The types of battle in hip hop. And my favorite battle of all times !

 

Hi there everyone.

Today is the day where I continue to procrastinate on writing the next hip hop style article by talking about my favorite types of battles and go over the different types of battles in hip hop.

Indeed, battles are modular (just like anything in hip hop really), so let’s look at the different categories of battles, and before making any changes to the rules here, we will start of by talking about the classics.

There are are 3 types of classic battles.

Solo

Duo

And crew.

The definition of a crew for battles is a team of dancers, some contests have a limit on the number of people in a crew. For example, in UNSS championships, the one that are monitored by schools in France, a crew has to have at least 3 members and maximum of 8 members.

But in more classic competition the limit is much more easily bendable, you can see small crew of 6/10 people, but there are also more average sized crews of 10/25 people which, IS A LOT, and in some instances there are massive crews which go from 40 to 60 people!

 

Personally, I enjoy them all for different reasons, generally solos show one’s mastery and are often shorter battles with not a lot of variety in terms of style. It’s mostly to show musicality and free style.

Whereas the crews tend toward having a much stricter set of music and one of each styles so that the pros of each style, that compose a well made crew, can have their time to shine.

In crew competition its also more obligatory that different types of choreography happen, there are some where you are free to take as many members of your team as you want, but more than often the require one crew, one duo and one solo, and they get to chose for one passage .

That’s why I have more of a soft spot for duo competition, because it both gives a break by giving a variety, but still keeping a lot of the solo elements that are essential to judge A dancer. Plus almost all solos are improvised, and you know that I love me some impro. What is even better with duos, is that some people are so close and have already done so many things together that they do “connection passages”, where its total impro but with 2 people and so they follow the music and the other and try to create something beautiful on the spot and the amount of knowledge, care and closeness that emanate from them is insane. I mean, not only do you need to think of what the music's going to do, BUT ALSO you need to have a close enough bond with your partner that you should be able to predict what they're going to do !

 

So that’s about the match-ups. But then what are famous bending of those rules.

Well there’s the "armagedons", or "dancemagedons", or "tri battles", whatever you want to call it, it is when a battle is between 3 sides, most often done with duos and solos, it also sometimes happens between 3 small crews, and so you have this triangle of forces that is very interesting. 

Because if I were to draw a schematic, based on where you look you appeal to different types of audiences. (here on the classic schematic above its the judges and the audience). 

But in an armagedon the structure entirely changes and it forces you to rethink how you interpret space in your dance, because if you flaunt you have to do it to 2 sides (or it would be weird, you wouldn't respect one but you'd respect the other), the audience isn’t just one side anymore, its 2.  And appealing to the judges would mean turning your back on your audience and opponents

 

Another honorable mention are the "experts battles" that I discovered through the UNSS and that have a ton of other names. Its battles where you have a set style that is given for each passage, you have to do for example popping or you’re out. These battles are set in 6 rounds, so they are looooong, and the last one is obligatory a solo, BUT, on a music that isn’t hip hop at all, it could totally be classic, metal, rock, jazz… and in these solos to end the battle there are wonderful displays of sensibility and originality its jaw dropping.

 

Finally my favorite type of contest with my favorite battle of all times is the French invention the “I love this dance” which is a solo competition, where each dancer comes with a music of their own. And the first round is the dancers discovering and dancing on the music of the opponent and the second round is the dancers dancing on their chosen music.

Here, you have display of strategy that is wonderful in term of choosing the music. There are 4 main tendencies that I found in those battles, so lets look at those scenarios.

1.       You are a mastermind in one style so you take your favorite song in your style so that you can crush it with your performance, but possibly give a nice song to your opponent but you’ll get a comeback after it because you are a master on this particular subject.

2.       You know your opponent has aprticular strong suit so you get around it by chosing something else, or even more vicious you know they’re very bad at one style so you take a music where its almost impossible to do any other type of dance on it and look good. And so you can take up the advantage, but it could be something at which you’re not particularly good at so you’ll do better but it’s not the best case scenario for you.

3.       Another strategy is taking musicality behemoths of songs, where your opponent will get destroyed by taking a crack at an unpredictable music. However, on your passage you will have studied the music and know all of its nuts and bolts (it might even give you an advantage by showing to the judges much better their choreography before could have been because you make them discover whole new elements of the music they wouldn’t have discovered otherwise)

4.       Last and certainly not least (and my personal favorite) people that take something that’s not hip hop at all like classic/jazz… but this is rookie level of trickery, I’ve seen someone come in with a recording of an inspirational speech… the opponent when discovering it like waited for it to start off, but it never started, because the speech wasn’t an intro to the sound, it was the sound. SO not only to you surprise them, but also take them to grounds they wouldn't have discovered before. However, this level of trickery bears a disadvantage, you need to be able to dance onto it better than your opponent on a sound that is made for them in second round.

 

So, now I think I can talk about my favorite battle of all times.

And my favorite battle is between popping C and Zyko in the I love this dance tournament.

Popping C went for the 1^st strategy while zyko went for the 4^th.

Here is the link : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXydlS4hOG8

And… allow me to nerd over these performances

 In the first pass there’s Zyko, who showed a great display of some of his freestyle… (To be honest Zyko was for a long time what I’d think of doing if I could get to pro level. It's this kind of movement that I find really interesting and fun to play around in. This idea of collapsing and going back up while sort of puppeteering yourself is what I look for)

I don’t really have anything more to say but to look at the dance, there’s nothing particularly interesting to look at or any real mistake/flaw to nitpick… its just… great.

 

I think that in popping C’s response you can see how popping C was taken aback by this and tried to make the most of thisunusual audio. He gave a great display of musicality and technique but he wasn’t confident. Well, he was but we can clearly see that he didn’t truly recover from the shock of a music that he knows but didn’t expect. He started off with great confidence on the first sound that popped up without waiting to discover the actual music, and had to slow down to think when the piano appeared and when he heard the lyrics he finally understood but you can still see that he is puzzled and doesn’t hide it well.

But overall real great passage with very beautiful popped waves. Even where he incorporated some of the lyrics in his dance with the 2 lovers that are mentioned.

 

THEN ! THEN THE BEST PART, we move on to the second round where dancers dance on their music and there is my favorite part.

But before that, please debate one which passage was best from the first round, feel free to pause. Ponder. Give your opinions on who won for you in each round

 

AND NOW, we come to my favorite passage of all time… (I haven’t seen a lot of battles but shush here, I was new to hip hop when I first saw it and it struck me… and it still does… the first display of a champion on a music that isn’t hip hop)

 

Ne me quitte pas is already a powerful song, its lyrics show a man that hit rock bottom... AND BROUGHT A SHOVEL. 

Zyko has a display of skill, playing with his articulations beautifully. Its just jaw dropping, there’s imagery oozing everywhere, there’s the symbolism of the song that oozes back, you can see the fields, the golden light falling down on him, the waters springing forth… but what truly hit me is when he sort of mimicked hanging himself, and then his feet moving a little to always push him up a little more, it’s a powerful move he did there and it hits hard I think. This is creativity andorigiality at its finest.

And the best move here was during the chorus of ne me quitte pas, where I think I could do a whole analysis of these move without having to invent anything. He is turning his back to his audience, showing us the hands where we can almost see as if this love and this embrace was taking him down just like this relationship does. Further on, the way its loose and then digs itself in before actually pulling on him sort of does this chain-like effect where he is once again trapped in this desired embrace, this illusion of a relationship that once was and that pulls him into despair and pain.

But if you look at it from the perspective of the judges, they can only see someone hugging himself, the ultimate act of comforting oneself and when people are at their lowest and alone. and he gets lost into it, his torso pulled into this, he alone is the one pulling himself further down, but he can’t let go, he is trapped and can’t do anything just like in a forced camisole. This breakup incapacitates him and drags him on the floor.

 

(I don’t have a lot of things to say about the response but it’s also beautiful it’s just compared to that personally I think Zyko destroyed him but it’s still a wonderful response, one is all about originality and creativity, and the response is jaw dropping technique and musicality)

Popping C is showing a great display of technique, he is a master of popping, and he shows it. The confidence, the easiness yet precise aspect of his dance show a particularly interesting sense of how well he incorporated this style. After all, it’s not for nothing that he is called POPPING c.

 

And for me at this point, popping C barely won the first round but its Zyko who won by a large margin the second round… but what is your opinion, which one did you find best, and why, even if its just a hunch say it, a hunch in art is a valid argument in my opinion, especially when you're not usd to it. Your feelings are always valid in art, and in this one you don't ahve to justify yourself because you're not really analysing a performace, you are comparing 2.

 

SO yeah that’s my break down of the different types of battles, competition and my favorite battle ever.

 

If you’re craving any more battles I advise you to check out the accounts of the big events (just debout, i love this dance, WOD...), but you can also find compilations of dancers or just search hip hop battle and add whatever you want next to it and you’ll find it.

Hope you had a great time, and, until next time, don't forget the pillars of hip hop :

- peace - love - and have fun !

Hip Hop n°0 the basics, what to look for and what to judge

 

Heya Charlie.

I just realized something, when I tried to explain some of things the lack of knowledge on how we judge (and so understand/perceive) hip hop makes it difficult to be explained.

And when you think about it… its normal, as an analogy: if you can barely read or if you don’t know anything about types of speech, literary devices… You can’t really understand what makes a text beautiful. And once you know at least a little bit of it you can start to understand how intricate a text can be.

SO THAT’S WHY I’M HERE TODAY!!!

 

To complete your general knowledge let’s start by looking at what is really a battle. (also all that I will say are general guidelines, since we’re discussing art people change the formula constantly)

(Side note:                          Here we will talk of  impro battles, the most common type of competition (and, for me, the only type of real battle). There are some competition that are more choreography based but it’s not really a tournament it’s a talent show. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with it, but it’s a competition of who did the best set choreography on a set music. We are more judging the capacity of the dancers to follow guidelines and the choreographer’s imagination rather than the artistic ability and sensibility of the dancers themselves.

But if you like these types of thing you can see some really great performances. After all, it’s not for nothing that shows like “insert country here” ‘s got talent are so popular. My point is, It’s just not really a battle.)

A classic battle, like the one in academic competitions is structured in 4 rounds. A round is structured like this.

1)      The DJ blasts a music unknown to the dancers.

2)      The first person to go is chosen randomly (spin the bottle)

3)      They enter the dancefloor, dance, and have to leave before the 45 seconds are over. (the question)

4)      Then, once they are out of the dancefloor, the other team comes in (this part is also called the answer or response), dance for the 45 seconds, they leave the dancefloor.

5)      Music stops, judges finish their notes on the round comparing the question and the answer

And repeat it all over again from step 3 for 3 more times for a classic battle. Everything depends on the competitions some are 1/2/3/6 rounds long

Like I say because it's art everything is modular and people do what they want but that’s the general basic skeleton that most people can get behind.

 

To guide us in this journey let’s look at the inner workings of a battle and the judge’s sheet. (I'm sorry i only have it in french so you will have to suffer through it)

 

First on the top we have the different styles. We judge consistency, because yeah freestyle is cool but being able to test your capacities in other types of movement than your comfort zone. But what we really want to see is if the styles are varied. In Hip hop, there are so many different things that you can do, and so inventing is cool but still mastering the old base can make everything so much better. Here with styles we strive for variety and the wider range of choices the better.

And boy! If you are a jack of all trades master of none you are a valued member of a crew and holy hell will you dominate solo and duo competition. Because if one’s passage has a real great part of it (4 x 8 beats, or 'temps' for the classics that want to sound sophisticated by speaking french) is of one style and has no cut in the middle of it you gain 1 point. And since your overall grade goes to 18points max and if you dominate your rival on every single aspect you get 14points so if you can get up to 4points you have a ridiculously large advantage over your opponent. I mean imagine, just because you can use one different style precisely each battle you have 22% of the points you could get covered.

Only little problem... us judges already have a lot to keep track of a bunch of things so… let’s say that counting precisely this length of time while also wondering if you are solely doing things of this style and nothing else isn't something we look at the most. So its valued but not always so it’s not too broken if you think of winning a maximum of points. And so if it is to be counted, you need to make it reeeeaaaaally obvious. Therefore, we judge how much you can change style and how obvious you can change styles, because here, subtelty is to be thrown out of the window if you want to make sure we identify your style.

 

Moving on a little further down the sheet, another element that just brings points up are special effects. These points given are for each passage.

Here the for each passage the side that us
ed the most special effects gains the point. Here there are different elements to toy with.

First there’s space. Here you can find changes in the formation of the dancers like the burst of its/ changing of geometric shapes/ differences in heights/ orientations…

Then there are ones where you play with time. Here there are effects like people suddenly stopping in time or slowing down / everyone doing their thing and suddenly all ganging on together at the same time / question and answer where one freezes the other dances and then there’s contact that switches the roles/ or like doing a cascade by making the same move one after another …

It could lie in the ‘’other’’ category where, among other things, plays with choreography. For example: like doing a shiva like / mirroring each-other / different ‘’portée’’ / or also playing with objects like a cap or ball or anything really …

 

To be honnest, space is often a bit boring but essential for a nice choreography.

Time can be done really well like in the gif but most of the time it isn't all that great.

But its with the other that you get to really have fun and that's why it will get a second image, to explain what is a "shiva" is, because it is a really neat thing in my opinion, and in motion its beautiful (unfortunately i couldn't find any gifs)

But lets go back to our point and not opinions.

We judge teams by the quantity and quality of special effects they use. But one thing that we hold as most important is their diversity. For example (and based on a true story), a team that does 5 A+ effects but only on time, will lose their points when in face of mediocre effects but that have one in space and one in other. Since they are more diversified, the bad ones get the point.

 

And now we enter the big 3 : the 3 things on which you’re mostly judged on :

-          Precision

-          Musicality

-          Presence/space

 

The first criterion that enters judgement is the technical precision. 

It’s just one’s mastery of their movement, if they’re precise and controlled. Can they be varied and fluid? Are their moves technical?Which one of the 2 did the moves seems to be the most difficult to reproduce? And is it precise and controlled enough to make it more difficult to be reproduced? And that’s it.                                                                                                                                                 Wierdly, this is the most simple of them all, you really have this gut feeling (and I know when we think about it it’s weird, but actually it’s the thing the simplest part). Somehow even though it sounds to be the most difficult, to the untrained eye, it’s the first one you get correctly. Especially since when you judge you just need to determine which one of the 2 is best, so you don’t need to give a grade it can just be a feel or a particular preference.

The most difficult thing to get is the precision, because you can easily make the difference between 2 dances which one seems to be the most difficult to reproduce. As an example, you can tell if you look at someone, when they quickly put their arms in front of them, if they're just swinging it very fast in a direction and have to force to stop the movement, or if someone very precisely does somehting quick and stops instantenously because they have controlled their movement.

And now for the one that I think might be the most difficult to explain to newcomers but actually is logical to analyze and is the one that I find one of the most important and the thing that really shows someone's skill. 

MUSICALITY I talked about this one before but it is how much a dancer can correspond to the music. You can fail at musicality if you dance off-beat which can be difficult to spot at first but you can mostly see it with the messiness of their choreography and how it just looks like watching a video with the sound off in the middle of a party. This then can be better one with being actually on beat and using different elements of the music. 

To clarify, a music is composed of different elements and the best musicality are the people who can deconstruct the music and use all of these elements separately. For example, when you listen to a song, you can dissociate all sorts of sounds, the melody, the beat. So a good dancer for musicality, by basing his dance on different elements of the music, can therefore show how well they can adapt to the music given. They will base themselves on each different instrument that compose the music or different type of beat.

The best don’t just embody different aspects of the music but they have such a fine capacity to decompose the music that they make you discover sounds you didn’t even realized were there but also embody the general feel of the music, slow when it slows for examples. They follow the music so well they are one with the music (I know it sounds cliché but that is it). Mind you all of this is improvised so it’s an ability to decompose and analyze the music IN ORDER TO PREDICT IT!

And that’s why in a battle you see people sometimes jump in excitement and tap their ear to show off that they found a detail very well hidden or that they already heard the music so that they already know what’s in it!

And that is what makes it so interesting, music is pleasant to our brain because it is made of a quantity of different patterns that repeat themselves or that follow a certain algorithm, and our brain loves this. So musicality is how well someone can understand the pattern and reproduce it as the music is going. It's literally applied music theory!!

That is crazy, and the musicality centered music are made to trick you and mess with the way you would normally expect a music to happen but still following a pattern so it doesn’t sound bad. Try this exercise at home, for example when a music builds up, try to guess when the beat will drop. One of my perfect examples of how everyone is able to do this is with the song “Radio gaga” from queen. In the chorus when you try to clap your hands, you know how the music goes even on the first time you listen to it, and even though the time at which you clap them isn’t always at the same time because your brain has integrated the pattern that is already within the song.

here's a video from a dancer that explains the concept better by showing with a music as example : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4zZqjF14WU

Finally, the last element that plays into it, presence/space taken. Here it’s really about confidence how well you can act, the lowest levels is someone not taking a lot of space, no expressions, seeming timid and doesn’t have the confidence to take the dancefloor. To win it’s the one that are giving their all. But the pros know that there’s a level above, it’s controlling the flow of your space taken, going small, and then BOOMING and taking the space leaving a stronger expression. It’s sort of who can set up the best act.

Dancing using the body just like any other act centered around the body uses acting, especially in battles, you have to show confidence, play a role sometimes, have your own special vibe so you pop out of the competition. I think of the French freestyle winner of the UNSS championships 2019 which is part of the Criminalz Crew now, you might know him as the kid dancing in Papaoutai.

Rubix.

Rubix usually in a battle has different personas like you would imagine David Bowie have different personas for his different songs. The most notable persona he dawns is the grizzly, we see the aggressiveness in his movement, close to the ground and puffs himself up, seemingly bigger every time he jumps up after getting low to the ground; he is a master of space and flow because when you look at him he catches your glare in a second and you can’t let go.

For example, here is a compilation: https://youtu.be/RnSOVwtfx14

And you can see that, in the first passage from 0:15 to 1:05, the general mood of when he goes into the persona, the aggression, the booming of movement when he is standing and slowing down to reposition himself when he’s on the ground, the provocations.

HOWEVER

On the third extract, from 2:22 to 3:10, here the mood totally changes he is playing, having fun, joking with the judges. You can see that here dancing good and on the music isn’t just that, it’s also an act, you must perform different emotion to empower or give a certain feel to your moves.

He still masters space and through his act is exert a certain presence, an aura that shows confidence and gives emotions to his performance.

 

 

Well that’s a wrap, now with this post you can see what is important, how the art of Hip-Hop battle is to be broken down to be better appreciated.

Ballroom Dance

Hey guys !

2 years ago, I started taking dance lessons, and more particularly, Ballroom dance lessons. It is quite uncommon, a lot of people don't know what it is and often I need to describe it as the type of dancing that can be seen in "Dancing with the Stars". So, I wanted to write an article about it because recently I became even more passionate about it and really want to improve in that sport.

Ballroom dance first of all consists of a couple dancing, that's the most noticeable feature of it. You can sometimes see the word Dancesport which is, in fact, the same as Ballroom dance but in competition.

An important thing to know is that Ballroom dance is divided into 2 categories (and two types of dresses) : Standard and Latin. Each consists of 5 different dances.
- Standard : Waltz, Tango (and not Argentine Tango), Viennese Waltz, Slow Foxtrot and Quickstep which are basically danced to western music (often from the mid-twentieth century)

- Latin : Samba (different from the traditional Brazilian Samba), Cha Cha, Rumba, Paso Doble, Jive which are commonly danced to contemporary Latin American music.

As you may have noticed, in general, many couples dance at the same time on the same floor during competitions. The judges are placed on one side of it and look at each couple and put a mark on their paper if they want to see the couple during the next round. That's why it is very important to be well placed when you enter on the dancefloor so the judges can see you because there are times when great dancers weren't selected because the judges didn't pay attention to them.

In my case, I'm learning Latin dances (for now I've learned Samba, Cha Cha, Rumba and Jive) and did a bit of waltz and I really enjoy my dance lessons. I hope that in the future I will be able to learn more and more about that sport!

Also, if you're interested in Japanese anime there is one about ballroom called "Ballroom e Youkoso" I TRULY LOVED IT <3

Falling in love with dancing

Hi Charlie, today I'm going to tell you a story of mine xx

Five years old.
My mam asked me if I wanted to experience dancing. I absolutely didn't want to dance, maybe because I hadn't really discovered what dancing was about. To my mind it was more of a shyness issue, I really hated situations in which I was feeling embarrassed, like the new little girl. (I'm sure we all hate being embarrassed, particularly when we blush, like me..). However, one day, my mam decided to bring me to a classical representation and I fell in love from the very first second. I fell in love with the elegance, the fluidity and the lightness of dancing. Falling in love, dancing in love, trowing and passing every single emotion throughout a movement, passing from a banal person to a reincarnation of life. I was impressed to see how people were moving perfectly together, without having one second late on the person next to them.

All moving the same way, yet having different facial expressions.
All wanting to express the same idea, yet having a different story from the others.
All bringing harmony, yet letting people search for each details that dissociate a dancer from another.

Letting the public discover one by one the secrets that every dancer on the stage are hiding.
Letting the public discover how every dancer is trying to find their own way of dancing.

Dancing has always been a way for me to face the problems in life, without screaming, yelling, just by letting my body externalise what he needs to externalise. Letting my body express what he is feeling. Dancing is much more than paying attention to other, it's sharing passing messages with different emotions, showing to the world how you need to be self confident.

"Dancing is not a sport, it's for little girls, fearful little girls". First or fall, dancing has helped my body to build it self since I was 5 years old. Plus, I have boys in my contemporary dancing classes, and they are beautifully build and are able to match elegance with virility and potency of a strong man. *respect* Dancing is an art, a sport, it's proper to every single country and civilisation.

 What you have to keep in mind guys is that dancing is inexhaustible. Always keep your passion by your side. I'm sure we all have things in life that we adore!

Have a nice day! Xoxo Erin