Now celebrating its 22nd year of pioneering Hip Hop Dance Theatre, Breakin’ Convention returned for 2025 to extend their growing legacy and continue bringing the finest movers from around the globe to London.
As always, the main events on the world famous Sadler’s Wells stage were held up by family and education centred activities across the long weekend, with all Hip Hop’s elements beautifully balanced to continue to inspire old, young, experts and beginners to express themselves through our culture. I was blessed to be able to attend on Sunday 4th May. I entered to the venue filled with friends and family to the vibes set by my sis Steph Be, as she controlled the decks on the foyer, as the crowds made their way to our seats.
Unity by Belinda Lawley
The show opened with an electric, powerful piece from a veteran Breakin’ Convention collaborator, Unity Dance Company. Despite the OG status, the company is known for their work with exceptional young dancers, and that is exactly what was delivered to open the show. Addressing deeply important and unfortunately increasingly relevant subject matter in ‘Blade from Young’, the talented 11 to 25 year-olds used a plethora of styles, from KRUMP to popping to ballet – and a whole host of acrobatics – to explore the mindsets, anger, actions, impact and grief that lead to and from children killing children on our roads and schoolyards. Using multiple mediums including film alongside the staging, lights and their bodies, the piece told a too familiar story of a small altercation leading to a loss of life. Through opening multiple timeliness to explore possibilities and consequences, the message was clear – life is too precious to lose yours or someone’s you love over pride, and walking away is often the better, if not harder choice. I hope anyone who had been battling with making such a decision was given what they need by watching this powerful piece.
Valuing life and processing grief continued in the return of Max Revell to the BC Stage. Two years ago I’d seen his solo piece using a suit as his main foil, and this piece had been return too and extended in ‘The Party’. Now with a team of five, including the brilliant Jordan JFunk Franklin, the same poetic style and a collection of very stylish suits, were used to produce some beautiful and poignant work.
There was a strong otherworldly feel to the piece, as floods of orange light, excellent use of shadow and masterful handling of the props and costumes provided expressed the inner workings of dealing with loss, of someone not being there as they were before, having to come to terms with this and using what they have left behind to do so.
The legendary creator of Breakin’ Convention and its ever-present host responded to Revell’s work to take a beautiful moment to pay tribute to two of our recently transitioned family members, Thad Baron of Itch FM and Lawyer Da Black of Battle Scars. Both are pillars of London’s Hip Hop community who provided platforms and opportunities for countless Hip Hop artists over decades of dedication to the culture. A wonderful moment of noise paid due respect to our brothers, who will be sorely missed.
The first half continued with two solos, first with KRUMP piece ‘BeZarbi’ from Belgium’s Illi Wild, followed by ‘PANOPTICON’ by Tarantism from Greece. The latter is a stunning piece I shared the stage in March last year as part of Open Art Surgury, and I got to see up close the dedication and craft that went into it from this fantastic mover. Her deep research and unfathomable flexibility, which drew gasps from the crowd, were used to thrilling effect to explore Foucauldian surveillance and the tension to maintain and rebel against control. Excellent use of lighting and paint are used to accentuate her bright red hands against her dark costume, as she wrestles with what it is to be raised in a surveillance society that enforces autocolonisation.
The Ruggeds By Paul Hampartsoumian
The crescendo of the first half was another BC stalwart, The Ruggeds. Celebrating 20 years since their origin, the legendary Dutch crew used ‘20yRS’ to pay homage to the many elements that have been developed over this time to make them who and what they are, central to this being their friendship. Beautiful BTS footage from decades of touring showed just how tight knit they are, and how fun and exciting their lives together have been. This was captured beautifully on the stage, as the Ruggeds did what they did best; immense strength, agility and power moves merged with effortless cool, impeccable synergy and intelligent, creative storytelling.
Simeon-Campbell by Paul Hampartsoumian
At the interval, I made sure to get to the Lilian Bayliss Theatre to catch ‘SADBOI’ by Simeon ‘Kardinal’ Campbell (presented by BirdGang), and I’m glad I got there. The chaotic, visceral pieces was a deeply moving encapsulation of the inside of Simeon’s head and life. Using a touching voiceover narrated in sign language, which he explained is his first language as a CODA (Child of Deaf Adults), Simeon and his team produced a performance about Simeon’s life with ADHD that truly embodied what it is like. So many ideas, movements, moments bombarded the stage and audience, (literally at times) pulling in different directions, wrestling for your focus. A mixture of harrowing lows, ecstatic highs, paradoxical acts and learnt coping mechanisms really gave form to the line ‘if you aint like me, you won’t get me, you get me’; so much of it hit hard. It was an astonishing piece of work, which received a deserved standing ovation.
The second half on the main stage was a brave decision from the Breakin’ Convention team. It’s the first time that I remember a whole half of a main event being given to one company, but that was what in store for us as we took our seats. We were treated to Saïdo Lehlouh’s ‘Témoin’, translating as ‘Witness’, a 1 hour 10 minute epic. Mirroring some aspects of the opening piece from Unity, the performance was given by a huge team of movers and used a similarly broad range of styles. One difference though was how refined and accurate the movements were; even to my relatively untrained eye, you could tell that some of these dancers were seasoned.
Saïdo Lehlouh by Belinda Lawley
One aspect that displayed this was the intensely slow speed of much of the piece. Long, languid, creeping sections would trod on for what felt like ages, whilst dotted within were rapid bursts of energy and speed in the form of solos and duos, complimenting, battling, embracing, antagonising, were skillfully offset by the atmospheric lumbering mass off their collaborators. It never felt like the elements were separate, though, more like snapshots of individual lives and moments within an interconnected whole. The group sometimes moved as one, sometimes as individuals, often a blend of each, giving the feeling of a biosphere, a living organism made up of many independent, interdependent parts. As the sequences came and went, the piece felt like I was looking at an experience which might be rapid and intense for those experiencing it, but the rest of existence carries on as normal, seemingly unaffected. And yet the whole is effected, it just might be too small to see, or could take time for the impact to be felt, or may only be once enough has accumulated.
Temporality played a key role in the pieces explanation, and this existed beyond the movement. The first 30 minutes or so featured a flip of Mobb Deep’s ‘Shook Ones, Part II’, with the stems of it time-stretched, re-pitched and remixed into a monumental soundscape. The track had been deconstructed, with each element of it moving to its own, unique time signature, meaning the track existed in multiple different times simultaneously, with only the vivid, harrowing hood poetry of the late, grate Prodigy anchoring it in its original time signature, and even this would repeat, restart, reload. Different movers were in sync to different parts, and the effect was engrossing and entrancing.
I heard a few people ask “what was that about?”. With so much sonic space given to chronicles of “official Queensbridge murderers”, I felt there must be a connection to the trials of slums and cities and all the lives that play out amongst and on top of each other. I’d be lying if I could tell you definitely what the answer to that question is, but I’m a strong believer that great work doesn’t have to ‘be about’ anything specific; interpretation and how it moves individuals differently is central to so many of my favourite works. By the end it did feel like it had gone on a very long time, but I also think that was key to the work, and when I was fully in it, I was never really sure how long any part, or the whole piece had gone on for, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing.
When it did come, the end was intelligent and apt, as the entity formed by the dancers spread and spilled over into the crowd, making us part of it, with dancers holding poses and movements at uncomfortably close distances to some audiences members, often accompanied by equally intense stares. As the lights dropped for the final time and the end was signaled, a lot of the crowd were clearly intensely moved, with some moving to other parts of the theatre to ensure the dancers could see and hear just how much they appreciated their work. It was a captivating, absorbing piece of art, that I was glad I’d been there to witness, and be part of in some small way. Yet another triumph for Breakin’ Convention’s team.
Apex Zero