Welcome to my article on hip hop dance moves, where I will describe what I have found important about hip hop dancing from my experiences as a beginning student. I hope to encourage you to get into hip hop, because if at the age of 29 I was able to start taking lessons and doing some moves together, then absolutely anyone can do it! I have never danced before and have absolutely no dancing skills.
So what is important?
1. Feeling the rhythm of the music.
When you’re just starting out, it’s easy to get lost trying to get the moves right and forget you’re actually dancing to the music. It was like that in the beginning, and it makes it less enjoyable and actually more difficult to make the moves happen. You will find that as you progress, even a little bit, you make the best progress in learning movements when you feel the rhythm and move to it.
2. Remember to bounce.
Most hip hop dance moves are performed to the beat of the music, as described above. Almost always, the timing of the movements consists of moving the head and bouncing the body “up, down, up, down, up, down” to the beat of the music. All of the moves that beginners will try to master early on, from the two-step to the running man, should all have the concept of “the bounce.” If you don’t have the bounce in your movements, you will dance stiff and upright and you will look strange. It’s also a bad habit, and if you’re not bouncing, the moves aren’t well timed and it will be almost impossible to dance to the music in a way that looks good.
3. Warm up and stretch
Warming up and stretching should be a part of every hip hop dance session. As you learn hip hop, take note of the stretches and isolation exercises your teacher walks you through so you can use them when you practice or dance elsewhere. Without proper stretching, you may injure yourself or not be loose and ready to dance well.
4. Create a routine
The dance moves need to come together in a sequence, otherwise you’ll be doing one thing repeatedly, or just randomly starting the next type of move as you go. If you practice your moves in a routine with steps leading up to the next move, you can store these transitions through practice and use them in the future when you’re dancing. With a few different transitions, you’ll be able to seamlessly dance for short periods of time quite easily.
5.Practice
Practice really helps you remember what you have learned. The thing about hip hop and other dance styles is that physical learning is not like learning from a book. You can’t just study it to learn it, you actually have to. Practicing short routines, even just for 15 minutes outside of class, can really help you consolidate the steps you’ve learned and ensure you don’t forget your hip hop dance moves.