maybe I can apply here,” for the purpose of teaching dance. Based on the YouTube videos Caidor has posted of her fierce enthusiasm while dancing, UMass Boston would be crazy not to accept her as an instructor.