Choose954 Podcast Episode #79 With Pablo Malco

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bv-LGhZfOTQ&list=PLOQvdw7d0cd9RZZkd2lZy2hmrnJv-cfLI&index=20

Evan Snow: And we are back here on the Choose954 Podcast, Episode 79, with our upcoming AAF creatives and speaker and local Broward legend in the dancing choreography scene, Pablo Malco. We are very excited to have you share your story on September 9th as part of our monthly breakfast lecture series. But before we get to that, we wanted to have you on the podcast to do a little preview and let some of the folks that might not be familiar with your work get familiar with the incredible things you've been doing in the community for years now. If you aren't familiar with Choose954, myself, Evan Snow, and my business partner, Mr. Andrew Martino, started an initiative as arts advocates and community builders to keep people in the know with the great things that are going on, primarily within the arts, culture, and community-building space, in an effort to make Broward County, my hometown, a better place to live and not just a better place to vacation. The point of the podcast is to connect you with incredible people like Pablo that do important things in the community, and he definitely has quite a bit of important initiatives. So without much further ado, Pablo, why don't you introduce yourself a little bit and kind of take us through a little bit of your journey at a high level here?

Pablo Malco: I appreciate that. Thank you so much, Evan, for the great introduction. Shouts out to Choose954, shouts out to Andrew, to Mr. Snow. I see you guys' work in the community, so I just want to say first and foremost, like, it's so very much needed, and you guys have been doing this for a long time. A very grassroots organization. I saw you guys grow, and I see what you guys do to kind of enlighten the community about the arts community right around them that a lot of them don't know about. So I think that's fantastic, by the way. I'm a huge believer in that. I had a fortunate opportunity to be a professional dancer for 30 years now. I always believe in kind of giving back to the youth in the community and just helping other artists kind of find their way in their path. Just for a little bit about me, I was born in Brooklyn, and I was raised in Lawrence, Queens. I say raised because I left when I was seven. I went to Trinidad and Tobago. I left there, I went to Texas. I left there, I went to California, and I've been in Florida now for about 27 years. And I tell you all that because, like everything else, my travels have influenced me as a person, the way it shaped my mind, the way that I see the world. And, you know, I have a lot of appreciation for all these different places that I saw, all the different places that I lived, and all the different places that kind of helped inspire me to be the person that I am today, for starters.

Evan Snow: Should I keep going? Oh, well, and I didn't know that you spent some time in Trinidad and Tobago. Andrew happens to be from Trinidad, and we always like making those connections. But yes, from that point on, please fill us in. I know you've accomplished quite a bit in your few short years on this planet here.

Pablo Malco: I appreciate it. You know, I appreciate you saying that. It never feels like it when you're in the driver's seat, like you've traveled as far as you have, and if you've waded through as many waters as you have. I come from a Caribbean family where dance was something that women did, and it wasn't a real career. And I say that because I feel like so many artists go through that with friends and family, you know, asking, "Yeah, but what are you going to do as a backup plan?" I'm going to tell you, man, I went to college, and I took dance, which was my first formal training, to be quite honest with you. I was already 18. I had really been dancing every day for like four or five years at that point. I knew that's what I wanted to do. But I took photojournalism as a backup because I had to. If you gave me the option, I would have taken dance and did dance as a backup too. That's where my mind was. I was just set on a goal. However, I gotta say, I was blessed to be able to walk the path that I walked. I have a brother who's in entertainment, and because of his connections, I was able to be seen by some of the right people at the right time. You know, they really say being in the right place at the right time is huge. And when I was younger, because of his connections, somebody saw me doing something and said, "Hey, I didn't know you did that. We want you to come do this performance for us." That performance led to another thing, and here I am 30 years later with a decent resume. So, I'm kind of wanting to do this talk because I want people to know that you have to follow your deepest desire. Now, of course, if your deepest desire is unethical and it's at the cost of other people or the expense of other people's happiness, livelihood, or health, that's not cool. In no form or fashion is that cool. But if your desire is to make yourself happy again without it being at the expense of other people, then I'm all for it. And sometimes we get caught in the world of popularity, fame, money, or having a perception that makes people go, "Oh, that person is great or cool or successful." And the truth of the matter is that is not where happiness lies, in my opinion. Happiness lies in being able to wake up and do what you love doing on a daily basis. Now, because you love doing something doesn't mean it doesn't get hard. It doesn't mean that you won't run into challenges. It doesn't mean that you won't fail at it sometimes. But it's something that you love doing, and just loving it is enough encouragement for you to continue to strive and find new ways out of whatever hole you dug yourself into, so to speak. So, I started remembering the dances. I told you, street dancer. I learned ballet, started when I was 26 with ballet. I've done a little tap, which I think is my weakest but one of my favorite things to do, to tell you the truth. I spent a lot of time doing martial arts only because I am a physical person, right? And today, I don't do any of those. Maybe I do a little martial arts because that's my form of exercise. I don't lift weights. I don't go to a gym. I'm a martial artist at heart. I want to build muscle and stay limber through martial arts. I don't dance as much anymore, and that's kind of what I'm going to speak about this coming September 9th, which I'm looking very forward to, is how I went from dancing all the time, that being my love and my passion, to where I am today, where I sit at the desk in an office, and I only do things that provide opportunities for other young artists to kind of taste what it's like to be in this industry, right? And when you give them that kind of taste, you give them that kind of opportunity. I mean, I also provide for professionals, but when you give aspiring artists a taste at that moment, they can go, "I really want to do this," or "This is not for me." And I didn't have a lot of those options when I was younger until I got to the point where I started working as a dancer. So, I kind of was like, "Well, this is what you chose. You have to stick with it," right? I wish I did know some things prior to it becoming a career, but I think I found my way, okay? I was blessed, like I mentioned. I had some good people around me, and I made some great friends along the way that were very encouraging, and I don't think everybody has that.

Evan Snow: I appreciate you sharing that and sharing transparently that, you know, you might not be dancing anymore, but you still were able to turn your passion into purpose and that you now have, throughout your experience, been able to create platforms to support others in pursuing their passion. And it's, you know, not everybody is as forward-thinking. A lot of people, you know, think about athletes. When you're growing up, you want to become a professional athlete. Well, what if that doesn't work out? What's your plan B? So, I commend you and give you kudos for having the vision and then being able to take your vision and your purpose and your passion and create platforms to support others. Could you tell us a little bit about how you do so with your foundation, Developing Dreams?

Pablo Malco: Absolutely. So, in 2007, I started the Pablo Malco Foundation, what I called at the time—I don't know if it was my ego or what, but I just knew I wanted to do something. And, you know, people had encouraged me, "Oh, you gotta just do a nonprofit." I was a dancer when they were telling me that. I was a dancer, and I wanted to dance. So, I was still traveling, doing a lot of performances, choreographing a lot of stuff. So, at the time, I wasn't ready. In 2007, I met the woman of my dreams, who is now my wife. I met her in 2006, actually, and I knew at that time that I needed to stop traveling so much because I wanted to build and nurture a family. So, to be quite honest, just being very open about how I got here, okay? In the way of planning, not traveling so much, being at home in Broward County, and doing more work in my community, because I was going to Europe and teaching kids and spending months out there at a time working with other people's kids and not my kids right here at home in my own community. So, the Pablo Malco Foundation, we were just teaching dance, the performing arts—ballet, hip-hop, tap, stuff like that. After doing that for a while and getting to know these kids and seeing them every day and realizing, "Oh my God, these kids are me when I was a kid. They have no idea what's available to them outside of this community," because my dad, you know, bless his soul, my dad was a hardworking man. He raised my brother and me. You know, he worked in snow, sleet, rain—he really did, and I'm not just saying that. So, I have a lot of respect for him and for all, you know, people who have jobs that they probably don't love, but they do it to support their families. So, my dad wanted me to be a construction worker like he was. My dad was a specialized pipe fitter and welder. He wanted me to follow in his footsteps. So, I'm looking at these kids in the community, and I'm going, "They're going to end up doing what their parents are doing too." Okay, how do I expose them to other things? Now, nobody knows this about me, but in 1997 and '98, I was signed to a record company called Whodunit Records, which was signed to Mesa Blue Moon, which was signed to Atlantic Records. So, it was a small deal, and I used to do reggae dancehall music. So, I love music. I love songwriting. I love music production. I love all that stuff. So, when I started looking at these kids and going, "What else can I show them other than dance?" I was like, "Oh my God, music production." I started doing this in 2002, and everybody thought I was crazy. Everybody was like, "You know, what? Music production? Like, what is that? These kids don't want to learn that. They want to move their bodies and all that." Okay, yeah, they need to move their bodies. I get that. But these kids do want to know what this is. I met with several organizations at the time that were much larger. They shunned me away. A month or two later, they were offering the same program that I came offering them. But, I mean, I just want to throw that out there because it really did hurt my feelings. But, you know, everybody gets their turn, and it's been my turn for the past 13 years because I eventually found my way, started offering photography, music production, video production, web designing, and graphic design through after-school and summer programs. So, for the past, I want to say, 12 years solidly, we have been offering after-school programs in media arts and performing arts and instrumentation to kids who normally can't afford it or who are not exposed to those kinds of things because, you know, they took it out of the schools. And when I took them out of the schools, like, I took that personally because I played violin in seventh grade. And even though I can't play a lick of violin today, that really helped shape me, and it helped me understand arts and made me have a love for arts and music. So, you know, that's how I got here.

Evan Snow: Powerful stuff, and I definitely resonate with you on, you know, other organizations that, you know, have conversations and there are synergies, it doesn't work out, and then they end up offering a similar thing later. And I could already tell you, you know, you take the high road, like, you pride yourself on taking the high road, and that's one of many things that has led you to obviously having a long-standing career, making an impact, changing lives. But I really admire your admiration and love of the dance form and of the movement and of these practices, martial arts being one of them. You mentioned tap, you mentioned ballet, and other modalities. For those that might not really be that familiar with these movement practices, could you share your thoughts personally and then, I guess, professionally as it impacts the work you do through the foundation on the importance of dance and movement in one's life?

Pablo Malco: Oh my God. Okay, hold up. Okay, okay, so yes. Okay, so, okay, first let me start off just saying this really quickly. I've been working with senior citizens for about the past six years. I teach them twice a week, and I—so that's one class that I won't pass on. I have nine, maybe ten instructors, but that's my class. You guys can't teach that class. And the reason is not only is it inspiring to me, I have students that—we do chair aerobics now. We used to do line dancing six years ago. Now we do more chair dancing and chair aerobics. And I'm only saying that first because, dude, I have two or three students that are 99 years old, okay? And they can move, my brother. So, when you talk to them and you say, "Wow, you know, how do you do it?" They go, "Never stop doing it," you know? And I look at them, and I go, "Wow, that's like the most profound thing. It's so simple, but it's so profound." Okay, so, okay, without—I'm not trying to be rude here or exclude anybody. I just want to bring up a point. America has an obesity problem. When you go to other countries where they ride bikes to work, where they walk to the train station, where they walk to go to dinner, and they walk from dinner, and not everything is a cab or a drive, you don't see that as much. And that's just living life. That's not even an extracurricular activity. That's just living life on a daily basis. So, when you think about that, movement is huge. Just movement, period. So, any form of movement, I think, I highly recommend and admire yoga. I mean, I'm not really flexible. I've never been as a dancer, believe it or not. I'll explain why more on the 9th. I mean, why I think I'm not flexible and how I got around it. But, you know, yoga is great. Martial arts is great. Dance is great. Aerobics of any type. Just walking. I mean, even—I'm not knocking the gym. The gym is fantastic, but we need this in our body, our muscles. What do they say? "Don't use it, lose it." That's the truth. Same thing with our brain, same thing with our body. But I just want to go a little deeper and say that dance, the importance of dance, or the importance of something like a martial art or like yoga in somebody's life is because we exercise the body, but we don't often enough exercise the mind and the soul and the inner spirit. We really don't. So, you know, you have a lot of people out here that got, like, eight and twelve packs, beautiful muscles and quads and legs, but inside, they're hollow, they're empty, and they're dark. So, something like dance kind of embodies all of those things in one. You're not only working out your physical body, you're working out your inner body and your soul and your mental health and strength. So, in my opinion, that's why dance, martial arts, and movement are important because it's a full 360 in the sense of mental and physical health.

Evan Snow: Amen. That was the answer I was looking for. And movement, as we actually found out with our last month's speaker, who is a flow arts practitioner and started the Flow Fest movement, can come in many different forms. I happen to like and gravitate towards yoga, and some people gravitate towards dance, some people gravitate towards hula hooping. But I think as long as you can incorporate some movement, and even as you alluded to, walking home from the restaurant, bicycling to work, certainly will help with that level of activity to hopefully have longevity in your life. And I joke with my dear friend here, Mindful Doctor, with, you know, just doing a simple forward fold every night before going to bed. I want to be able to, you know, wipe my own ass when I'm 80 years old and be able to bend over and be mobile. And, you know, doing yoga, I think I'm gonna have a good chance of doing that. So, I appreciate you sharing that, and I appreciate you, you know, really connecting the dots with people that—I try to get my parents to do yoga. It might not be for them, but my mom does jazzercise, which is another, you know, form of movement and exercise, and it works. So, you know, as long as people can find something that really works for them that they enjoy that, you know, doesn't feel like a chore or a task, I think there's definitely value in there.

Evan Snow: I made a note as you were sharing. I don't know if this will come up in your Creative Zen talk, but you mentioned your brother was in the industry and connected you with an opportunity that served as a breakthrough for you. Would you be able to briefly or intimately share what that breakthrough or aha moment was?

Pablo Malco: Absolutely. Absolutely. So, man, you know, it's hard to say this without sounding like I'm throwing shade, but I just have to say it the way it is so that it's clear. Not because I want to take all the credit for everything or lessen the credit or take away credit from anybody, but I just want to be clear about this, okay? So, my brother used to be a rapper, and he's still a damn good rapper. I'm talking about 30-plus years ago, he was an amazing rapper. He still is an amazing rapper. He's a very talented brother. And honestly, let me just throw this out there for the record—if it wasn't for him, if it wasn't for my brother, I can 100 percent guarantee you I'd be in jail or I'd be dead. I was fighting every day at four, five, and six years old. I was about that life. I wanted to be about that life. That street life was what I aspired to be. He was like, "That's not how we get down," okay? So, he's always been very motivated. He wanted to rap since I was four. Sugarhill Gang came out, and he was like, "That's what I'm gonna do the rest of my life," because he used to sing really well and stuff. Anyway, so he was signed to Virgin Records at the time as a rapper, and he was also writing for some of their artists. And I used to want to dance for him, but the truth of the matter is I wasn't quite good enough as a dancer. I was trying to find my way. I could dance, but not on the level of these guys in L.A. I had just come to L.A. to stay with my brother, and I'm 16, 17 maybe, and he's my legal guardian at the time. So, he's going to rehearsal at a place right off Sunset in Hollywood, California, and I'm like, "Well, can I just come hang out in the studio while you guys practice?" Because they had mirrors and dance floors and stuff, and I danced on the street my whole life. I didn't even know what a dance studio looked like, so this was amazing. So, I promise you I won't make any noise. I'll sit in the corner. I just want to come. He was like, "Sure." So, when the rehearsal was finished, I got up and I started just going at it. I had like three minutes before we had to get in the car, but I was like, "I'm gonna practice in front of a big mirror." And I'm dancing, and a lady walks up to me who's from Virgin Records, who was there watching the rehearsal, unknown to me. I didn't know who she was. She walks over to me and she goes, "Young man, you dance really well." I was like, "Wow." And she was like, "How much do you weigh?" I said, "I don't know, 145." "How tall are you?" "Five-eight, five-seven." She was like, "You'll be perfect. Would you like to do the Black Expo for us as Scat Cat, Paula Abdul's cat who did 'Two Steps Forward, I Take Two Steps Back'? Remember that song?" And I'm like, "Yeah, I do." I didn't even know what that was at the time, to be honest. I mean, I knew who the cat was. I had seen the video, but I didn't know anything about what they were planning to do with him. I didn't know much about the whole thing. I was like, "Yes, it's a job. I'll take it," kind of thing. So, I went to the Black Expo for them, and they were like, "Yo, you got the job." I didn't know I was auditioning for a job. They were like, "You got the job." I went on tour with Paula Abdul for about a year and a half off and on, like maybe two or three times a month, when I was 18 years old, from that one performance. But now I want to explain because, like, this is where it gets blurry and I always have to clear it up. I didn't dance for Paula Abdul. I was Scat Cat. Scat Cat was a separate entity from her. Once she came up with that song, he had his own album, and he had his own chore as a performing cat. I wore a costume, and if Paula would go to New York, I would go to New York, but I would go to all the hospitals, I'd go to all the malls, I'd go to all the places where there were a lot of kids, and I would promote that Paula Abdul was in town tonight. And then once in a while, they would have me—because we had like two or three of us that wore this costume, different costumes—I would have to do my own show as Scat Cat. So, they'd take me out, I'd be in front of a crowd in this big costume, and I'd be kind of like lip-syncing to the music and dancing and freestyling. And that was my job, bro, for like a year and a half at 18 years old, three months into college. Needless to say, I didn't finish college. But anyway, that's not where you start; it's where you finish.

Evan Snow: And I mean, listen, someone's got to do the Scat Cat, and if you're signed to Virgin Records and you're touring with Paula Abdul, if you're on the stage or if you're behind the scenes, I mean, that's pretty good. That's a pretty high level. Kudos to you. Just in that one story, interestingly, so, you know, you've had some exposure now, obviously here in South Florida, you've had some exposure. You mentioned going to New York and L.A. You know, you live here in Broward County. We've seen great growth and progress in the arts in Broward County, but I'm gonna bring this up, and I think you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. This was a place, unfortunately, for many years—not my term—was called a "quote-unquote cultural wasteland" right down the road from the mecca of arts in North America and potentially the world—Miami, Art Basel, Wynwood. Broward County, Fort Lauderdale, unfortunately, some people in high levels of government decided to call this place a cultural wasteland despite many efforts of people like yourself and myself, my business partner. But thankfully, you know, we are in a much better direction now. But from your experience over time, could you share your thoughts on the evolution of the arts in Broward, and I guess more specifically to your seat, you know, the dance and choreography world?

Pablo Malco: A hundred percent, man. A hundred percent. And I know I'm a little long-winded. I'm gonna try to be a little shorter on this, but I have to explain this, please. Please, please. I came here in 1995 from California, okay? To be quite open and truthful, I didn't come for dance. I came because I wanted to be closer to reggae music because I said I was signed to Whodunit Records as a reggae dancehall artist. Because at some point in my life, I realized that I wanted to help people. I wanted to kind of be an evangelist, but I wanted to do it through music, and reggae is that positive source of information constantly—well, at least it used to be. So, I wanted to be a part of that world so bad, so I moved here to be closer to that. I started offering dance classes as a way to pay bills because, you know, we were recording songs and flying back to L.A. every so often, but I wanted to have a job that I enjoyed doing while I was making my album. Dance kind of took over my life again. But I would go to people in 1995 and give them a resume and say I wanted to teach hip-hop dance, and they would look at me and be like, "Hip-hop what? What's that?" Or "That's not real dance, young man. We only do real dance." Dude, I've had so many doors slammed in my face. I've had resumes set on fire in front of me. I've had my pictures thrown on the floor in front of my face. But I've—I really have seen this thing grow, and this is a huge part of my story. I'm going to talk about this on the 9th because I want to tell you how I went from that to how I went from going, "I don't want to be part of this industry anymore. I'm a very non-confrontational type person." So, I'm going to get more into that on the 9th, but just to stick to the question right now—very close-minded when I first came to Miami and Broward County. The scene—the scene, if you didn't look like them, and I don't mean look like them in color, but more so I think it was more of a class thing. Also, more of a classism type of thing. So, I came to Florida in '95 because, believe it or not, I stopped—I quit dancing, and that's going to be another part of my story on the 9th. I quit dancing after having such a great early career, too, but I wanted to teach my people. And I say my people, I mean everybody literally, but just anybody who would listen because I don't particularly have a tribe. Okay, and I'll speak about that in a second too. So, I wanted to teach my people. I wanted to be an evangelist, but I wanted to do it through music because there was a time when reggae music, for me, was soul music and the music of education. A lot of who I am today is because of reggae music, right? So, I wanted to do reggae, so I moved to Florida to do music. And then, as a job while I was recording my albums, I would fly back and forth to LA a couple of times a year, and we were working on our project. Living here, I had to pay bills, so I worked a couple of odd jobs—oh my God, I could tell you guys about some of those too on the 9th. It's pretty funny, some of them actually. But I said, I'm going to go back to teaching dance because, you know, it's something I enjoy doing. I can do that while I work on this album.

I would go to dance studios in 1995 when I came to Florida, mostly in Broward County, and they would tear my resume up. They would laugh at me, they would close the door in my face. I had a lady throw a picture back at me—my headshot was thrown at me—and I was like, oh my God! I mean, you have to know, first of all, I'm going in there for a job, so I'm going in there on my best behavior, full manners, the whole nine, and they're treating me like dirt. I had a woman literally tell me, "Who do you think you are?" And I was just like, whoa, like, what is this? "That's not real dance, that's not dance, we don't do that out here." That's the kind of stuff I was getting, and this was early '95. So, again, I just want to say on the 9th, I'm going to cover this—I don't want to go into too much detail right now—but sure, I was one of the guys in South Florida, and I can't say the only guy, but I was one of the guys that pioneered hip-hop dance in South Florida.

And the fact that I quit, again, to do more of my nonprofit—now, I can do both, but I chose not to because the climate of the scene has really turned me off. I'm not very confrontational, so when things get confrontational, I start looking for other options. Now, it doesn't mean that when things get hard, I stop going—just when things get confrontational, it becomes a problem for me. So, I saw the art scene gradually grow, and hip-hop became one of the biggest forms of dance in my community. I must have been, without exaggeration, to about 50 studios between 1995 and 1996, asking them for hip-hop dance. Nobody hired me, nobody wanted to talk to me, nobody called me back, nobody returned my calls, nobody even responded to my emails.

Can I tell you that I've gotten a call from at least 35 to 40 of those same studios over the next couple of years going, "Pablo, we want hip-hop now."

Evan Snow: I believe that, I believe it.

Pablo Malco: You know, and then people were stepping on toes, and I just don't understand why people think that there is not enough for everybody. Do you think fish in the ocean fight because there's not enough water to swim in? I just don't understand. So, amongst dealing with the people who think you're not of their class or you're not on their level or you don't have the experience, then you're dealing with the community who's also like crabs in a bucket, fighting amongst each other because, you know, they don't want you to get in so they can get in. So, it was kind of like a battle on both ends. I was trying to do business-to-business relationships; those were failing me because we were a little slow on getting there as far as what urban art is. And that's where this story is going, to urban art.

So, there was always, I think, some form of opening for classical artists of all genres—ballet, fine art painting, instrumentation. There's always been more of that on the scene, but I'm an urban artist. I was a street dancer, and that's why I have the Developing Dreams Foundation—particularly for urban artists—because still to this day, in 2022, there are not enough options and things available for urban artists to exercise their passion or their purpose. If you can—I'm going to ask you, Mr. Evan—many people, okay, now I know that not everybody cares for rap music, and I got to be honest with you, I have my woes about rap music and even reggae dancehall music today, which is the music that raised me. And I realize that I'm a little older and kids are into different things, but let me ask you this: how many platforms do you see for young performing artists to exercise their talent?

Evan Snow: The only one, locally, the only one that really comes to mind is Darius and the Art Prevails Project. I mean, and you. I mean, there are some studios—you're right—now, via the work of many, many years, there are places like Funk and Flow Studios that do offer hip-hop dance classes. But in terms of an organization or in terms of a platform or in terms of another evangelist that's dedicated to these types of art forms, yeah, correct, there are very few and far between, unfortunately.

Pablo Malco: So, I just want to say this. Dance classes—hip-hop dance classes—all over the place. You can find dance classes everywhere. You can go to a ballet school that says "School of Classical Ballet" or something of that nature and find hip-hop dance classes inside of it now because that pays the bills today. But to me, that's not exercising your purpose; that's a place where you go to study. It's like school—nothing's wrong with it, I'm not knocking it. I'm just saying it's different from what I'm talking about. I'm talking about how do you go from that dance studio, and where do you go to actually go on a real stage in front of people that are not just your friends and your family, and perform for a real audience of strangers and go, "Okay, I'm good at this, I'm not good at this, I can excel at this, I see where I need to improve." Not many places. You mentioned Darius, and I see that they do pretty awesome stuff out there. I just want to tell you, I have been doing this, specifically providing these opportunities, and I will have to say, I believe that I am one of the guys, if not the guy, to pave the way for people to be able to do it today. Because when I was doing it—listen, man, I've been doing this since 2007. I got my first grant in like 2015. You know why? It wasn't the first one I'd written; it wasn't the first one I wrote, brother. It was the first time somebody saw what I was doing as needed in the community. And before I was doing after-school programs, I was over the foundation. I was only doing dance productions. I was raising money to do dance productions to provide work opportunities for local performing artists, okay? And nobody would give me a cent—not a cent, not a hundred dollars, not fifty dollars, not ten dollars towards this project.

And then, somebody did give me money, and that was from the Cultural Division—Adrian Clark and Jim Shermer. And I got to tell you, that changed everything for me. That was like the moment where my confidence changed, brother. My life changed, everything said, "Oh my God, oh my God." And dude, let me just tell you this, I have videos of this show. Actually, actually, I may be lying—it may have been, I may have gotten approved in 2012, you know, I didn't get the grants until 2013 or whatever—it was maybe a couple of years before that. And it was the Cultural Division. And I did that show, and I have videos to prove it. I did that show, brother, everybody came out. And from that day on, people have been going, "Oh, you have to talk to Pablo. Pablo's the guy for this now."

So, I started to—and listen, I'm not patting myself on the back, I'm not trying to brag—all I'm saying is I hit the road, I paved the way, I made it a cool thing, and I showed people who didn't believe that it could be—how do I want to say this—that it couldn't be a professional art form, so to speak. When they think of street dance, at the time when I came and I was asking, they just saw some brother spinning on their face on cardboard paper with bad attitudes and sagging pants. But when they saw what I did—it was called Hip-Hop Symphony—I had an orchestra, I had hip-hop and contemporary dancers, and I had a rock band all at the same time on stage. And from that moment, people started going, "Yo, this guy does something different than street dance." No, no, no, we do street dance. It's just not what you thought it was. You made up your mind that it was bad and derogatory and offensive, and we showed you that there are so many different elements to this thing that we call street dance and street or urban art. And that's where I think a lot of the tables started to turn, because you know what? Nobody was doing what I was doing at the time, and I do take full credit, 100% credit, for the organizations that come after me that I set an example for how it should be done and how it could be done.

Evan Snow: Amen.

Pablo Malco: And that's where I—

Evan Snow: No, no, no, no, not at all. I commend you for paving the way. I appreciate you eloquently highlighting, showcasing, and putting it in context—it really does take years and many doors slammed in your face, many grant applications denied or not even responded to, many asks for sponsorship and funding that you feel and know in all reality are qualified and just, you know, for sponsorship that just don't get fulfilled. And it can be very, very frustrating for an artist, for a producer, for a community builder, for an entrepreneur—whoever that person may be—to keep wanting to pursue this mission, this passion project. I really appreciate you mentioning the evangelism part of things. I mean, clearly, you are an evangelist in this space, in this community. Somebody had said that to me years ago, that I was like an art evangelist, and I didn't really know what that meant at the time. But it really takes people altruistically, which is something Andrew, you know, keeps me into and instills in me, that you gotta do good without having your hand out, necessarily hoping or expecting anything in return, but doing good because it's the right thing to do, creating these platforms for the future generations, and getting people to care. And you're right, I feel you a million percent about, you know, you're not asking for a pat on the back, and you're not asking for the 50 dance studios that you brought the opportunity to have hip-hop dance classes at, you're not asking for them to give you a part of the revenue now or to give you credit for instilling this opportunity in them, which now leads to more offerings and more people moved forward. But, you know, somebody had to do the work, and it'd be nice to at least get the credit. And I'm so grateful that Adrian and Jim Shermer and the Cultural Division did see the value and does see the value in this work, because it does allow you to do bigger and better things. And I did want to segue now to some of what—you mentioned—you mentioned some of your current offerings in terms of with the seniors and with classes and after school, but could you share a little bit about some of your current initiatives and ways that people might be able to attend and participate, like the Choreographer's Ball and some of the other things that you have going on?

Pablo Malco: Absolutely. So, listen to this, right? I've been doing this for 25 years. We just mentioned 1997—I hosted my first show in 1997, and I've been doing it since, right? And why am I telling you that? I'm telling you that because I know a lot of artists. I could do—if I wanted to do a show tomorrow, literally tomorrow, I promise you I could make 50 calls today and put that show on tomorrow, flawless, without a hitch. But I don't do that. I don't do that. What I do is I open it up to the general public. Some of my friends and some of my peers miss opportunities that I offer because they don't respond to my posts or my emails. So, I post everything that we're going to do on social media. And if you are into this industry and you want to be part of an event that I do, you probably want to be hired by one of our productions or something of that sort, or you want to be referred as a professional by us when other people call us—because people still call us from all over the place: "We need this, we need as many of these." I still get it; I got one right now that I have to respond to when I come up with this thing, anyway.

So, I would just say, follow our social media, join our mailing list or something like that, because that stuff is always there, and it's always out. The Choreographer's Ball is October 23rd this year. All you got to do is submit a video of your dance team, and it's on the website. It's pretty easy to find, I think under Events—Choreographer's Ball Submissions—it's pretty easy. I have a talent show coming up here in September, another place where I'm now looking for new, fresh talent. I just did a documentary last month—I put out a call for artists. Not many responded—well, not nobody, a few people responded—well, it's a few, like 30 plus people responded, but none of them were actually my friends or people that I knew. And because of that, I didn't use any of my friends or people that I knew—I used all the people that submitted, right? Because I was like, this is what I have to choose from, these are the people that are interested in my project, they're going to give me 100%, give me their all. So, I love new talent, and my thing here is to give more opportunities and to find new special things in the community. So, with that being said, my website is a great place to find what we're doing and to submit a link.

You can just do it anytime, whether there's even nothing coming up, and we'll put you in a database. And when something does come up, we'll email you and let you know. Or follow our social media, which is the best because we're posting there weekly on everything that's coming up, and we want people to respond to those posts—not because we want to get 100 likes, but because we only feel—listen, if you give it to them for free, if I call my homeboy and be like, "Yo, dog, I need you to do XYZ," he's not going to take it seriously like a professional job. I run a professional company; I need people that are going to take my job, my work seriously. But people that submit online, they may not be as talented as my homeboy, but they're more committed. And as we know in this industry—if you know anything in this industry—it's not about how talented you are, it's about your desire, your follow-through, your commitment, and your professionalism that gets you to the next level.

Evan Snow: Amen. So, with that being said, social media, website—could you spell them out for those that are looking to follow?

Pablo Malco: Absolutely. So, fortunately, we were able to get our name—developingdreamsfoundation.org—on Facebook.com backslash developingdreamsfoundation. And on Instagram, on Instagram.com/developingdreamsfoundation—don't forget the "s" after dreams—but other than that, we're pretty even. Oh, on Twitter, we might be art educators, but that's another thing. But okay, we focus most of our energy on Facebook and Instagram.

Evan Snow: And if they want to email you directly, what's the best email address?

Pablo Malco: pmalco—P as in Paul, M-A-L-C-O—at developingdreamsfoundation.org would be the best. Or just go to our website. You can even go to my website—info@pablomalco.com. I do a lot of personal projects where I still hire artists, but for things different from the foundation—a little bit more avant-garde, a little bit more possibly controversial, right? I never intend to be that way, but I just wanted to throw that out there. So, info@pablomalco.com or pmalco@developingdreamsfoundation.org, whichever is easier to remember.

Evan Snow: Phenomenal. And one last question we'd like to ask the locals on the podcast here—you've alluded to some of it, but why is it that you choose the 954? Having been to the places you've been to, lived in the places you've lived, why do you call the 954 home?

Pablo Malco: Oh man, that's a really good question, and I have to think about that a little bit because, to tell you the honest-to-God truth, I don't know. I should have left this place a long time ago, but I'm glad I didn't. I was ready to move to Austria, Vienna, Austria, in 2006. I was ready to move because the art community for urban artists was suffering. It was suffering. I stayed—I stayed for multiple reasons, to be quite honest with you. One, because of my wife, and another reason was because there were some kids that I was teaching at that time that I felt like I was more than a teacher to those kids, and they looked forward to me, man. They celebrated me when I arrived, and I said it would have killed me to pass them on to somebody else. It would have killed me. And I got to tell you, some of those kids reach out to me today as adults, and I go, "I made the right decision," because they're like well-established, respectable, contributing citizens to our community. I just love it—I love it, I love it, I love it. So, there were classes that I was teaching at the time, which was only dance because nobody would take my music production classes, that were very dear to my heart, man. And I couldn't even take telling them that I was going to leave, I couldn't. So, I ended up here. Everything happens for a reason, huh?

Evan Snow: Absolutely, absolutely.

Pablo Malco: Oh man, this is good stuff. I will wrap it up; I will be respectful of your time. But you mentioned the kids—in closing, any noteworthy success stories that you care to share from either kids you've taught, mentored, or have had come through the program?

Pablo Malco: Well, okay, so I'm just gonna say this. When kids come to my program, it's an hour, two hours, three hours a day. So, by no means will I ever take credit for their success, you know, because a lot of them don't have to come to me. Or sometimes they're stuck in a camp that makes them take my class, but there's so many other people at that camp that are influencing and inspiring those kids to do better with their life. But I just want to say this—my assistant choreographer at the time, Athena Cameron, brought a young man to me and was like, "Pablo, this boy can sing. He's talented. He can't dance that well, but we're gonna work with him, we're gonna get him up there. I teach him privates, but I want to bring him to our dance company." We had one of the few hip-hop dance companies at the time; nobody was really much doing it. And I was like, "Okay, let's bring him down." She brought the dude down, and I was like, "Oh my God, okay, this boy really can't dance." But she wants me to put him in our choreography and all this stuff for shows, and I'm like, "I don't know if we can do this." Anyway, we're working with him, he starts to develop a little style. A couple of years later, I get more involved with the organization—Pablo Malco Foundation, which is now Developing Dreams Foundation—so I start spending more time with the organization, less time with the dance company, and it kind of eventually dissolves for a minute. I'm not doing as much practice, only when people call me for events and shows.

Long story short, I go to my television one day, I'm watching VH1, and this face comes up, and a picture, and on top of the picture, it says—I have it on my phone still—it says, "Jason Derulo used to dance for Fusion Entertainment," which was my company. Jason is like one of the hugest pop stars out there today, from right here, from Broward County.

Evan Snow: That's right.

Pablo Malco: And he's known as the dancing machine—not only can the boy sing, but he's known as the dancing machine. I can't take any credit for that, but I'm just saying, here's a kid that came through, he knew what he wanted, we were there for him as a landing spot, he worked his way through that, and he worked his way all the way up to becoming a successful musician and artist. And that's our hope for everybody. I think the one thing I will say—he always wanted to be a singer—the one thing I think I will say is we helped him realize that he could do it all. But I do not take any form of credit for that boy's talent, his growth. If anything, my girl Athena, who was my assistant choreographer, she was the one who, even after rehearsals, would stay with him to make sure he learned the dance, would meet him on her personal time. She spent time with him, but the guy came through us. I have pictures of us, and I don't put them out because I don't want to embarrass him, but I have pictures of him when he was 15, 16 years old in my dance company.

Evan Snow: I love to hear it, a true story. I 100% believe it. And by having platforms, by doing the work, and by being an evangelist and committed to that vision, it does create a space, a container, an opportunity for a Jason Derulo, for an Ariana Grande, and for some of these talented people that have come from Broward County to be able to pursue their craft, pursue their passion, pursue their creative outlet or profession—whatever it may be for them. You don't know until you try it. So, I appreciate you sharing that. I appreciate you being, you know, real down-to-earth, humble, modest. I appreciate you prefacing, you know, not taking the credit for his success, but—and it totally shines through—your transparency. So, I'm really looking forward to having you share your story during Creative Zen, our monthly breakfast lecture series—mini TED talk that we host for free every second Friday morning of the month. This next installment will be at the great Fuel Cafe in Fort Lauderdale, off of Commercial Boulevard, just east of Federal, on the morning of September 9th. We have doors open at 8:30, have a little opportunity to mix and mingle with fellow community members, and then the talk and free guided meditation start shortly after 9 o'clock to put us in the Zen state. We're out of there by 10. You can hang around, co-work from there, have lunch, smoothie, juice, whatever the case may be.

Last month, we had a hula hooping demonstration at the little green space out back behind the cafe after the talk was over, and it was a really cool moment, you know, just to kind of let loose and make new friends. So, we appreciate people coming. If you're worried about being early in the morning, missing an hour or two of work, we have a list of very truthful things to tell your boss. You're gaining insight and inspiration that you can bring back to your team, you know, you're connecting with other people in the community, and you could be back in the office by, you know, 10:15, 10:30, depending on where it is. You can find out more at AAF Creative Zen. This will be September 2022. A couple of other events that we have coming up to look forward to—the return of 954 Day, the third annual installment. We do another form of movement on September 5th at 4 p.m. We host an annual bike ride. The past two years, when I was living in Fort Lauderdale, we did it throughout downtown and the beach. This year, since I moved to beautiful Hollywood, Florida, we're going to start it at the Hollywood Arts Park at Young Circle in downtown Hollywood. Free parking in the park in the Publix garage if you need to, you know, drive over here and bring your bike. And we're going to start it off with a light stretch, light yoga flow, with one of my favorite local yoga instructors from our studio, Bend and Breathe in Hollywood, Yanni Amador, aka Yoga with Yanni. She's going to lead a light, complimentary, donation-based stretch at around 3:30 before the bike ride starts at 4. She is an advocate, as well as myself, for Yoga for Change, which is a beautiful 501(c)(3) nonprofit that provides a lot of trauma-informed resources through the yoga practice to people in recovery, people in prisons, people in women's shelters. So, if you do feel compelled to, you know, make a dollar or a donation—four cents for 954 Day—it would go to Yoga for Change, but it's not required, just optional. And then we'll take a nice little bike ride down Hollywood Boulevard to the beach and back, you know, bring people together. I'll try to point out some interesting things about Hollywood.

So, that's a free event, Monday, September 5th, 4 p.m., Labor Day. We are also glad to bring back—I just posted it right before this—our Choose954 Local Artist Potluck series, where we invite local artists to share a meal and discourse with their contemporaries and the community. It's another free event. You just bring a dish for, you know, five or six people because not everybody eats everything. We're going to do this next one at the Gasper Art Studios in Dania Beach on Federal Highway. Laura Gasper is a phenomenal ceramist and now has the space that we like bringing people into—different studios, different art spaces—so they can, you know, see what's out there. So, that's going to be Sunday, September 25th, 5:30 to 7:30-ish, you know, maybe a little later if the conversation is going good. So, that's the Choose954 Artist Potluck. And one last one—it's a good month here in September—we have the return not just of Greater Fort Lauderdale Beer Week, which is another initiative our agency, the United Group, that Choose954 is a part of, has brought to the community to highlight and showcase breweries and the craft beer scene here in Greater Fort Lauderdale and Broward County. But the anchor of this week is the return of the fifth annual Female Brew Fest, founded by my business partner's wife and one of our partners, Frances Martino, who created this platform to specifically highlight and showcase women in the craft beer industry that either own breweries or they're the brewmasters, brew mistresses. And they've got, I believe, up to 40 breweries coming this year to the Kimpton Goodland Hotel on Fort Lauderdale Beach, so you could, you know, get samplings from probably over 100 different beers, really nice place, really great event, music, you know, community, the whole nine yards. So, that's going to be on September 17th in the afternoon. You can find out more at femalebrewfest.com. Later that night is also the Hollywood Art Walk on the third Saturday night of the month, where we still need free tours of the Art Walk at 7 to 9 o'clock. There's a free tour of the Downtown Hollywood Mural Project led by Jill Weisberg, the program's project manager and curator.

Starting to get a little cooler, not a shot out, hopefully, for much longer, so we encourage you to come out. If you've never been to that or haven't been in a while, we take a lot of pride in what we do, touring people through the community, and these are completely free tours. Art Walk is free, so a couple of free events to check out—Creative Zen is free. And I guess just the last one to save the date for—we got the return of Fort Lauderdale Art and Design Week coming up for the fifth annual installment, January 21st through the 29th. Already talking with Pablo about potentially doing something—maybe screening one of his films during the week, or, you know, who knows, maybe having some other events. So, to find out more at ftladw.com. You could drop me a note at choose954@unitedgroup.com. Find me on social media; I'm an open book. Pablo's an open book. Feel free to reach out, connect, engage, inspire, and hopefully—and I actually feel pretty confident about it—this conversation got the wheels in your brain turning and creating new neural pathways, and maybe inspires you to try a different form of movement or a different modality or stepping outside of your comfort zone or any or all of the above.

So, Pablo, I genuinely appreciate you taking the time. This is one of the more enjoyable conversations I've got to have, and I'm really looking forward to you sharing your story in full at Creative Zen. And I appreciate everything you do in the community, man. We can never have enough art evangelists, so I really appreciate it, man.

Pablo Malco: Thank you so much. You guys do some fantastic stuff yourselves, man, and I'm looking very forward to connecting with your audience on the 9th. Hopefully, some of my friends will come out and kind of hear the whole story because, you know, they've heard bits and pieces, but they don't really know how it all went down and what gets me here today and why my wheels are still spinning and why my heart's burning to keep doing this work in my community until I can no longer breathe. So, I'm looking really forward to it, brother.

Evan Snow: Amen, my pleasure. We'd love to hear why you choose 954. Feel free to drop us a note if you know somebody doing important stuff in the community. Feel free to share it, always looking for new people for the podcast. We appreciate you tuning in, and we'll see you at Creative Zen.