MOVING PEOPLE: Greg Miller on Dance Parade New York's Insurgent Origins, Evolution Since 2007 and More
Greg Miller
Biography
Greg Miller worked for 14 years in management for Fortune 500 companies, including Lehman Brothers, Revlon, and Cablevision. Drawing from his love of dance, he stepped into producing and founded Dance Parade in 2006. Miller continues to promote the "One Parade - Many Cultures" vision by including as many artistic and vibrant forms of movement as possible. We managed to catch Miller shortly before the 16th Annual Dance Parade & Festival on Saturday, May 21, 2022.
Photo credits: Jerry Goldman (headshot) and Josef Pinlac (Miller with a fellow dancer)
My earliest memory of dancing is ___________.
when I was 12 years old. It was my summer camp's end-of-the-season dance. I remember awkwardly trying to dance to Saturday Night Fever among other hits from the '70s.
As far as dance idols go, I was first smitten with ___________.
Paula Abdul.
The most expressive part of the body is ___________.
my face — I always wonder why a lot of pros leave this part out.
An event that transformed my life, dance-related or not, was ___________.
dance meditation in an ashram in Pune, India, where I was really given permission to let go and express myself. It was there that I contemplated studying dance ahead of a contemporary dance career. The formal training part never happened, but I woke up to the possibility that dance was a vehicle for fun and mental wellbeing.
A blissful day in my books constitutes ___________.
two hours' worth of dancing to great music with my 5Rhythms dance community.
___________ is underrated.
World cultural dance
___________ is overrated.
Being right
My favorite type of apparel to move in is ___________.
Spandex!
My personal motto is ___________.
life is short and death is long.
If I woke up one morning and miraculously found that I had become the ‘grand master’ of one dance, it would be ___________.
Salsa on roller skates!
The idea for Dance Parade came about when ___________.
I attended the Art Parade put on by the Deitch Projects in Soho. I adored dance and asked the question, if there's an Art Parade,' why can't there be a Dance Parade? It was happening at the same time when the State Supreme Court was hearing the case of the NYC Cabaret Law. And it made sense to have the first parade be a dance protest in support of the dancers who brought the case, including Peter Martins from NYCB.
Compared to the first parade in 2007, Dance Parade 2022 is ___________.
much better attended by dance students of all ages, artistic and cultural organizations.
Each year’s parade performers are selected by way of ___________.
simply knowing that Dance Parade is open to everyone, so long as they dance! It is DanceFest, the five stage festival that follows the parade, that is a curated event — this happens at Tompkins Square Park. A seven member curatorial committee reviews applications and awards stipends to over 75 selected art organizations.
This year’s featured dance companies include Freedom Dabka, which ___________.
is a Palestinian cultural dance organization. Each parade features over 100 unique styles of dance and it will be our first time presenting Palestinian dance.
The best feedback I have received about Dance Parade is ___________.
it's best day of the year!
Bet you didn’t know this about NYC: ___________.
There used to be Dance Police — technically the 'Cabaret Task Force' — in the 1990s that fined and shuttered nightclubs and even venues for Tango, Swing and Ballroom. This was the basis for the first Dance Parade — as a form of protest following a State Supreme Court ruling issued by four dancers representing various dance genres.
In conjunction with Create NYC Cultural Plan in 2017, we repealed the administrative requirement for a dance license. Even still, venues need to be zoned for dancing today.
You can make a difference to the aforementioned law by ___________.
signing the petition at legalizedance.org. As a society, we need to recognize that dance is a healthy activity that needs to be supported.
Oh, and if you're caught not dancing at Dance Parade, our NYDP (New York City Dance Police) will cite you for a non-moving violation and summon you to the After Party at Nublu!
Covid has taught me that ___________.
you can make lemons out of lemonade. We made a film called The Resilience of Dance through the Pandemic featuring Alvin Ailey, Urban Bush Women, Buglisi Dance Theater, Heidi Latsky Dance, and the Dance Theatre of Harlem, among others, that we're really proud of.
Outside of dance, my three greatest pleasures are ___________.
hiking in nature, biking around the city and attending live music performances.
When people look back at my legacy, I’d like them to think, “Man, that Greg Miller was ___________.
fun to dance with!
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