While most of you were watching Super Bowl XLI, I went to my first breakdancing class. I’m signed up to weekly classes at Dance Zone through the UT Texas Union Informal Classes program.
The first class started with a brief discussion of the art and a passionate plea by our instructor to understand the history of what it’s all about, which was refreshing since I worried it might turn out to be some lame hip hop dancing sort of class.
Nope, this is the real deal. My instructor has trained with the original B-Boys such as the ones featured in the classic movie Breakin'.
There are about 10 beginners and 6 or 7 more advanced B-Boys and B-Girls in my class. The pace is pretty fast, which I appreciate.
On day one we started with a few basic moves to help us catch the beat, as classic original funk and breakbeat songs blasted on the hi-fi. The instructor then had us try to walk on our hands across the floor. I could do about 3 or 4 steps the few times I didn’t immediately fall over.
After that we learned perhaps the most fundamental move of all, and the basis of “footwork”, the 6-step. Here’s a pretty good YouTube video to show what I mean.
I am still a bit sore from it, two days later, but that is subsiding now. I can’t wait to get back in there!
