Author: Emma Loggins
Date: 2008-05-05


Interview:
Compared to the likes of "Hannah Montana's" megastar Miley Cyrus, you wouldn't know it by the look or sound of her, but multi-talented singer and songwriter, actress and dancer, Montana Tucker is already reaching career heights at just 15 years of age. Perhaps it's her innate passion as a performer, and perhaps it's partially fueled by her drop dead looks, but something has driven this teen star to stardom so early in her years. A native Floridian, in order to further her singing and acting career she has recently made the move to Tinsel Town. Montana began modeling at the age of eight and quickly became one of the most sought out child models in Florida and NY. Montana soon after caught the attention of producers and directors and began booking national commercials, music videos, and television shows. At the young age of just twelve, Montana had a resume that resembled what someone twice her age could only achieve, which included nine national commercials, covers of magazines and a national TV show. FanBolt had the pleasure of sitting down with Montana to discuss her career, her future, and how a triple-threat 15 year-old stays grounded. Here's what she had to say:

Tell me a little bit about how you were discovered.

When I was around 8 or 9 I started modeling, and I started doing a bunch of ads for Sports Authority, Limited Too, and Macy's. When I was on all of these different shoots, the photographers would ask me if I knew how to dance, I had never had any dance lessons at that point. So I went to this workshop with Darrin Henson (known for his work with Britney Spears and NSYNC), and he came up to my parents after the workshop and said that we needed to move to LA or New York, that I would be working every day.

Instead of moving, my mom actually opened a dance company called Pop Stars, as a hip-hop training center. She brought all the choreographers from New York and LA to Florida. She brought Shane Sparks, Dave Scott, Wade Robson, and all the different choreographers to Florida, so that's how I really got started with dancing. With the company, we opened and performed with a lot of different people. I actually won the World Hip-Hop championships.

I started dancing with Ashanti as a backup dancer, and then other people as well. And I realized... hey, I want to be that performer! I want to have fans screaming my name! Just thrill of dancing on stage, is such an amazing feeling being on stage and having people write me on MySpace. It's just such an amazing thing.

I started taking voice lessons about a year and half ago with Betty Wright (best known from Making The Band 3, she's worked with John Legend, Gloria Estefan, Beyonce). My singing career just took off from there. I've been recording, and I'm on the Step Up 2 soundtrack with a song called "Ain't No Stressin". It was actually a MySpace contest that I won which got me on the soundtrack. MySpace has really helped my career.