B-boy culture busts out at the Isabel Bader Theatre Wednesday evening with the grand finale of the Dare to B after-school program. For the past 14 weeks, non-profit group Break it Down has been instructing teens from seven Toronto high schools in the foundations and finer points of break dancing. The students go head-to-head Wednesday from 5:30 – 9 pm in this “school vs. school battle”.
Program co-founder Lee Pham – Lethal to his crew, the Supernaturalz – stresses that the showcase will be a “friendly” competition. “The idea was to bring kids from different neighbourhoods across the city to one place to share the passion,” he says. “Each school will showcase and then there will be head-to-head battles, which hopefully will be very intense.”
Intensity is a hallmark of the break dancing phenomenon. On Saturday, I attended a drop-in session at the St. Lawrence Community Centre where Lethal, above left, and his partners Dyzee (Karl Alba), centre, and Drops (Jon Reid), right, were overseeing the casual, freestyle session. There were a few young women in the room but the male/female ratio is typically 10- or even 20-1 in this male-dominated practice. Hip hop beats pounded from the PA while dancers stretched, practiced and coached each other.
Pham, above, and Dyzee stress that breaking is “a dance slash sport slash art.” Like figure skating, the nuances require a well-trained eye to catch but anybody can see how physically demanding breaking is. Some of the warm-ups involved hand-stands, head stands, one-armed balances and any manner of kicks and spins.
Lethal and Dyzee have spent considerable time and money developing a five-tiered scoring system that will be introduced at a major break competition in Korea in July. “It’s going to change the international scene,” declares Pham.
Break dancing is a global phenomenon, especially big in Asia and the U.K. but prevalent all over the world. And according to Pham, his Supernaturalz crew is one of the best.
“I’m a full-time dancer,” he says. “I practice with my crew almost every day in 3 or 4 hour sessions. Unfortunately, the way the industry works right now, it’s hard to make a living off just dancing. Dyzee and I opened a company called Back to the Underground because the scene here needed amateur competitions to help it grow. The youth programming became an extension of that; I started Break it Down with Drops who’s also in the Supernaturalz crew.”
Pham hopes “lots of people will come out to cheer these kids on Wednesday because it makes a huge difference. Our whole thing is about giving them the confidence to become community leaders. If you want to facilitate social change do it with the youth because they’re the next generation. Any money we raise is going right back into the program and that’s what it’s all about. Our goal is to hit 16 schools next year.”
Coincidentally, ArtReach Toronto is holding a showcase at the same time, May 19 from 5 – 8 pm at the Art Gallery of Ontario (317 Dundas Street West) featuring photography, dance, musical performances, theatre and more.
WHERE/WHEN: Dare to B School VS School at Isabel Bader Theatre (93 Charles Street), Wednesday, May 19, 5:30 – 9 pm, $10, $7 students.
Photos by Christopher Jones
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Best of luck to everyone to involved.