Want to know more about break dancing? Hooch, our man on the ground and in-house expert for Freesports coverage of the 2010 Sony Ericsson B-Boy Championships World Series, gives a brief history of how it all started.
B-boying is the original dance of hip hop culture which is also known as break dancing. It consists of top or up rock, footwork, power moves and freezes. This style of dance emerged as part of hip hop culture during 1970's in the South Bronx of New York City.
The term 'B-Boy' was created by DJ Kool Herc because they originally danced on the prolonged breaks of the track. The original style of breaking was quite basic, and popular with street gangs who often replaced fighting with dance battles. In this way groups of dancers came togeter to form crews, they practiced together and performed together, spending hours a day creating dance routines and improving their own solo performance.
Afrika Bambata a lendendary DJ, greatly influenced the growth of bboying, he saw it as not just dancing but a way to achieve something and encouraged dancers to train hard. He formed one of the first ever bboy crews known as the Zulu Kingz. The 80's saw the popularity of breaking soar and become accepted as a 'legitimate' dance style seen in many movies (such as Beat Street,Wildstyle and Flashdance), commercials and print media.
As the dance evolved the new style of breakin was influenced by the Rock Steady Crew who added more acrobatic movements such as the Continuous Backspin also known as the windmill in 1981. The dance was also greatly influenced by Kung Fu films.
B-Boying has evolved over the years and now spans the globe. Moves have become more and more intricate as dancers continue their quest to come up with the freshest most original style.
Find out more at the Sony Ericsson B-Boy official site.
