Artistic director of Cirque du Soleil’s Kooza comes full circle

I WAS BORN IN St Petersburg, Florida, in 1984. My mum called me Mr Sparkles or Mr Showman. I was always putting on a show. I was always entertaining whoever was around. I definitely had something. That’s why I think they encouraged me to go into theatre. There was just something a little different. They recognised something special.

NO ONE KNEW I could sing until I was probably nine or 10. When they heard me sing in the school choir, that was when it turned into “put him in lessons and let’s help facilitate that as much as we can”.

Jamieson Lindenberg in his youth. Photo: courtesy Jamieson Lindenberg

I STUDIED AT A performing-arts high school for theatre and dance. My core education and training vocally as an artist was in this conservatory as a young adult. That is where Cirque du Soleil came to recruit ushers. We did an interview and they offered me a position as an usher for a show called Quidam that was playing at the Tropicana Field (in St Petersburg). That was my first job. I was 15.

I’D NEVER HEARD OF Cirque du Soleil, but I was absolutely blown away by what I was seeing. I was studying theatre, so it was quite a contrast to Broadway, which is what I went on to do.

Jamieson Lindenberg (right) at a singing competition in Florida when he was 14. Photo: courtesy Jamieson Lindenberg

I BROKE SOME OF the rules – I was very late to work as a 15-year-old high-school student is – and I was let go. I was disappointed, but didn’t even think about Cirque or that I could ever perform or be involved in that capacity because I finished school for theatre.

Daily News

Artistic director of Cirque du Soleil’s Kooza comes full circle

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