Submitted Photo J’Kobe Wallace, a graduate of Minot State University, is performing with Sesame Street LIVE!

NEW YORK CITY – We’ve seen him in Ann Nicole Nelson Hall. We’ve seen him in the Burning Hills Amphitheater in Medora. Now J’Kobe Wallace, 2019 graduate of Minot State University, is on Sesame Street, where he gets to do the two things he loves most: performing and teaching.

Wallace recently performed in New York City with Sesame Street LIVE!, an interactive children’s educational show on one of the world’s most famous streets. Later that same day, he taught a virtual session of voice and piano lessons from his hotel room in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the next location on Sesame Street’s nationwide tour.

Such a combination of performing and teaching is nothing new for Wallace, for he has been doing both since his time in the music education program at Minot State.

“I did Minot Summer Theatre a lot when I was in high school, and I remember really enjoying it and meeting a lot of the music faculty through that,” he said. “I decided to stay in Minot to get my degree, and I’m glad I did because I got to work with those professors, and there was some sense of continuity with the things that I was learning and already doing in the community and what I got to do in my undergraduate as well.”

Regulars of live music and theater events while Wallace was at Minot State are sure to have seen him perform. He played in concert band, sang in concert choir and other small vocal ensembles, acted with Campus Players and performed in several productions with the Western Plains Opera Company.

He also was an advocate for education in many roles, such as president of the MSU chapter of the National Association for Music Education, a member of the Music Student Advisory Council, a student conductor for the Western Plains Children’s Choir, an aural skills teaching assistant and a cheerleading coach for Minot High School.

“I was doing a lot at Minot State, and I would often leave to do theater work outside of North Dakota because there were paid opportunities elsewhere,” he said. “It was fun to learn and explore, and then I would come back to school and apply things I learned outside of my time in North Dakota into my own degree or in operas and things like that.

“When I graduated in December of 2019, I did have teaching offers, but for me, personally, I knew that I loved teaching so much, and I still do it — I teach virtually — but I also love performing, and I really wanted to find a way to marry those two loves. Since I graduated, I’ve fortunately been very successful in finding a way to make gig work and theater art a part of my career.”

Successful is right. The first opportunity Wallace earned was a Black history tour with Bright Star Touring Theatre based in Asheville, North Carolina. While on the road, he auditioned for the Medora Musical and performed there for the 2020 and 2021 seasons.

“I spent the entire summer in Medora, which was a really cool thing for a North Dakotan, to be a part of one of the largest stages in North Dakota,” he said. “We’re a cast, and we all live in the same area in Medora, so we got really close, which is really important when you’re doing a hundred-plus shows in a hundred-plus-degree weather.

“One thing I realized when I moved to New York is how much I missed nature and seeing stars. My favorite part about being there was after the show, driving down from the hill, still sweaty and gross, and then I would look up from my cabin and see the actual Milky Way, like, the whole galaxy. That’s incredible. You don’t get to do that everywhere.”

Having moved to North Dakota in 2012 and spending a large part of his young adult life in Minot, Wallace was especially proud of his role in the Musical.

“They introduce every Burning Hill singer and where they’re from, and there are people from, you know, Tennessee and all these other states, but then when they say, ‘J’Kobe Wallace from Minot, North Dakota,’ the audience goes crazy, which makes me feel super special,” he said.

In January of 2021, after his first season in Medora and his first tour with the Medora Christmas Show, Wallace moved to New York City, where he is based today. Between his first and second seasons with the Musical, Wallace also performed alongside Broadway performers at Feinstein’s/54 Below, also known as Broadway’s Supper Club in New York City. At that time, he started working as a virtual voice and piano teacher for the Rogers School of Music, based in Rogers, Minnesota.

As the end of his second Musical season approached, Wallace started looking for what was next for his career. Excited to get back into the auditioning process, he booked several auditions. Sesame Street was his last.

“Before I left to do the Medora Christmas tour, I was like, ‘Oh, this could be fun. I don’t really know what Sesame Street LIVE! is. I’ve heard of Sesame Street. Everyone’s heard of Sesame Street, but like, I really don’t know what this would be about.’ So really for me it was a learning opportunity,” he said.

After passing through the initial audition, the callback, and the dance call, Wallace received the news.

“I got off the subway and got this voicemail — the service down there’s horrible — and it said that I got the job and that I got to be on the road with Sesame Street, so it was like a happy accident,” Wallace said. “I take every audition seriously, but this was one that I was like, ‘Don’t get your hopes up. This could be fun. This could be cute.'”

Touring with Sesame Street as one of the show’s two live vocalists and hosts gives Wallace the opportunity to pursue both of his passions at the same time.

“We ask everyone to dance along, clap their hands, jump around, move like a bird, and at one point, we have snow coming down, and Abby Cadabby flies,” he said. “To hear all those kids and adults react and have like a bit of magic in their lives is really cool.

“I’m a big proponent of energy. In college, for example, whenever we would do performance labs or when I had my senior recital, what would help me perform better is knowing that there are people in the audience who were excited and there for a reason. Especially after the last two years, we’ve definitely seen the importance of live theater. When you’re not able to go, you find a bit of a hole in your life,” he said. “Now there’s a whole generation of kids who were born before they could see a live performance. I’m seeing kids that aren’t old enough to know what it’s like to see theater, like, ever.”

Some of the lessons Wallace gets to teach on stage are especially close to home.

“To be one of two people that are in charge of advocating all this information, it’s really exciting because to see me, a Black boy, on stage singing and dancing and working with all these lovable characters, it’s absolutely important,” he said. “I love looking out at the audience and seeing other little Black kids, dancing and singing along. I know if I had seen that as a kid at a live theatrical production, that would totally inspire me sooner to join the arts.”

Medora and Sesame Street are only the beginning of Wallace’s career in performing and education. This summer he has plans to return to a community closer to Minot State — International Music Camp (IMC) directed by members of the Minot Symphony Orchestra — for another opportunity.

“I just got a message a couple weeks ago from my friends at IMC, and they asked me to be a musical theater teacher this summer,” he said. “So, at some point, I’ll get to go and be an educator at IMC, which is super cool because in high school, I was never able to go.”

Before then, Wallace will be touring around the country with Sesame Street LIVE! until the beginning of May.

“I’m so grateful to have this job. I’m very lucky that they trust me with this task,” he said.