Appearing on the stage, alone with a six-foot-long ribbon, Carmel Kallemaa begins to move rhythmically to Brenton Wood’s 1967 upbeat hit, Baby You Got It.
No sooner does Canada’s Got Talent judge Lilly Singh comment to Howie Mandel about a lone performer appearing on such a large stage on her own, when company arrives.
Kallemaa is joined by 17 other Team Canada rhythmic gymnasts, all dressed in black in striking contrast to Kallemaa’s pink leotard.
And the audience erupts.
“It’s difficult, we use ribbons six metres long … it took a lot of practice to synchronize everything,” the 26-year-old athlete, who is originally from Estonia who now calls Barrie home, later explains.
Kallemaa has been dancing since before she could talk and still loves it. It’s a family sport. Her mom, Janika Moelder, ran three gyms in Estonia before the family came to Canada.
The family, including her dad, Kaupo Kallemaa, now operates three gymnastic facilities called Glimmer Athletic Club in Ontario — one in Oakville, another in Toronto and one much closer to home in Barrie. She works in the family business and competes for Team Canada with her mom as coach.
She credits her mom, who knows how to share her passion, with her enduring love for the sport which she explains has four pieces of apparatus: hoops, balls, clubs and ribbons.
“In the routine we have to combine elements which are balances, jumps and turns,” she says, noting there are also throws and rolls, risks involving throwing the apparatus high and rolling and a dance portion. “All this needs to be fit into one min and 30 secs … you have to choreograph them into a story.”
All that needs to be combined with a leotard designed to go with the theme.
Kallemaa has a solid social-media presence, with 13,700 followers on Instagram alone. A post of one of her performances caught the attention of one of the TV show’s producers and she was invited to audition.
She had earlier dismissed the idea of appearing on television as something that was perhaps what other people did. But she recognized the opportunity when it called, not just for herself but also to shed some light on rhythm gymnastics and, perhaps, grow its audience.
Not to say it was easy. Kallemaa who regularly travels around the world performing in front of thousands of people, did get the jitters. Performing is one thing, she says. Having to talk and address the high-profile judges with an audience to boot is quite another.
“It’s been one of the best experiences,” she says now, without revealing whether or not we’ll see more of her on Canada’s Got Talent.
“I think I was lucky. My filming was one day, 12 hours before I had to leave … The producers are super nice, they’re able to help out if needed,” she said.
The show aired during the first half of April and she received a 'yes' from all four judges. On Tuesday, May 7, viewers will learn whether she made the judges' cut.
Meanwhile, Kallemaa’s busy competition schedule persists. The Canadian championships are at the end of May and right on its heels are the Pan American championships in Guatemala.
Kallemaa says she plans to continue with gymnastics as long as she can. At age 26, she is definitely on the older side of a sport, where it’s not unusual to see gymnasts retire at age 20 or 22, although there are some who still compete at age 30.
She intends to persevere and has her eye on the Los Angeles Olympics in four years’ time.
As for how she makes out with the TV show? Well, she’s not saying.
