Hip hop dance theatre is both art form and entertainment, with its own catalogue of ever-evolving steps and styles. Here’s a (by no means definitive) glossary of some of the moves.
Boogaloo
Boogaloo
A West Coast style developed in the mid-70s by The Electric Boogaloos and marked by rolling hip, knee and head actions.
Breaking
Breaking aka b-boying and b-girling
‘It’s when the DJ mixes the two records, there’s a little drum break in there, and everybody gets down because that’s the fastest part of the tune,’ says UK soloist/performer Banxy. ‘But also the guys [and girls] used to go so mental they were getting to the breaking point.’ Depending on who you consult, the ‘b’ stands for break, boogie, beat or Bronx, where hip hop has roots.
Rocking
Rocking
Downrocking is when the dancer takes his or her weight on the hands and weaves fast footwork around it. Toprockers, by contrast, remain upright. In early hip hop, uprocking was a fast and quasi-combative version of a kung fu fight.
Krumping
Krumping
Underground clowning meets fierce, confrontive body jerks in this new, West Coast style.
Locking
Locking
Rapid mimetic poses are characteristic of this funky 1970s West Coast style, developed by Don Campbell.
Popping
Popping
A more fluid but still muscle-flexing variation on locking, again credited to The Electric Boogaloos.
Moonwalk
Moonwalk
A misnomer for the robotic glide, correctly dubbed ‘backslide’, that Michael Jackson popularised. A real moonwalk is stationary.
Suicide
Suicide
A front flip landing flat on your back. The men here in the photo are midway through the manoeuvre.
Windmill
Windmill
A sustained backspin. Although this technically doesn’t show a windmill we were pretty impressed . . . . !
