Street Dancing Is Any Style of Dance That Got Its Start Outside The Dance Studio, Typically in Urban
Street Dancing Is Any Style of Dance That Got Its Start Outside The Dance Studio, Typically in Urban
Street Dancing Is Any Style of Dance That Got Its Start Outside The Dance Studio, Typically in Urban
Clogging is thought to be considered a very early form of street dance, since it evolved in the
streets and factories of northern Englandin the mid-19th century.
Street dancing is any style of dance that got its start outside the dance studio, typically in urban
streets, schoolyards and clubs. From its roots in the late 1960s African American street culture of
New York, the edgy, syncopated moves have earned global acceptance as a vibrant
contemporary dance discipline. Street Dance Background
What is called street dancing today developed in a rec room party in the Bronx in 1973 when DJ
Kool Herc mixed records, 'breaking' and scratching them to prolong the instrumental sections so
the dancers could show their moves longer. The extended dance was called breaking, and the
emcee patter that covered the breaks became rap. Competition heated up over fancy moves as b-
boys and b-girls worked out their styles to funk, soul, rock and percussion riffs in the streets and
schoolyards.
The West Coast created some signature moves to rock and funk as well. Waacking came from
the gay dance clubs that featured 1970s disco music in L.A. Locking and popping also developed
in L.A. in the 1970s and crossed over into an umbrella hip hop category that expanded to include
a fight style called krumping in the 1980s.
Street Styles
Hip hop in all its forms can be found everywhere from the hit Broadway musical Hamilton to
TV reality shows like So You Think You Can Dance. As an art form, street dancing requires real
mastery, but an amateur enthusiast can pick up a few smooth moves in a dance studio or by
watching videos online.
Breaking
Tutting
Tutting looks like a flip book of Egyptian frieze paintings. It's a series of angular moves,
primarily for the arms, shoulders and hands. The style was named for King Tut and tutters create
intricate and improbably perpendicular angles with their hands and arms, syncopated to the
music. Finger tutting is an elaborate specialty, a product of the 1990s Big Apple rave scene.
Fingers form a series of shapes made from 90-degree angles and continuous moves in which the
fingers always remain touching.
Animation
Animation is twitchy, glitchy and weird - waves and zigzags that sweep through the body,
interrupted by constant tics and sudden freezes into poses derived from cartoon characters. The
Guardian describes animation as a "jerky, freeze-frame style" in which a dancer seems to have
no bones and to be electronically controlled. Animation dancers such as tWitch and Spencer
have popularized the form on shows like So You Think You Can Dance and show their new
moves in performances and master classes at dance conventions.
Krumping
Krumping is very fast and aggressive hip hop dance that incorporates locking, popping,
improvisational or freestyle moves and upright posture. It's a bi-coastal mash-up of gang culture
and clowning. Rhythmic bobbing and jerking, spine flexing and chest popping are staged in
mock battles between two or more dancers. Krumping started as a nonviolent alternative to street
violence and has been picked up by artists from Missy Elliott to Madonna in music videos.
Waacking
Waacking often incorporates 1960s East Coast voguing, and mimics signature poses of old-time
movie stars such as Bette Davis and Lauren Bacall. It's a '70s West Coast punk style that started
in the LGBT clubs of Los Angeles and was popularized on the TV show Soul Train. The
freestyle diva-ish choreography is danced to 1970s disco and music by artists such as Diana Ross
and James Brown. Dancers show off their musicality, sense of rhythm and emotional
interpretation with fluid arm-over-and-behind-the-shoulder moves, fancy footwork and voguish
runway poses.