Where did the idea for
Krump Dance Studios come from?
The idea came from the need to fulfill dreams. I
grew up knowing what I wanted to do even as a kid, but I never thought it was
possible because of my environment. I wanted to help other people dance. That’s
basically my driving force; being able to influence and make change and make
dance available for other people. I have my own dreams. I’m still dreaming. I
want to establish dance as a profession here in this country. Also, I want to
perform.
So you want to
be a world-class performer?
Yes, definitely
I do. I don’t like confining myself to one single act. Yes, there are parts of
me where I have to be solo, but I would love to perform with my team as well. I
love theater. That’s where the idea of the Grease production came from. I love
everything about dance theater. I don’t want to call it Broadway because we’re not
on Broadway, but Broadway is a term that is used to describe that type of
production. I’m passionate about telling stories with dance.
Where did you get your
dance training?
It started off
by what we can say ‘the streets’, from one dance team to another, and also on
my own. I wouldn’t say that I knew that I was training myself at the time. As I
grew up and I decided that I wanted to pursue dance, I started connecting with
dancers in workshops. As I did, I began to learn myself.
Can you tell us
more about the street training?
When I was a
kid I had a dance clique. We would just meet in different people’s houses. When
I got to secondary school it was the same thing. We would train and rehearse.
We also had idols. I was also part of the Redeemed, that was gospel. I also got
to choreograph a lot. I don’t think there was any town I went to where I didn’t
meet dance lovers.
So do you refer to yourself
as a professional dancer?
Yes I do
because I’m paid to dance, but I still try to obtain other levels. I’m not just
thinking about Nigeria, I’m thinking about the world so we’re trying to see how
dancers here can connect with world-class dancers and follow the ropes. We have
lay people, we have raw dancers and amateur dancers and they get here and are
not sure how dance works. We organize workshops for them to learn. Some of the
instructors that I work with are coming from Lagos and they’re always trained
in different levels.
Who are your
dance idols?
Well, MC Hammer
used to be one of them but there are so many of them now. There are many that
have inspired me. I’d say Mia Michaels, she’s not just a dancer, she’s actually
a choreographer. I’d say Popin’ Pete. He’s one of the pioneers of hip-hop. I
love Cirque du Soleil as well. Pop artists like Usher was someone I really
looked up to at a point in time. Right now, someone I definitely like when it
comes to dancing is Chris Brown. It’s not that he is so fantastic but I know
he’s really passionate about dance. He has that connection. You can see someone
who is passionate about dance. You can tell.
What about the
Nigerian pop artists?
I like
P-Square’s choreographer. I think his personal work is actually awesome.
But I wouldn’t say I connect with Nigerian artists. There are some parts of
their performances that I don’t agree with. Some of them are too vulgar. If
it’s not vulgar or seductive, it’s not popular. I don’t think Nigerian artists
challenge their creativity.
How many dance instructors
do you have at Krump Dance Studios?
I have nine
instructors here. Three of them are part time and the rest of them are
full-time. They’ve been trained at different levels. Some of them have gone to
the schools here like Corporate Dance World and Mobile Dance Academy in Jos.
Most of them have competed in competitions like Maltina Dance All. We have a
lot of creative people who have been trained in Latin, salsa, contemporary and
hip-hop. For the life of a dancer, training never stops because it’s
creativity. You might learn the principles but you have to keep on learning.
So, we’re all training and we’re dancers at the same time. We’ve been doing
training on a very casual level for a while, but we actually just started a
faculty for training using a curriculum.
Last year,
Krump Dance Studios presented the musical dance production, Grease Naija Mix.
What were the challenges of putting that on?
It was
something that was new. I had challenges to get the dancers to understand what
we were doing. On one side they enjoyed what they were doing, but we had to
train them. We had to do auditions and they came and didn’t know what they were
doing. They’re all raw. It was quite a challenge and we weren’t able to sell
the vision to the people. We didn’t have financiers. They were interested and
thought it was exciting but they wanted to see us pull it off. You know,
probably because it was new and it was dance and live, so they weren’t sure if
it was a viable production. Will people come? Have you done this before? It was
challenging but I think it was worth it. Because of that, we had to improvise
with costuming. We had to also work with time. We funded the production
ourselves.
What advice would you offer
to people here in Abuja who are not sure where to start?
I’d say come to
the studio, as training is inevitable. You have to train as a dancer. It’s not
just a gift so go to anywhere you can to train, but come here to start with.
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