Hip-hop is ‘Breakin’’ in Charlotte

Emphasize the first word, and “Breakin’ Convention” becomes a retrospective of 35 years of dance rooted in the hip-hop community.

Emphasize the second – breakin’ convention – and you get the full point. This October event intends to pull audiences into Knight Theater who’ve never passed through its doors and smash mainstream Charlotte’s preconceptions about an art form it probably doesn’t understand.

Jonzi D, creator and artistic director of the 12-year-old festival, will bring it to Charlotte Oct. 9-10 along with Blumenthal Performing Arts.

He gave an invited crowd a video preview of the show Tuesday on the Knight stage and summed it up in a sentence: “It’s about peace, love, unity and having fun, things hip-hop was founded on 40 years ago – not the images we see today.”

The first Breakin’ Convention took place in 2004 at Sadler’s Wells Theatre, which bills itself as “the world’s No.1 venue for international dance.” Over the years there, Jonzi has introduced dancers from France, the Netherlands, the United States, Korea and many other nations.

He’ll do the same here, linking established dancers from around the world with local performers, graffiti painters, spoken word artists, disc jockeys and emcees.

“This is all about connecting a theater with the local hip-hop community,” he said. “The way theaters usually reach out to the (economically disadvantaged) is to give away lots of tickets to ‘Swan Lake,’ yeah? Doesn’t work. Before we come, we’ll look at the people who are already making art here. We’ll have events leading up to the festival and workshops to teach people dance styles.

“We have had 70-year-olds jump into the cypher (where the audience can perform) with 7-year-olds. We’ve had families bonding, people in their 40s who remember what hip-hop really is and want to share that with their kids in a safe environment.” (Jonzi remembers: He was in middle school when Sugarhill Gang released the pioneering “Rapper’s Delight” in 1979.)

Blumenthal President Tom Gabbard has committed to the festival for three years and hopes promoters from other cities take it after its premiere here. It will bring the Blumenthal a new sponsor (Coca-Cola) and, he hopes, new audiences.

“When we went to London two weeks ago for the convention, we looked down at the (main) floor and saw every age and every skin color,” he said. “That’s our goal ... we want our audiences to look like our community.”

This story was originally published May 19, 2015 at 4:39 PM with the headline "Hip-hop is ‘Breakin’’ in Charlotte."